Busy week!
Today started off pretty relaxed, and now as I’m getting ready to leave for the day I feel like I have a ton on my plate for the rest of the week. Things to think about include: the internship fair, various projects for Bob Bordone, the Negotiation Workshop… the list goes on. But I’m happy about that; I’ve always felt that I actually thrive on that feeling of nearly being overwhelmed. I also had a really good meeting with Sarah today where we basically organized ourselves for the near future. So I’m pretty psyched up for the next few days.
Tomorrow and Thursday I’m filling in for a couple negotiation simulations for the Workshop – which means I’ll actually get to negotiate! I’m feeling a mix between huge excitement and huge apprehension. In tomorrow’s simulation, I play a lawyer for a movie producer. Now, I know little to nothing about law, and the majority of the other students in the class are HLS people – so I hope I’m not out-teched. And although I do have experience in mediation, I would imagine that being a facilitating third party feels quite different than actually sitting down and having to reach a settlement that protects your interests.
I’ll just have to keep reminding myself that lots of successful negotiators don’t have law degrees (…right?), and that facing aggressiveness in a negotiation, while intimidating, shouldn’t cause me to lose confidence. When I consider real-life situations in the past that have involved negotiation, I realize that I’m much less worried about exploding in a fit of anger than I am about making so many compromises and concessions that I’m unhappy with the outcome. It will be interesting to see what types of mediation skills are transferable to a one-on-one negotiation setting.