Category: Negotiation

Demystifying Power. Enabling Empowerment. | MLD-340 Power and Influence for Positive Impact with Julie Battilana

Greg Dorchak

Having been awarded the Academy of Management’s 2022 George R. Terry Book Award* for her book Power, for All, Julie Battilana brings her award-winning research to life in the Harvard classroom teaching MLD-340 Power and Influence for Positive Impact.

In Power, for All, Battilana and her co-author Tiziana Casciaro offer a new vision of power – what they define as the ability to influence someone else’s behavior – as deriving from having access to valued resources. Understanding what those resources are, people can take action to plan for, create, and sustain organizational and systems change. Drawing upon lessons derived from their rich research, and conveying lessons through wide-ranging case narratives, Battilana and Casciaro reveal the insights into power and influence that come from understanding (1) the two basic needs all human beings share—safety and self-esteem—and (2) the resources people seek to satisfy those needs: obvious ones, like money and status, but also less obvious and less tangible resources, like autonomy, achievement, affiliation, and morality. In sum Power, for All demystifies the essential mechanisms for acquiring and using power, showing that it is available to ALL people, not just those with personality, money, or, indeed, those willing to use intimidation, threats, or worse.

Split picture: At left: Tiziana Cascario and Julie Battilana seated together at a table. At right: book cover of their book, Power, for All.Pictured
Tiziana Casciaro and Julie Battilana with their award-winning book, Power, for All.

Building on these empowering ideas…,

…and designed for individuals at any stage of their career, Battilana’s course MLD-340 Power and Influence for Positive Impact will debunk the fallacies that many have about power and explore the fundamentals of power in interpersonal relationships, in organizations, and in society. In doing so, it will lift the veil on power, revealing to students what it really is, and how it works, ultimately unleashing their potential to build and use power to effect change at home, at work, and in society.

MLD-340 is ideal for students who want to make things happen, despite the obstacles that might stand in the way. Students will walk away prepared to exercise power positively to challenge the status quo in order to address the pressing social and environmental problems of our time. Students will learn conceptual models, tactical approaches, and assessment tools to develop their personal influence style and understand the political dynamics surrounding them. The subject matter in the course also specifically encourages students to use power responsibly, resist its corruptive perils, and challenges students to develop their own sense of what constitutes the ethical exercise of power and influence in their lives.  In the past a stellar array of in-class guests have been invited into the course, each an eminent and effective changemaker in their field:

MLD-340 is a useful complement to other MLD course offerings in the areas of Leadership, Negotiation, Organizing Civic, Political, and Social Action, and even Social Enterprise. If you have any questions about this course, or any other in the MLD curriculum, email Greg Dorchak, MLD Area Administrator.

*The Academy of Management’s George R. Terry Book Award is granted annually to the book judged to have made the most outstanding contribution to the global advancement of management knowledge during the last two years. Books that contribute to the advancement of management theory, conceptualization, research, or practice are eligible for this prestigious award. Battilana and Casciaro were presented the award at the 82nd Annual Meeting of the Academy of Management on August 7, 2022.

Fundamental Negotiation Training at HKS: MLD-215 with Rob Wilkinson and MLD-223 with Kessely Hong

Greg Dorchak

Among the signature curriculum of the Harvard Kennedy School, negotiation training has always stood out as among the most popular due to its practicality and necessity across all sectors and policy domains. Founded by one of the luminaries of negotiation science, Howard Raiffa, HKS faculty have always been at the forefront of negotiation research and training. Furthermore, we recognize negotiation skills are a critical contributor to effective leadership of organizations, campaigns, and social movements of all types.

With the two introductory negotiation courses outside the MPP core, MLD-215 Negotiation and Leadership: Essential Theory and Practice for Enhancing Your Personal Effectiveness with Robert Wilkinson and MLD-223 Negotiating Across Differences with Kessely Hong students can learn the fundamental, time-tested frameworks of negotiation analysis. Both courses introduce the core concepts of distributive bargaining, value creation, stakeholder analysis, trust-building, barriers to agreement, and strategic approaches to negotiation.

Portrait photo of Robert Wilkinson, Lecturer in Public Policy and Leadership
Robert Wilkinson, Lecturer in Public Policy and Leadership

MLD-215 (Wilkinson) will provide students with the fundamental principles, theory and practice of the field of negotiation, but MLD-215 is especially distinctive in blending leadership and negotiation principles in a single course. The curriculum will balance theory and practice, and draws on the classic literature, as well as more recent work. Students will learn using the case study method, active simulations, group work and lectures to bring the conceptual material to life, as well as to build students’ personal negotiation and leadership skills. Drawing on his extensive experience as a practitioner in the field, Wilkinson will emphasize bringing in international examples and cases throughout the course, to provide both domestic and global perspectives on negotiation and leadership.

 

 

Kessely Hong smiling and teaching students in a Harvard classroom
Senior Lecturer Kessely Hong

MLD-223 (Hong) offers more complex, multiple-stakeholder cases and simulations, some of which include salient cultural or power differences and multi-party dynamics. Students are challenged to navigate differences in expectations, attitudes toward risk, culture, power, status, and partisan perceptions. In Hong’s course, students read and analyze a variety of very rich real-world cases, in which interpretations of the protagonists’ actions provide illuminating insights into similar spectrum of dynamics (personal, psychological, political, cultural, etc.) at play in negotiations over public policy.

 

 

Both MLD-215 and MLD-223 serve as pre-requisites for MLD-280M Advanced Workshop in Multiparty Negotiation and Conflict Resolution, the January-term course, taught by Brian Mandell, Mohamed Kamal Senior Lecturer in Negotiation and Public Policy.  Students wanting to additional venues to study, research, and design new ways of negotiation practice will be interested in exploring the Negotiation and Conflict Resolution Collaboratory. Established and directed by Brian Mandell, the NCRC develops ways to connect students of negotiation with practitioners on the frontlines and faculty leading cutting-edge research. They seek to advance the field of experiential learning and motivate innovations in teaching advanced negotiation in simulated environments. In addition, NCRC faculty affiliates within the Center for Public Leadership engage in the interdisciplinary study of developments and trends at the intersection of negotiation and leadership.

MLD-215 and MLD-223 are offered at Harvard Kennedy School in Fall semester. MLD-280M is offered in January term. If you have any questions about these courses, or any other in the MLD curriculum, email Greg Dorchak, MLD Area Administrator.

MLD-234: Conducting Negotiation on the Frontlines with Claude Bruderlein

Greg Dorchak

With the deepening of political divisions on societal challenges, policymakers must navigate increasingly tense environments to engage in constructive dialogues across political fault lines. They must be equipped with relevant sense-making frameworks, analytical tools and interpersonal skills to maintain productive dialogue with difficult counterparts on contentious issues such as the response to the pandemic, climate policies, gun control or irregular migration. Public officials and civil society organizations alike are not only expected to craft a constructive dialogue with all stakeholders but also to prevent and mitigate the risks of instrumentalization by various groups. To fulfill their role in such environments, policy professionals need to acquire strategic capabilities to lead constructive engagements with a wide range of stakeholders from the most supportive to the most disruptive while managing risks effectively in a tense public arena.

Student who take MLD-234 Conducting Negotiation on the Frontlines with Claude Bruderlein develop a solid understanding of the social, behavioral and cognitive implications of political tensions in society and equip students with the required strategic frameworks and practical tools to engage in high-stake policy dialogue and negotiation. It will provide students with core competences on strategic planning and crisis negotiation informed by current practices from the political, commercial and humanitarian sectors. It will further expand their technical skill set and self-confidence to engage with adversarial or intimidating counterparts while facilitating their connections with US-based frontline negotiators. This course is designed for students who intend to work in high-intensity environments at the domestic or international level. It complements the January-term course IGA-353M Frontline Negotiation Lab examining negotiation practices in the response to the Ukraine crisis in Europe.

Please note, this is a jointly offered course hosted by the Harvard Chan School of Public Health and, accordingly, students must adhere to the academic and attendance policies of HCSPH.

MLD-234 is taught in close collaboration with the Centre of Competence and Humanitarian Negotiation and the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, enabling students to engage with frontline humanitarian negotiators from the UN and other international agencies operating in crises around the globe. This course offers a unique safe space to review and discuss current challenges and dilemmas with stakeholders of ongoing negotiation processes and examine practical tools and methods to overcome these challenges. Students will also be encouraged to develop their own critical thinking about these issues and to test their negotiation skills in simulations and other practical exercises.

Claude Bruderlein is Adjunct Lecturer on Global Health and Senior Researcher at the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative and Adjunct Lecturer at the Harvard Chan School of Public Health. He also holds a secondary appointment at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. In his research, Mr. Bruderlein focuses particularly on the conduct of negotiation in complex and hostile environments.

Claude BruderleinSince 2012, he is serving as Strategic Advisor to the President of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Geneva, focusing on strategic relationships, communities of practice and institutional development. He also serves as Senior Researcher at the Centre of Competence on Humanitarian Negotiation (CCHN), a joint endeavour of the ICRC, the World Food Program (WFP), the High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), and Médecins- Sans-Frontières (Doctors-Without-Borders) (MSF). In 2010, he co-founded the International Association of Professionals in Humanitarian Assistance and Protection and served as its first President of the Board until 2012.

Before joining Harvard University, Mr. Bruderlein served as Special Adviser on Humanitarian Affairs to the UN Secretary General, focusing particularly on issues related to the negotiation of humanitarian access and the targeting of sanctions. He worked on negotiation of access in Afghanistan and North Korea. He also served as an independent expert to the UN Security Council on the humanitarian impact of sanctions in Sudan, Burundi, and Sierra Leone. He has previously worked with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) as a field delegate in Iran, Israel and the Occupied Territories, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Yemen.

MLD-234 is an excellent complement to the fall course MLD-236 Continuing Conflict: Old Challenges and New Debates with Rangita de Silva de Alwis, Bruderlein’s own January course IGA-353M Frontline Negotiation Lab, and other MLD negotiation courses.  Questions about other MLD negotiation courses or any other in the MLD curriculum, email Greg Dorchak, MLD Area Administrator.

 

Sohaila Noori, 29, owner of a sewing workshop, poses at her workshop in Kabul, Afghanistan January 15, 2022.

Engaging Global Policymakers Working to Support Women in Geographies of Conflict | MLD-236 – Continuing Conflict: Old Challenges and New Debates with Rangita de Silva de Alwis

Greg Dorchak

Rangita de Silva de Alwis speaking into a microphoneThis fall HKS hosts Rangita de Silva de Alwis to teach a special new course, MLD-236 Continuing Conflict: Old Challenges and New Debates.  Rangita, a full-time faculty member at the University of Pennsylvania Law School with an S.J.D. from Harvard Law School, is a globally recognized international women’s rights expert with over 25 years of experience advocating for equal representation of women across the globe. On June 23, 2022 Rangita was elected to the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW Committee) for the term 2023-2026.  The CEDAW Committee—consisting of 23 experts on women’s rights from around the world—is the body of independent experts that monitors the implementation of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW).

Rangita’s new HKS course aims to meld her policymaking and advocacy role with learning in the classroom. MLD-236 will focus on two theaters of continuing conflict: Afghanistan and the Sahel region in Africa, the world’s most conflict heavy region. Collaborating with UN Security Council non-permanent members, this class will examine these recent conflicts, its impact on women, and the role of women as peace builders. From the denial of women’s and girl’s education in the recent Taliban takeover in Afghanistan to Africa’s Sahel region’s climate collapse which has impacted a gathering crisis in food security, access to water, migration, and the feminization of poverty, the class will analyze some of the root causes of recent conflict and provide new policy imperatives through a gender perspective. The confluence of the 3 Cs, conflict, climate change and COVID will continue to have a disproportionate impact on the lives and livelihoods of women.

This course will function as a lab to incubate new ideas and provide an opportunity for students to participate directly with important global changes on policy making. Through case studies in the two regions, students will learn an array of transformative policymaking tools to address the root causes of conflict and explore new approaches to peace building. Students will also engage with recent UN Security Council resolutions and directly connect with an amazing array of current global policymakers working in these geographies of conflict.

Policy makers expected to be guest speakers (virtually) in MLD-236 include:

From Africa’s Sahel Region:

    • E. Michel Biang, Gabon’s Ambassador to the UN (Security Council)
    • E. Cheikh Niang, Senegal’s Ambassador to the UN
    • E. Lang Yabon, The Gambia’s Ambassador to the UN
    • E. Ammo Baroud, Chad’s Ambassador to the UN
    • E. Fanday Turay, Sierra Leone’s Ambassador to the UN
    • E. Konfourou, Mali’s Ambassador to the UN
    • Under Secretary General Zainab Bangura, Head of UN Africa
    • David Moininia Senge, Sierra Leone Minister of Education and Innovation; Fellow MIT Media Lab

From Afghanistan:

    • Simar Samar, first woman Vice President of Afghanistan; Fellow at HKS’s Carr Center for Human Rights
    • Shukriya Barakzai, founding Chair of the Parliamentary Commission on Human Rights, Civil Society, and Women’s Rights and former Ambassador to Norway
    • Naheed Fareed, youngest woman parliamentarian and most recent Chair of the Parliamentary Commission on Human Rights, Civil Society, and Women’s Rights
    • Maria Basheer, first woman prosecutor in Afghanistan
    • Fawzia Koofi, member of Afghan delegation to Doha peace talks
Niger_Malian-refugee-sisters
Niger_Malian refugee sisters. Credit: Louise-Donovan

MLD Area chair, Hannah Riley Bowles, who also serves as Co-Director of the Women and Public Policy Program at HKS, commended Rangita’s HKS appointment, stating: “We are honored and delighted that HKS will continue to benefit from Rangita’s intellectual energy and role model. In addition to her scholarship on gender in international law, Rangita brings direct experience working with governments and international institutions to bring a gender lens to peace and security.”

Martha Minow, the 300th Anniversary University Professor at Harvard University and former Dean of Harvard Law School, recently said of Rangita, “I know of no one with more expertise, tenacity, and devotion when it comes to advancing women’s rights . . . Rangita would be a stellar contributor to the efforts to protect against gender-based violence and to make human rights meaningful regardless of an individual’s gender.”

MLD-236 with Rangita de Silva de Alwis be offered at Harvard Kennedy School in the fall semester. This course makes an excellent complement to the following other AY23 HKS courses:

If you have any questions about this course, or any other in the MLD curriculum, email Greg Dorchak, MLD Area Administrator.

About feature photo above: Sohaila Noori, 29, owner of a sewing workshop, poses at her workshop in Kabul, Afghanistan January 15, 2022.
Source: REUTERS/Ali Khara  (https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/afghan-women-losing-jobs-fast-economy-shrinks-rights-curtailed-2022-01-20/ )

Understanding Emotion in the Context of Intractable Intergroup Conflict

Greg Dorchak

Special Presentation: Understanding Emotion in the Context of Intractable Intergroup Conflict
 with Professor Eran Halperin of Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya, IsraelPortrait of Eran Halperin

Bio:  Professor Eran Halperin is Dean of the School of Psychology and Professor at IDC – Herzliya. An award-winning pioneer in examining emotion processes using field experiments, Dr. Halperin’s research uses psychological and political theories to investigate causal factors driving intergroup conflicts. More specifically, his work develops new approaches for modifying the psychological roots of intolerance, exclusion and intergroup violence.  The unique case of Israeli society in general, and of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in particular, motivates much of his work and, hence, most of his studies are conducted within the context of that “natural laboratory.”  His laboratory currently spearheads a government sponsored project to standardize social inclusion in Israeli education.

Date: April 27, 2017    11:45 AM – 1:00 PM

Location: HKS, Belfer Building, Land Lecture Hall (Room 400)

Space is limited; RSVP by April 19 REQUIRED  (Light lunch will be provided)

Presentation sponsored by the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School.  Additional support provided by the Herbert C. Kelman Seminar on International Conflict at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs at Harvard, the Management, Leadership, and Decision Science Area at the Harvard Kennedy School, and the Middle East Initiative of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs.