Thursday, March 23, 2006

Bargaining Basics


Making a promise is quite a hazardous enterprise. Especially when you are tempted into making promises with long ranging consequences. I'm not talking about personal life. Promises made in personal relations even have more weight than they already have in business-affairs. "Afspraak is afspraak." This Dutch saying is best translated as "a deal is a deal". Its not quite the same. A deal is about an agreement. An "afspraak", sometimes is about a deal, but it also involves making a commitment of a personal nature. You made a deal and you are going to take personal care that deal will really be made. I think this notion is one of the cornerstones of Dutch social life. Today I walked out of an important meeting because I had promised a client to be at a certain place at a certain time. My colleagues were not too happy about it; I had my doubts myself, but the client was satisfied. I had kept my end of the bargain which to him was nothing exceptional. And the reason I did it? I did it because "afspraak is afspraak".

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