Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Business Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Organizational Behavior and Theory

Series

2016

Power

Articles 1 - 2 of 2

Full-Text Articles in Business

Bargaining Zone Distortion In Negotiations: The Elusive Power Of Multiple Alternatives, Michael Schaerer, David D. Loschelder, Roderick I. Swaab Nov 2016

Bargaining Zone Distortion In Negotiations: The Elusive Power Of Multiple Alternatives, Michael Schaerer, David D. Loschelder, Roderick I. Swaab

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

We challenge the assumption that having multiple alternatives is always better than a single alternative by showing that negotiators who have additional alternatives ironically exhibit downward-biased perceptions of their own and their opponent’s reservation price, make lower demands, and achieve worse outcomes in distributive negotiations. Five studies demonstrate that the apparent benefits of multiple alternatives are elusive because multiple alternatives led to less ambitious first offers (Studies 1–2) and less profitable agreements (Study 3). This distributive disadvantage emerged because negotiators’ perception of the bargaining zone was more distorted when they had additional (less attractive) alternatives than when they only had …


Secret Conversation Opportunities Facilitate Minority Influence In Virtual Groups: The Influence On Majority Power, Information Processing, And Decision Quality, Roderick I. Swaab, Katherine W. Phillips, Michael Schaerer Mar 2016

Secret Conversation Opportunities Facilitate Minority Influence In Virtual Groups: The Influence On Majority Power, Information Processing, And Decision Quality, Roderick I. Swaab, Katherine W. Phillips, Michael Schaerer

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

We examined the impact of secret conversation opportunities during virtual team discussions on majority opinion holders’ motivation to attend to minority opinion holders. Studies 1a and b showed that majorities were more motivated to process others’ arguments when secret conversation opportunities were available (vs. not), provided these arguments contained unique (vs. shared) information and this information was offered by the minority (vs. majority). Study 2 demonstrated that this effect occurs because secret opportunities made majorities feel less powerful after being exposed to unique information from the minority (Study 2a), especially when majority members expected others to use these channels (Study …