sorry if youre expecting a mushy read but the title has nothing to do with this entry. im just tired of the random notes title so i decided to place the song which is playing on my mind instead. people here at home were watching juno earlier, that song was in the movie, and it stuck on my mind.
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im enjoying labor-management relations. we were discussing negotiations and collective bargaining in class for 2 sessions now and its just fun and refreshing to know its dynamics. this afternoon, we had 2 exercises in class, 1 was the oil price setting, the other was still on jessie.
the oil price setting was the very same exercise my professor did when he attended the kennedy school of government in harvard. it mainly involves 2 developing countries which supply oil to a third country. to help determine a good price for each of the 2 countries, a matrix was provided (there were only 3 options for the prices) showing how much would each of the 2 countries earn if it would sell its oil for a specific amount.
we were divided into 2 main groups, each group represents one country. each country was further divided into 3 main oil players. i was 1 of the oil playes in country b. so the exercise went like this, we were to set oil prices monthly, without knowing how much would our counterpart would sell theirs. t he objective of the exercise is to earn as much as you can for your company but make sure that you dont put your competitor out of business.
if both would sell their oil for $10, both would get a $5 profit each. if they sell at $20, they would get $8 each. if they sell at $30, they would get $11 each which is the highest profit possible, because $30 was the price ceiling set. if you sell lower than your counterpart, you'll earn at your counterpart's cost.
it was fun. negotiating blindly. hoping that your counterpart would get your message. both of us started with $10 which was fine, then we went to $20 which was better. then from there, our individual interests surfaced. we were both suspicious of each other so we didnt go for the $30 price. the pricing went crazy. i was dropping hints that i wanted both of us to earn big so i was setting my price at $30 but she keeps on setting hers at $10 so i kept on losing and she on winning. in the end, my self vision that ill never be a good businessperson was strengthened. i lost haha i only earned $52 against my counterpart's $79.
and what did my professor said? it showed our potential opportunistic behaviors haha and that behavior is something that we have to throw into the rubbish bin if we want to become negotiators.
the 2nd exercise was on jessie. its actually from an earlier assignment. its about this teacher, jessie, who teaches physics in a catholic school who suddenly changed his religion. but before that, he knows that he needs to keep his catholic religion as a precondition for continuous employment. so when he changed his religion, the school had to terminate him.
this time, dez and i were to represent jessie. and we had to negotiate with the school authorities to keep jessie's religion and his job. and what's our best agreement? keep jessie's religion and job but he has to follow the school's regulations when it comes to religious practices. he has to keep his opinions neutral and must not prophesize to his students. nice...
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i was telling dez earlier that im realizing that i actually like conflict. but let me clarify that. i dont like conflict per se, what i like is what happens before and after the conflict, how people manage to handle conflict. you may ask, but conflict dont really end, right? which makes it more interesting =) still not making sense? basta...
blame it on marx and his conflict theory. or maybe blame it on my radical professors from cssp. or maybe blame it on me for romanticizing the idea of conflicting interests.
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every saturday, i go on abstinence. i abstain from eating lunch because i dont have the time to eat. see, i have work till 12 nn and i have class at 1pm. and i use the 12nn -1pm period for travel. so having a decent lunch is really a challenge for me, in which, i have been consistently failing. so earlier this night, dez and i went on a food trip. we decided to treat ourselves to a feast! a P244 eat-all-you-can buffet at kamay kainan in trinoma. god, its soo good to eat. and what did i have? let me enumerate them for you.
plain rice.nilagang baka.a lot of kare kare.papaitan.sinigang na hipon.crispy pata.sinigang na isda.ginataang kuhol.sisig.arroz ala cubana.lumpiang shanghai.manggang hilaw.lechon kawali.pipino salad.grilled oyster.tempura.pusit.liempo.kaldereta.friend hipon.
and since i still have sore throat, i couldnt have ice cream and so much sweets so i only settled for buko pandan.
after that, a big BURP....
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