Negotiating with a Gender Perspective

This is how it works in the perfect world. But what happens in daily life? Does different age and sex of the negotiators influence the results or even the will to find a compromise or, is the gender pay gap partly a result of the better negotiation skills of men?

By applying a gender perspective on negotiation situations, a training program organized by FES Nepal from 18th to 19th February not only imparted knowledge about negotiation skills but also analyzed the underlying gender biases impacting outcomes. FES colleagues from Bangladesh, India, and Nepal, who participated in the seminar in Kathmandu, worked in groups on three negotiation cases they experienced in their professional life. In each case the gender issues were the themes of negotiation, be it in the form of underrepresentation of women or gender stereotypes or resistance concerning the promotion of women.

By the end of the two days, participants had gained a lot of insight having exchanged their experiences and best practices in dealing with gender issues in negotiations. Beyond that, it became clear that taking into account power imbalances often associated with gender as well as the un-obvious gender stereotypes helps in analyzing the negotiation outcomes and improve your own negotiation practice.

The training was part of the FES efforts to test out new ways and promising approaches to promote gender equality and equity through gender mainstreaming in all its activities.