Maylee Richards
2 October 2011
PM598/ Dr. Oz

Negotiation Exercise 1
Sara is a customer representative that cares about her job and her goal is to make sure that each customer leaves with a positive experience when shopping at Alpha Electronics. She seems to try and see both sides of a situation and is focused on resolving conflict, when it involves customer returns. She prioritizes her objectives and goes over and beyond the company’s expectations and tries not to lose customers’ when they become dissatisfied with the products that they’ve purchased. She examines the alternatives and selects fair standards when dealing with customers. (Garrett, 2007)
John is your typical customer that wants to be satisfied with his purchases. He seems to have high expectations when it comes to interacting with a company representative and probably researches each product before he purchases it. He’s probably a serial returner and has developed a winning strategy that involves specific tactics and counter tactics when he returns merchandise he doesn’t like. When there is a problem with an item that he has acquired, he seems to take it personally and wants the situation resolved immediately. (Garrett, 2007)
Sara’s goals and objectives as a returns employee are to make sure that the customer leaves the store with another piece of merchandise. She’s pleasant with each customer, she listens to each problem and she tries to appease them by offering small discounts for their trouble, whether it may have been big or small. She is sensative and takes things to heart when someone attacks her employer or fellow employees. Her main focus is to make sure that customer returns to that store for future purchases.
The main goals and objectives of the customers that shop at Alpha Electronics is to purchase electronic products. They also shop at the store because it is convenient and probably provides all of the major brands that they are looking for. The store offers good incentives and a friendly customer experience. The store has a generous return policy, they can return, exchange or receive store credit for items that they are not satisfied with.
Sara’s goals differ from that of her customer’s because she is working to make sure the company get’s the better end of the deal. She knows that if the customer is not satisfied with the stores return policy, then they may not come back to the store and relay their negative experience to other customers. The customer’s main focus is to either return their merchandise and get their money back or exchange it for another item.
If I were a customer return’s employee for Alpha electronics and encountered John as a customer, I would have researched how many times he’s returned items to the store. This falls in line with planning the negotiation. Stores typically, do not allow customers to return opened electronic equipment. If an item is defective then they usually can exchange it for the same exact one or receive store credit. Once I had that particular information in hand, I would have offered the same incentive that Sara did, 10% off a similar item. Then, when John expressed his disdain for that offer, I would have presented him with proof that this was not his first return and he has been given allowances in the past. If he still was not satisfied with the offer, I would have just offered him store credit and if he didn’t take that, I would have gone over the store policy and reiterated that I am making an exception for him.
I think Sara diverted from her negotiation plan by allowing John to bate her into giving him 50% off a similar item. She knew that the discount would not favor the stores bottom line and could possibly affect the daily sales. The first mistake that Sara made was to ask John, “ what would make the him happy “and not offer an apology, although she knew the sales associate did nothing wrong. I would have given him additional coupons for future purchases and provided the apology myself.
If I were the customer in that type of situation, I would’ve requested to speak to the store manager. Once they brought over a person authorized to negotiate on the stores behalf, I would have explained my expectations about the item that I purchased and what I thought was lost in translation between myself and the store associate. I would not have demanded an apology but would have expected that I receive a gift card for a future purchase or a coupon for a discount on another item that I purchased that same day. I believe that Sara did what she could to satisfy John but she gave in to his demands. She did not want the situation to escalate so she offered an incentive that did not favor her company. She should have been better prepared before negotiating with John. He seems to have had experience with returns and knew what tactics to use to achieve his objectives. Sara became too emotionally and allowed her emotions to cloud her judgment. She should’ve remembered the main goal of the negation, know what’s negotiable and what’s not. She allowed herself to be compromised by literally giving away merchandise and she should’ve walked away from the negotiations when he demanded 50% off of his purchase. (Garrett, 2007)
In conclusion, Sara should have followed the 45 practices to improve results. She would’ve been better prepared and she would’ve been able to counter John’s tactics. I am sure she has learned from this experience and will be better prepared in the future when she encounters an irate customer that is hard to please. (Garrett, 2007)

Bibliography:
Garrett, G. (2007). World class contracting. (4 ed., p. 409). Riverwoods, IL: WoltrsKluwer.