Conflict and Negotiation for leaders

Phelps, Inc

You are Philip Manual, the head of sales for an office products firm, Phelps, Inc. Your personnel sell primarily to small businesses in the Los Angeles Metropolitan area. Phelps is doing about average for this rapidly growing market. The firms new president, Jose Ortega, is putting a lot of pressure on you to increase sales. You feel that a major obstacle is the firms policy on extending credit. Celeste, the head of the credit office, insists that all new customers fill out an extensive credit application. Credit risks must be low; credit terms and collection procedures are tough. You can appreciate her point of view, but you feel its unrealistic. Your competitors are much more lenient in their credit examinations; they extend credit to higher credit risks; their credit terms are more favorable; and they are more lenient in collecting overdue payments. Your sales personnel are pushing back on you. They frequently complain that they arent playing on a level field with their competition. When you brought this concern to Jose, he said he wanted you and Celeste to work things out. His instructions didnt give any clues to his priorities on this matter Sure, we need to increase sales, but the small business failure in this area is the highest in the country, so we have to be careful that we dont make bad credit decisions.

Questions:

What are the salient situational factors?
What is the most appropriate negotiation strategy?
What advice would you offer to Jose Ortega? Celeste? Philip?

Source: David Whetten and Kim Cameron, Developing Management Skills, 7th edition, Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey, 2007

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