{"id":2180,"date":"2023-05-30T21:56:48","date_gmt":"2023-05-31T02:56:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/?p=2180"},"modified":"2023-05-30T21:58:11","modified_gmt":"2023-05-31T02:58:11","slug":"the-fine-art-of-negotiating","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/?p=2180","title":{"rendered":"The fine art of negotiating"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>The recent negotiations between the White House and Republicans in the House brought back some fond memories. During the 1980s, I participated in several union negotiations. Most of the corporate negotiators were mid to upper management employees. However, when negotiating with Farmland Foods, the lead negotiator with the company was a gentleman lawyer from Kansas City, Sewell Couch.<\/p>\n

Mr. Couch liked a drink or two after work. His usual hangout was a bar in uptown Denison called The Lounge. Several times during the negotiation season (about every 3 years), I would drive by The Lounge to see if I could spot Sewell\u2019s brown four-door Chevy Cavalier. If he parked anywhere nearby, I would stop in and find a seat next to him. If there wasn\u2019t a seat next to him, I would stand behind him and order a beer. After a couple of sips and striking up a conversation with Sewell, a person on either side would move and offer me the chair next to Sewell. The first thing I did was count the individual single dollar bills, lined up in a layer so they could be easily counted. It didn\u2019t take long to figure out that each bill represented a drink. If five one-dollar bills were neatly layered in front of him, I knew that Sewell had five drinks. If he bought me a beer, he would not add a bill to the pile, but if I bought him a drink, he would add a dollar bill. I learned later from a bartender that the dollar pile ended up as a tip.<\/p>\n

I wouldn\u2019t initiate shop talk until Sewell had at least three bills in front of him. He was careful, sober, or not. As we came to know each other, which was in the end very little, he began to call me a latrine lawyer. I accepted that title with pride. We never settled on an agreement with any issue facing the negotiating teams, but our conversations did lead to some persuasive discussions with our respective negotiating teams.<\/p>\n

Sewell had a process for presenting the corporation\u2019s proposals, one that I adopted because of its practicality. If the company had sixteen separate proposals, Sewell would present each member of his team, and each member of my team, with sixteen sheets of paper. Each sheet of paper had one explicit statement typed neatly on it. If that issue was taken off the table, everyone threw that sheet of paper away. I didn\u2019t. I often wrote notes on the proposal and kept it for future use. I didn\u2019t invent that procedure. I saw Sewell doing it, and he may have mentioned it at The Lounge during one of our early evening chats.<\/p>\n

He told me once that the trunk of his car had a box with several different brief cases in it. As he went from one union workplace to the next, he just shuffled one brief case for another. It was another practice that I adopted for the convenience of being as organized as possible, keeping paperwork separate.<\/p>\n

At the end of a negotiating session, everyone pulled out their calendars\/planners to agree on a date for the next session. I was the only one without a calendar or planner. He mentioned that I must have a photographic mind because I didn\u2019t need to check future dates to make sure a proposed meeting didn\u2019t run into another. I told him he was correct. \u201cYou just wait, mister smartass,\u201d he would say. \u201cSomeday you won\u2019t even know what day you\u2019re in.\u201d I laughed. Now, I know what he meant. And I\u2019m laughing again.<\/p>\n

A union steward on light duty because of a work-related injury was assigned to clean up detail in the Carroll, Iowa, plant. He was emptying trash in the office when he saw a letter from a vice-president of the company. On top by the letterhead was a statement: \u201cHow to get rid of the union.\u201d He turned it over to us and we called a meeting of the vice president, two plant managers and Sewell in Omaha. Each of the four was given a copy of the memorandum. Sewell said, \u201cthis is the first I\u2019ve seen this.\u201d When confronted with the memo, the vice-president said, \u201cI\u2019ll turn this over to my legal counsel.\u201d Sewell promptly tossed the letter onto the table and said, \u201cno, you won\u2019t. Without these guys I don\u2019t have a job.\u201d It wasn\u2019t long after that, the VP was fired.<\/p>\n

One weekend I had plans to go to Kansas City with one of my co-workers in the packing plant. We intended to golf at a couple of courses in St. Joseph and Kansas City, and take in a Royals baseball game on Sunday before heading back. The night before the baseball game, we couldn\u2019t decide where to eat. We had KC BBQ for two consecutive days and nights and wanted something different. I called Sewell. He recommend The Savoy<\/a>. If you\u2019re ever in Kansas City and want a high-end dinner, this is the place to go. I have never had a better steak, service, or ambiance. Sewell didn\u2019t hesitate when he suggested it. We beat each other up during negotiations, but respect was paramount between the two of us.<\/p>\n

When I graduated with a degree as a paralegal, he was the first person I called. \u201cIt\u2019s official, Sewell. I now have a degree as a shithouse lawyer.\u201d Neither of us got the last laugh. We laughed together.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Please help Fawkes-Lee & Ryan maintain this website by donating $10, $20, $30, $50, $100, or more.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Donate<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Your support is appreciated.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Subscribe (It\u2019s FREE): Email mrtyryn@gmail.com with \u201cSubscribe\u201d in the Subject Line.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Fawkes-Lee & Ryan<\/strong><\/p>\n

2516 Lynner Dr.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Des Moines, IA 50310<\/strong><\/p>\n

Copyright (c) 2023. Fawkes-Lee & Ryan. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The recent negotiations between the White House and Republicans in the House brought back some fond memories. During the 1980s, I participated in several union negotiations. Most of the corporate negotiators were mid to upper management employees. However, when negotiating … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[696,1092,1091,1093],"class_list":["post-2180","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-farmland-foods","tag-negotiations","tag-sewell-couch","tag-the-savoy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2180","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2180"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2180\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2182,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2180\/revisions\/2182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2180"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2180"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iowappa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2180"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}