The Facts Ball Ball is the nation’s leading supplier of tennis balls. The compan

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The Facts

Ball Ball is the nation’s leading supplier of tennis balls. The company has an esteemed reputation, being the leading sponsor for the prestigious national and regional tennis competitions. As part of its secret formula to produce top-notch quality tennis balls, Ball Ball requires a special pigment dye, which licence and distribution is controlled by Greeny, a privately owned company. Ball Ball is led by its MD, Sylvia, who for many years has enjoyed a wonderful relationship with Jimmy, the former CEO of Greeny. In a dramatic turn of events, news has just come through that Timmy, a long-estranged childhood friend of Sylvia’s, has recently been appointed as Greeny’s new CEO.

Years ago, when they were both management trainees, Sylvia had accidentally misplaced Timmy’s beloved journal. Till this day, 10 years on, Timmy has refused to speak to her. Sylvia did not mean to lose the journal and has no idea where it is now.

Given the current situation, Greeny has indicated that it will not continue supplying the dye to Ball Ball.

Facing a lockdown between the two companies, Sylvia has arranged for an urgent meeting with Timmy in a bid to mend relations. However, when Sylvia appears at Greeny’s head office. Timmy refuses to speak to her. Every comment or suggestion raised by Sylvia is answered with a “No” by Timmy. Eventually tensions boil over and Sylvia loses her temper. She calls Timmy “an immature brat who has not grown up over the past 10 years”. Timmy fires back that Sylvia is a “horrible, incompetent MD and an even worse human being”. Timmy contends that the real issue why Greeny will not supply the dye to Ball Ball, is because Ball Ball has unethical practices and regularly abuses its employees; which actually has no basis. Enraged, Sylvia threatens to bring her lawyers into the matter, which Timmy says that he will do the same. Timmy then states that he is only willing to sell the dye to Ball Ball at $50 a unit (even though he knows for a fact that market value should be for $20 a unit), whereupon Sylvia retorts that even if she wanted to, she is only willing to pay $2 a unit, before storming out of the office, claiming that she has other suppliers if Greeny doesn’t want “our business”.

Sylvia is upset at the way things have turned out. She has always regarded Timmy as a beloved friend and was felt extremely bad all those years ago when she lost his journal. However, being the prideful person she is, she did not actually apologise to him then. Given the right circumstances, she would like to start afresh with Timmy and privately hoped his ascension as Greeny’s CEO would have been the perfect platform for them to be friends again. She really wants to succeed as the MD of Ball Ball, given that it was her undertaking to her predecessor, Mr Miyagee. She wants to the company to do well, and at the same time obtain the due respect from her employees as well as recognition from her peers, because she is relatively young and has to prove herself in the industry. Sylvia knows that Ball Ball needs the dye supply from Greeny and has to work out a deal, otherwise her company will truly be in trouble.

At his end, Timmy feels disrespected by Sylvia. He has always been disappointed at how things ended with Sylvia a decade ago. He had written many heartfelt thoughts in his journal and was distressed that his childhood friend had taken it from him and not returned it. He is convinced that she still has the journal and would like it back. He was surprised at her sudden appearance at his office and was perplexed that despite seeing each other after so many years, Sylvia was all-business as usual instead of being warm. Deep down he harbours hopes of being friends with her again. Although he knows that Greeny cannot afford to lose Ball Ball’s business, he had to appear strong as a leader, in order to command the respect of his staff. He also wants recognition from his peers in the industry, because he is a new CEO. Timmy is also aware that Greeny has recently lost a lot of money in a failed venture overseas, and its viability as a company depends on the continued cooperation with Ball Ball. As the new CEO of Greeny, Timmy needs to company to do well, so that he can fulfil his promise to his late godfather, that he would one day “make it” as a leader of an organisation. Finally, Timmy needs to do well as CEO because he has a new car to pay for.

a) Identify the interests of the parties in the case above for

1)Sylvia and

2)Timmy

b) Identify and explain the negative negotiation tactics used by

1)Sylvia and

2)Timmy.

c) Apply the appropriate countermeasure to each of the negative negotiation tactics identified in Qns b). (For example, for XXX tactic, the countermeasure is YYY etc)

Explanation / Answer

a) Identify the interests of the parties in the case above for

1) Sylvia : Interested in succeeding as a CEO , maintaining a good rapport with the company, regaining the long lost friendship with Timmy and taking ball ball to new heights.

2) Timmy : Interested in succeeding as a CEO , maintaining a good rapport with the company, regaining the long lost friendship with Timmy and taking greeny to new heights. Also, clearing the debts that greeny has and the small stumbles.

b) Identify and explain the negative negotiation tactics used by

1)Sylvia: No warm welcome, straight to the business point, didn't think of greeting a long lost friend after meeting for so many years , arrogance on both ends, not being able to communicate and express their feelings freely.

2)Timmy : saying no at every word she's been saying. If he expected a positive reply or a wanted a warm Response, he should have said or reacted in the same way so that similar reactions could have come from the other end.

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