Negotiation Bootcamp

Assignment

Course Instructor:

Professor Leslie Shaw

Submitted By:

Suchir Bhatnagar (e063001)

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Assignment : A job interview with SAP VE, India

About SAP VE

The SAP Value engineering (VE) group focuses on the pre-sales stage of selling SAP to

companies. One is required to evaluate companies on certain pre-defined key criteria to identify

their pain points and how SAP can help improve this. The product is then pitched to the

companies by the sales team.

About the process

This process was carried out as a part of the campus placement program at MDI Gurgaon. The

process was preceded by a pre-placement talk by the company on the campus. The recruitment

process was divided into four stages:

1. Submission and selection of CV’s

2. A telephonic interview to assess basic fundamentals of finance and motivation to join

SAP

3. A Case based interview with the senior associates to assess technical skills and how well

suited one is to the work

4. A behavioral interview with the CEO, team head and HR to assess the fit with the

company.

Analyzing the process as a negotiation

The interview process can be assessed as a negotiation and we can apply the “4-step method”

to analyze the interview.

I will analyze the first stage of the process which is “Preparing” for the negotiation. The main

aspects to be considered in this are:

1. Objectives:

My priorities were:

a. To find out more about the group and get a job with SAP VE.

b. To get some interview practice as this would be useful later on if am not selected

here.

c. If I don’t like the work or the responsibility I should withdraw from the process at

any stage.

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According to me the other party’s objectives were:

a. To find out more information about the clients as they had already done a scan of

the CV’s for selection.

b. Recruit the best people for the job

I think in this case, the objectives of the 2 parties involved were similar and there was no clash of

interests e.g. conflicting objectives of trying to find a gain with the other person.

2. Information

The main issues involved in this were finding out about the company as much as I can. For

this I consulted the company website and took the opinion of the people working in the

industry. SAP is considered to be the 2nd

biggest IT Company in the world and has a very

strong brand name. I went through the company PPT to understand about the work of the

company and what would be required of me on a daily basis.

The balance of power in this case I felt was more with the company as they have to make

the job offers while I was looking for a job.

The assumptions I made in this case is that I am in a weaker position while the power

distribution in Recruitment should be similar because they need good people just as we need

a good job.

3. Concessions

The most important aspects that I looked for in the job were:

d. Responsibility and growth prospects

e. Salary

f. Location

g. Work life balance

Assessing the work I felt that the work is not very good to start with as it involved a lot of back

end work and had no client interaction to start with. However the growth prospects in the

company were very huge due to the growing market in the Asia Pacific region, the strong

brand name of SAP which I can leverage to move within the group or outside the group at a

later stage.

The location was in my home town and they had a very good work life balance policy where

they allow flexi hours and work from home.

The salary was not disclosed at this stage but I had a good idea from the market that SAP is

one of the good pay masters and had a benchmark figure in my mind of what would be an

acceptable pay package.

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The trading value of my concessions for the “not so good work to start with” was that I

would have very good growth prospects in the future the good work-life balance which is very

rare in most of the jobs at this stage. I was also willing to compromise on the salary as I was

getting a location at home, so I could always save this cost of paying for a rented house.

However the concessions I wanted them to make were to give me fixed timelines and a

clear career path of how long it would take to grow in the company and change my role if I

wanted to at a later stage.

4. Variables

My vital interests were to find out as much as I can about the company and see whether I

would like to join the company and get an offer from them if possible. I knew that if I did not

like the offer afterwards I could always reject it.

Their interests were to find the best person for the positions open with them.

The bridging factors between the two were that they had a position which had to be filled I

was looking for a good job to start with so both our objectives matched.

I was willing to compromise on salary and work now if I got a home location and good growth

prospects in the future.

My fallback position was that since this is only my first interview even if it does not go well, I

will always have the option to apply for another company and this would be a good practice

for me.

5. Strategy

My basic strategy was “Rational”, “Conceal objectives” and “Low Pressure”.

It’s simple because I knew that I had the qualifications which were ideal for the job. I have a

background in computer science and engineering and have worked for one year in the IT

industry in a consulting position. This made it easier for me to fit in the culture of the company

and gel with the other engineers across the different groups and teams.

They were looking for people with a finance specialization as the work involved company

valuations and balance sheet analysis. I had a finance and operations specialization so this

gave me a good fit with their work profile.

Based on this good fit with their profile I could use the rational strategy to prove to them why I

was the best person for their job.

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It’s flexible because I wanted to find out more about the job description and the growth

prospects with the company so I wanted to use a more question based approach to gather as

much information from them as I can about the work profile, the daily job schedule, how soon

I would be able to move, what are the other team members like i.e. backgrounds, colleges,

and number of years of work experience, how people used the flexi hours and the work from

home policy. I always had it in the back of my mind that if I find something wrong at any stage

“I can always drop out”.

I used the “low pressure” strategy as I wanted to tell them of my future plans to move into

consulting at a later stage, so how will this job help me in that growth path? If they felt their

position was not a right match with my career plans “they would let me know”.

6. Team work

As this was a solo negotiation on my part, I had to play the roles of the main speaker, the

support speaker, the questioner, and the observer.

I was the main speaker when making the opening statements, presenting my objectives and

giving arguments in my favor.

I was the support speaker when I had to support some of these arguments and elaborate

more on them through examples and incidences.

I had to play the role of the questioner when I wanted to elicit more information out of them,

wanted to cross check the information I had, probe out the minor details which I considered to

be important.

I was the observer as I had to observe their reactions and listen to their arguments to try and

gauge where the negotiation is proceeding. Am I able to create a positive impact or is it

drifting away and I am getting too carried away?

Conclusion

These are the main variables involved in my preparation for my job interview with SAP. The

interview process could be looked upon as a negotiation and if we apply the 4-step method to this

we can end up better prepared for the interview.

However while proceeding with the negotiation a lot of the variables involved may change and

one may have to counter some unexpected contingencies e.g. my interview went quite

successfully with SAP and I was made an offer. However the most important variable for me to

accept the offer was not the role or the salary given to me as I had thought but it actually turned

out to be the location. Since this position was based out of my home town my family pressured

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me highly to accept the offer and I actually had a bigger negotiation with them than with the

interviewers.

I had also thought earlier on that I have a flexible strategy and can with draw at any stage I like,

however while proceeding with the interview the other side was able to sell their job so well to me

and I got so involved in the interview process that at a later stage, walking off was no longer an

option for me.

I feel that no matter how hard we plan for a negotiation there will always be some factors which

we cannot plan for and they may actually end up influencing the negotiation more than what we

planned for, however if we do plan for the negotiation then we will be better prepared to handle

these situations, than without any planning.