CoSolve's World

Some of our key services

Training for Bargaining — Making bargaining work

The problem with conventional enterprise negotiations. Bargaining is often a rough encounter. Union and employer representatives arrive with their positions and predispositions, and play them out in what is often a win-lose exchange. Narrowly conceived productivity gains are traded off against wages rises to secure a deal. By the time the third and later rounds of enterprise bargaining are underway, things are often ritualised, fractious and unimaginative.

When things get difficult, conflict begins to escalate. Industrial action is threatened or resorted to. Tribunals and courts become involved, and much energy is expended downstream on dispute resolution.

It shouldn't be that way.

A different approach. Employer and unions have shared as well as competing interests. The challenge of the bargaining process should be to expand the common ground and manage the differences intelligently. The emphasis should be upstream - on preparation for bargaining and dispute prevention.

Interest-based (as opposed to positional) bargaining techniques have been developed to turn the bargaining process from a testy trade-off into a mutual gains event. CoSolve has a process designed to foster this result.

Training for Bargaining - how does it work? Parties serious about a new approach would engage CoSolve for a two-stage process. Firstly, well in advance of the first round of bargaining, union and management negotiators would participate in joint training in interest-based bargaining. The object is to learn the rationale and techniques of 'value creation' rather that 'value claiming' in the bargaining process.

Secondly, the parties would meet for a facilitated workshop on a common approach and ground rules for the pending negotiations. The workshop would cover both content and process: the business environment, the strategic plan of the business, union and employee perspectives and expectations, broad issues for negotiation, possible choke-points, information-sharing for negotiation, a timeline for and the logistics of negotiation, rules of conduct, how to deal with any disputes, media and public relations, and the like.

The workshop would conclude with a joint minute of what was agreed on both process and content. The exercise is aimed at enhancing the chances of achieving the optimum enterprise agreement, namely one that -

is arrived at through efficient negotiations;
represents a fair, realistic and durable balance of interests; and
is achieved without cost to the parties' long-term relationship.

CoSolve is often retained by the parties to facilitate the bargaining process itself, in a manner consistent with the approach and objectives of the training.

Both Anna and Clive participated in the Harvard/MIT program Negotiating Labor Agreements in 2003. The
program offers contemporary and authoritative insights and applied skills in interest-based bargaining.

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Facilitating Enterprise Bargaining

In most cases, parties will negotiate their agreements without any call on outside resources. However, there may be circumstances where it makes sense to use, by consent, the services of a dispassionate and independent facilitator. This open-textured process may help where -

the issues are complex or the stakes high;
a third-party presence promises to make the negotiating process more constructive and efficient;
a process combining negotiation, mediation, problem-solving and facilitation is indicated;
past conflict has damaged the trust relationship between the negotiators; or
negotiations are at an impasse and a fresh perspective may deliver a break-through.

The facilitator may help in the general preparation for bargaining, including information-sharing and fact-finding. During the bargaining exchange itself, the facilitator may act as mediator, reality-tester and option-provider, amongst other things. Public communications may also be handled through this office.

Our objective is always to search out and promote shared interests and therefore mutual gains. We recognise, though, that there will regularly be moments of hard bargaining in any negotiating situation. Some interests simply compete, most notoriously when the wage-profit cake needs to be cut. Here our job is to help the parties manage the conflict as intelligently as possible - to arrive at realistic outcomes without first having to go over the brink.

As in mediations, the facilitator does not make decisions on substance and cannot bind the parties to a particular outcome. It remains for the parties to make the own deal.

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Ongoing Consultation - Boosting Employee Contribution and Rewards

Bargaining over the work-wage deal typically monopolises the attention and energies of the key workplace figures. This is not surprising, as money counts in anyone's language, and the prospect of a strike or lockout always concentrates the mind. But bargaining - especially in an adversarial setting - turns largely on value claiming and not value creation.

Businesses are not grown during the spike of activity that bargaining represents, but courtesy of the steady, ongoing network of workplace processes and relationships. How can these processes and relationships be improved? Employee interest needs to be attracted and talent tapped - for mutual gain. That's the hallmark of the learning organisation. Properly designed and properly functioning consultative processes can be the best delivery mechanisms for effective employee participation in pursuit of these goals. But then the foundation of trust must be developed, and so too a clear business understanding amongst employees and their representatives, and for that matter managers as well. Consultative bodies must be properly empowered and resourced; the right balance struck between effective consultation and efficiency in decision-making; the necessary skills sets cultivated, and the cross-over to the bargaining process carefully engineered.

CoSolve has a wealth of comparative and local experience in this area, and is well placed to help stakeholders serious about co-operation and contribution to achieve a really competitive and rewarding edge.

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Relationship-Building Initiatives (RBIs)

- developing or restoring workplace relations

What is a Relationship-Building Initiative? An RBI is a carefully structured and independently facilitated process designed to help employers, employees and their representatives review their relationship, identify strengths and weaknesses and set common goals for a more productive future

When would this process be used? To rebuild a relationship damaged by past conflict, or to change an under-performing relationship into a productive one. The intervention of professional and impartial facilitators often helps the parties deal with the legacy of past industrial strife, overcome personality differences, settle long-standing grievances and review dysfunctional employer-employee practices and structures.

In practice, and RBI is often used to get relations on a sound footing before commencing bargaining for the next collective or enterprise agreement.

How is the process initiated, and then run? Stakeholder consent to the process is the starting point. The facilitators then meet with the parties, usually separately, to scope the issues and agree the optimum process.

The form of process will vary from case to case, but the problem-solving approach remains the same. A standard initiative would be built around a structured event, with key union/employee and management representatives meeting under independent facilitation over several days at an appropriate venue. There they would engage one another in accordance with a prepared program. The typical outcome would be an action plan on the way forward, coupled with monitoring and review steps.

In some cases, however, the intervention would not take the shape of a concentrated event but rather a series of structured engagements. The end product would be similar, though: consensus on an action plan for managing change and improving relations.

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Co-operative Change Initiatives (CCIs)

- aligning business plans with employee interests

What is a Co-operative Change Initiative? A CCI is a structured and independently facilitated engagement between workplace stakeholders. Its wider goal is to align employee and industrial relations with the corporate business plan. Its immediate goal is to win consensus on change issues at the workplace. A typical CCI will involve a mix of needs analysis, objective setting, joint problem-solving, mediation and negotiation. A CCI is designed to promote the achievement of clear business objectives while meeting employee needs. It stands in contrast to a more traditional approach, where plans for change are summarily announced and the ensuing conflict dealt with on a reactive and ad hoc basis through the courts or tribunals

When would this process be used? A CCI makes sense when -

significant business restructuring is required;
the restructuring entails major alterations to work practices or conditions of service, and the changes are hard for employees and unions to accept;
there is a basic rationality to the proposals on change; it is in the long-term interest of the organisation, the employees and their unions;
there is flexibility in the plan.

How is the process initiated and conducted? As with Relationship-Building Initiatives, stakeholder consent to the process is the starting point. The facilitators then meet with the parties, usually separately, to scope the issues and agree the optimum process. The form of process will vary from case to case, but the problem-solving, consensus-seeking approach remains the same.

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Investigations & Fact-finding

Controversy in the workplace is a fact of life. And when an issue does arise, there are typically opposing views over what precisely is at stake, what's causing it, who's to blame and what's to be done. There may have been allegations of harassment, that a management style is damaging shop-floor relations or that a work arrangement is an unnecessary burden. Very often the grievance is accompanied by a demand that someone or something has to go. Recriminations abound, internal investigations become bogged down and litigation is threatened or initiated.

CoSolve is able to intervene in these circumstances and provide an objective investigation of the facts and surrounding circumstances, and to draw conclusions that may assist the parties. Very often we are also asked to go further - to mediate and problem-solve issues. And, in the event of a persisting problem, it's not uncommon for us to be requested to propose recommendations on a resolution, or even to arbitrate an outcome.

Our experience shows that a credible and independent investigation process will generally be able to cut swiftly to the chase, isolate what counts and point the way to a solution.

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