Managing Around Roles: Building Groups in Labor Negotiations

Although the formal role structure of labor negotiations is explicitly confrontational, informal relationships and attempts at problem solving may develop among members of the opposing negotiating teams during the course of negotiations. Effective management of negotiations, it is argued, is a process of managing around formal role structures so that negotiators can interact openly and informally. The intervening variable that makes this possible is the creation of "joint" team identity among labor and management negotiators. This process of managing around roles is illustrated by a comparison of two labor negotiations.