Exercise 1.1. Personal Choices in Decision Making (Reprinted by permission of Jeanne M. Brett) Directions: There are three parts to this exercise. First, read the directions below and make your 9 choices in Part 1. Then score yourself in Part 2. Finally, benchmark yourself by comparing yourself to managers around the world in Part 3. Part 1. Making Personal Choices This set of questions asks you to allocate points to you and to another person. Imagine that the other person is someone you do not know (that is, you have never met this person before). You will not knowingly meet or communicate with this person. However, at the same time that you are making choices, the other person will also make choices that determine the number of points you receive and the number of points he or she receives. The points represent something of value to youeach point is valuable to you, and so, the more points you accumulate the better for you. The same holds true for the other person: the more points the other person accumulates, the better for him or her. Example A. You get 500; other gets 100 B. You get 500; other gets 500 C. You get 550; other gets 300 If you chose A you would receive 500 points and the other person would receive 100 points; if you chose B, you would receive 500 points and the other person would receive 500 points; if you chose C, you would receive 550 and the other person would receive 300 points. Note: Your choice influences both the number of points you receive, as well as the number of points the other person will receive. For each of the 9 choice sets below, please select either A, B, or C. Please keep in mind that there are no right or wrong answers and that the points are valuable both to you and to the other person. Q# 1 Choice Choice You Get Other Gets A 480 80 B 540 280 C 480 480 Choice You Get Other Gets A 560 300 B 500 500 Q# 2 Choice C 500 100 Choice You Get Other Gets A 520 520 B 520 120 C 580 320 Choice You Get Other Gets A 500 100 B 560 300 C 490 490 Choice You Get Other Gets A 560 300 B 500 500 C 490 90 Choice You Get Other Gets A 500 500 B 500 100 C 570 300 Choice You Get Other Gets A 510 510 B 560 300 C 510 110 Choice You Get Other Gets A 550 300 B 500 100 C 500 500 Choice You Get Other Gets A 480 100 B 490 490 Q# 3 Choice Q# 4 Choice Q# 5 Choice Q# 6 Choice Q# 7 Choice Q# 8 Choice Q# 9 Choice C 540 300 Part 2. Scoring Personal Choices Transfer your choices to this scoring sheet by circling your choice A, B, or C for each question. Then count the number of circled choices in each column. If you have 6 or more choices in a column, your social motives can be characterized by the column headings Cooperative, Individualistic, or Competitive. Question Cooperative Individualistic Competitive 1 C B A 2 B A C 3 A C B 4 C B A 5 B A C 6 A C B 7 A B C 8 C A B 9 B C A For example, if you have 2 points in the Cooperative column, 7 points in the Individualistic column, and 0 points in the Competitive column, you are classified as Individualistic. If you do not have at least 6 points in any single column, you have no dominant social motivational orientation. People without a dominant orientation often make social decisions depending on situational conditions. They often find making social choices out of context frustrating. Part 3. Benchmarking Personal Choices Your personal choices have characterized you as competitive, cooperative, individualistic, or no dominant social motive. Take a look at the table below to compare your social motives to those of managers from around the world in my master data set. Managers made their choices prior to taking an executive education course. All had 5 or more years of work experience. I took a random sample of cultural groups with more than 150 respondents. These groups were from the U.S., China, Hong Kong, Germany, and Israel. I added in Japan (118), Brazil (76), France (63), Thailand (145), Sweden (59), India (74), Spain (46) and aggregated 42 LA Spanish background respondents and 42 Middle Eastern Arab background respondents. For further information about the relationship between social motives and negotiating strategy, see C.K.W. De Dreu, L. R. Weingart, and S. Kwon, \"Influence of Social Motives on Integrative Negotiations: A Meta-Analytic Review and Test of Two Theories,\" Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2000, 78, 889-905. Social Motives of Managers Around the World Country Competitive Cooperative Individualistic No Dominant Social Motive Brazil 6.0% 40.0% 36.0% 18.0% China 6.5% 46.8% 36.0% 10.8% Germany 0% 73.3% 22.6% 4.1% Hong Kong 3.6% 54.6% 38.2% 3.6% India 8.2% 53.4% 32.9% 5.5% Israel 1% 37.1% 53.3% 8.6% Latin America Spanish 8.1% 54.1% 24.3% 13.5% Middle East Arabic 10.3% 44.8% 37.9% 6.9% Spain 8.7% 34.8% 37.0% 19.6% United States 6.6% 53.7% 33.1% 6.6% Average 5.9% 49.26% 35.13% 9.72% Reference C.K.W. De Dreu, L. R. Weingart, and S. Kwon, \"Influence of Social Motives on Integrative Negotiations: A Meta-Analytic Review and Test of Two Theories,\" Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2000, 78, 889-905