On Monday, June 6, the eigth “Leadership Basic Course” was held.
The theme of this year’s session was “Negotiation Skills”.

In the first half of the course, Professor Tamura gave a lecture on negotiation studies. We learned the SMATO Approach(*), a specific method to efficiently prepare for negotiations.
The session was followed by a time to deepen the learning in a practical way by reading a mock case on negotiation and having a group discussion using the actual methods learned.

In negotiations, we tend to focus on the Target (T) related topics such as price. Through the cases, students were able to experience the importance of advance preparation and the need to be aware of the Mission (M) and Creative Options (O). In the next session, we will be using more developed cases for learning.

Also, at the beginning of the PBL (Project Based Learning) Mr. Sugita told that the current group work is the climax of leadership, which prompted the students to reaffirm their commitment.
Continuing from the previous session, group work was conducted in each group in preparation for the final report (June 29), which will be further brushed up in the next week onwards.

(*) For more information on the SMATO approach, see Jiro Tamura, “A comparative analysis of Harvard and Japanese style negotiation : preparation using the 5 step SMATO approach” Hogaku Kenkyu, vol. 94, no. 6 (2021), pp. 45-65.