The Negotiating Challenge
Our client in the Energy Industry faced a complex and hostile series of work place negotiations.
- Two current EBA agreements to terminate in 3 months
- Previous round of EBA agreements 3 years earlier took 8 months and resulted in both sides reverting to litigation
- Long history of adversarial relations between Management and Union. Anticipated hostility and high probability of strike action, stop work, production disruption & further deterioration of management / worker relationships
- Local management restricted in negotiating with workers/unions due to restrictions imposed by overseas global management
- Complexity due to change of federal government and anticipated changes to Industrial Relations legislation & work place reforms.
How ENS Helped
We were engaged to focus on achieving a ‘Cultural Shift’ to help change the negotiating ‘mindset’ on both sides.
- Conducted negotiation skills training for both the Management Team and Union Negotiation Team (representing workers)
- After training, individual coaching was provided to both sides in using the our Systematic Preparation method
- Our consultant was available ‘On Call’ when difficulties were encountered during formal or informal negotiations.
Outcomes
Negotiations were concluded quickly, at low cost and with dramatically improved working relationships.
- Achieved outcomes satisfactory to both sides before expiry of the agreements
- Overall costs to the company were approximately 350% less than previous EBA negotiations
- The relationship between management and workers improved, with significantly reduced levels of animosity and mistrust, leading to more productive attitudes and ‘mindsets’ for future negotiations of all kinds
- Team work and relationships improved within both teams and greater respect earned from constituent members i.e. workforce in general
- Other client sites within Australia now interested in following our process.
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