How Does Interest-Based Bargaining Work?

With a career of more than 35 years in teaching and education administration, California resident Steve Betando is the current superintendent of Morgan Hill Unified School District. His previous roles include that of principal for Chrysler Elementary School and Eisenhut Elementary School, both in the Stanislaus school district where he eventually served as an assistant superintendent. Steve Betando also works as a leadership development consultant and has conducted training programs on topics like interest-based bargaining.

While bargaining is often seen as a confrontational activity, an interest-based bargaining (IBB) approach seeks to make negotiations more collaborative. Instead of positional bargaining, where parties pit demands or needs against each other and try to get the better deal, IBB involves more conversation and transparency, where groups lay their issues out and then brainstorm on resolutions that will benefit everyone. That is why IBB is also known as win-win bargaining. Another term for it is ‘integrative bargaining’ since the process often integrates a number of contested issues, and the stakeholders trade off on individual matters for an overall outcome where everyone gets some part of what they want.

The first step in an IBB discussion is to identify the issue. Parties then break down the core matter into their individual and shared interests and concerns in it. Clarifying what each group wants out of the negotiation and why is important and necessary for a more empathetic mindset when coming up with solutions. Breaking down the issue may also enable the negotiators to find specific answers that they mutually agree on. A crucial part of shortlisting solutions, therefore, is to create an objective metric for them; standardizing the desired outcomes ensures that parties do not leverage power or lose sight of the goal where everyone benefits. Finally, once everyone has addressed their needs and expectations, they decide on the solution plan together, rather than one group taking the lead.