Tag: business

The Art of Negotiating: Lessons from Hiring Experiences

July 17, 2025

This is just anecdotal and not based on any detailed research. But impressions are essential. The first story started with a knock on my front door. A young man introduced himself and offered to trim my cedar hedge, which is a bit disheveled and can be seen clearly from the street. My hedge needs a trim, so I asked him to provide an estimate. He walked along the hedge and came back to say that his team could do it for $250. Seeing my hesitation, he brought down the price to $200.

That sounded good to me, based on experience with hedge trimming. Before making any decisions, I wanted to learn about his experience and the composition of his team. Six recent college graduates formed a team, he explained, with three of them knocking on doors to generate business, and the other three handling trimming. I thought they had no experience at all. However, he assured me that they possessed all the necessary equipment, including tall ladders and trimming equipment.

Now I am always positive about young people initiating a business, and I told him I’ll think about it and to come back next week. I prefer not to make impulsive decisions. And he did come back a few days later. When I asked him when he could do the trim, he took another walk along the same hedge. He came back, explaining that it is a tall hedge on sloping ground, making it challenging to place the ladders. It is a tall hedge, over twelve feet. So, he concluded that the price would be $600.

I said what? Now, wait a minute, I said. You told me a few days ago that it would be $250. My voice indicated exasperation and disbelief. I even smiled at him, at his chutzpah in more than doubling the price. He suddenly changed his mind and offered to do the job for $300. That offer made me more than upset, and I said that I do not negotiate; you gave me a price, and I expected you to honor it. He decided to walk away.

By the way, I thought his final price was reasonable, but I did not like the way he behaved. What guarantee did I have that his work would be good and the cleanup complete?

Several thoughts crossed my mind. When one starts a new business, one marketing approach is to undercut the current market. One should demonstrate that the new company is superior to existing alternatives in at least one way. Why should anyone pay competitive pricing for a new product or service without testing it?

Next story. A couple of people were trimming the cedar hedge behind my house. I walked to the back of my garden and asked if they would be interested in cutting my cedar hedge as well. If so, I asked them to come over and give me an estimate. They did come over after finishing their job, and a young fellow said that he would message me his estimate later that day. Before leaving, I asked him about his background in landscaping and learned that he was studying to be an arborist. That sounded relevant to the job, and I awaited his estimate.

To my surprise, the estimate came in at $900, significantly above what I thought was fair (by the way, I had asked him to trim more of my cedar hedge than I had asked the young fellow I described above). To my response that he was way out of line, he messaged back that he was a bit high and that he could do it for $700. I responded negatively, to which he answered by asking me what I thought was a fair price so that he could learn from it. I give him high marks for sincerity, but why didn’t he work for a hedge trimming company and learn the pricing in the trade before starting his own business?

Now, these two stories do not provide a definitive characterization of today’s young people, millennials, to be sure. But I found it surprising that both started with a high estimate. Why did they not start with a low estimate (the first one did, but when it came to doing the job, he doubled the price)? Or, why did they not ask me what I would pay for the task? That would not be a bad approach; I think most people would come up with a reasonable estimate. When you start working, do you not need to obtain some contracts and build up experience that you can use as a form of advertising?

The new services introduced by the international telecom company I worked for were offered at less than half the price of those offered by our competitors. The purpose was to have our services used and tested by customers, demonstrating the superior quality and features of our services in comparison to the competition. The point is that the seller, a new entrant to an existing market, has to demonstrate the value of their services before prices can be raised.

I was frankly disappointed in the two young fellows trying their hands at establishing a new business without doing some background work, especially in asking for prices way above market rates.

Traveling on the Boeing 737 Max: A Passenger’s Perspective

July 9, 2024

The travel agent booked us a flight from Ottawa to Vancouver. It was a non-stop flight. That is what I like. However, I discovered the plane was a Boeing 737 Max when I received the itinerary. The infamous one. You remember? That model crashed twice, once in 2018 (Lion Air Indonesian Airline) and once in 2019 (Ethiopian Airlines), where 346 people died. After the crashes, all flying authorities banned the plane; all airlines grounded the 737 Max aircraft, and a whole set of studies began to identify the causes.

All 737 Max’s sat on the ground for almost two years; after substantial changes and modifications to these planes, some authorities and airlines eased up, and the aircraft flew again. The studies indicated that the company rushed the plane’s production to compete with other similarly designed planes and indulged in cost-cutting measures without attention to safety. Subsequently, the company changed its executive suite, the CEO left, and the company paid over $2.5 billion to the victims, to the airlines inconvenienced by the grounding of the planes and a penalty. The 737 Max was back in production and flying again by 2021.

The travel agent assured me that the plane was safe. She said the 737 Max was probably the most studied and safest plane today. She did not mention that a 737 Max lost a panel (a door plug) off the fuselage on an Alaska Airlines flight in January, forcing the plane to an emergency landing.

Did her opinion make me feel good about the safety of the aircraft? I am not sure, but we had tickets on it. At any rate, what options did we have? Should we look for another flight, airline, or route that avoids the 737 Max? Should we cancel our trip?

My thoughts raced around flying on this airplane, including the possibility of crashing. But why worry if all authorities and airlines are comfortable with this plane? In the end, we boarded the plane.

The Boeing 737 Max is a narrow-bodied plane with a three-plus-three-seat configuration. The seats are 18 inches wide, while the aisle is twenty inches wide. Up front, there are sixteen first-class seats in four rows, followed by 159 economy seats, separated by a bulkhead from the premier seats.

The travel agent booked us on an aisle and a window seat behind the bulkhead, explaining that middle seats are the least popular and that we may find additional space between us should the middle seat stay unoccupied. The idea did not work out this time; the plane was packed, and we had a pleasant gentleman watching adventure movies during the flight to Vancouver.

The toilet up front, only five rows ahead from the bulkhead where we sat, was strictly for first-class passengers. Economy-class passengers had toilets in the back of the plane, meaning we had to walk back twenty-five rows. To add insult to injury, the sixteen first-class people had one toilet while we, economy-class people, while 159 economy-class passengers had two.

You can draw any number of conclusions, but most people use a washroom at least once during a five-hour flight. When I visited the toilet, there was a lineup at the back of the plane along the narrow aisle. I thought I would never reserve a seat at the end of this plane.

What was interesting and disturbing was that the two toilets in the back of the airplane were adjacent to the food trucks. I thought this layout would not pass food inspectors in our city. I assume the reason for putting the service area next to the toilets was an efficient and tight layout design.

But wait a minute; I am not finished with the toilets yet. Let me say that while waiting my turn, I noticed some people turning sideways to enter the toilet. The door to the bathroom was narrow. Someone entered the toilet, backing into it, figuring there may not be enough room to turn around inside!

I also intuitively thought there was something unfair about first-class ticket holders receiving quick access to toilets while others, sitting in the back of the bus—sorry, back of the plane—line up for a toilet visit. We are people with similar natural needs, and the waiting time for a toilet should be identical.  

On the other hand, the service was excellent except for the slowdowns when the food trucks had to back up, letting people attend to their toilet needs in the narrow aisle of the economy class. The narrow aisles also made it difficult to pass each other.

I read that the Boeing 737 Max has been a commercial success. Air Canada has forty aircraft, and many more are on order. I wish, though, that the designers rethink the airplane’s layout to provide better access to toilets for all classes of passengers.

I also read today that Boeing admitted to mismanagement, resulting in a couple of crashes to avoid being sued in court (July 8, 2024).