2023 Special graduate degree programs Specially Offered Degree Programs for Graduate Students Tokyo Tech Academy for Leadership

Recognition of Social Issues Workshop C

Academic unit or major: Tokyo Tech Academy for Leadership
Instructor(s): Keisuke Yamada / Kenshu Kamura / Yuri Matsuzaki
Class Format: Exercise (Face-to-face)
Media-enhanced courses: -
Day of week/Period (Classrooms): Intensive
Class: -
Course Code: TAL.S509
Number of credits: 010
Course offered: 2023
Offered quarter: 2Q
Syllabus updated: Jul 8, 2025
Language: English

Syllabus

Course overview and goals

ToTAL understands that recognizing and understanding issues which are occurred in current society and in the field of academic, business, politics, technology and art would be fundamental for the course category of “Leadership, followership and consensus building” which aim for fostering capabilities to proactively solve such issues with no correct answers. During the course of “Recognition of Social Issues Workshop I”, students will acquire the knowledge and skills needed to promote communication and negotiation process necessary in complex situations with multiple stakeholders.
Any communication between two or more persons with an intention to influence or to persuade is negotiation. Negotiation are pervasive in business, government, academia, law and everyday life with family and friends. The problem of negotiation is that it often fail--deals are not made, relationships are damaged and money and time are wasted. Recognize possibilities for mutual gain is a possible solution for a successful negotiation and we need to learn a simple and systematic way to do it. This course will give you an opportunity to increase your self-awareness and diagnostic capability as a negotiator. Students groups will be arranged for the group discussions about such as conflict resolution cases. The groups will be arranged to include students from various backgrounds.

Course description and aims

1. Based on knowledge and experience about negotiation process for consensus building made in “recognition of Social Issues Workshop A”, students are being expected to experience and reach more smooth and higher level of consensus.
2. Further to understanding about aims and function of mediator learned in Recognition of Social Issues Workshop A, practice mediator for building consensus among people concern more smoothly.

Keywords

Consensus building, Issue identification, Communication

Competencies

Specialist skills
Intercultural skills
Communication skills
Critical thinking skills
Practical and/or problem-solving skills

Class flow

The course schedule will be announced at Tokyo Tech Academy of Leadership website (http://www.total.titech.ac.jp). This program will give you an opportunity to increase your consensus-building and communication skills by learning theory and practice them by role-playing. Students are requested to submit a report about the learning objectives and results including improvements build upon what they have learned in Recognition of Social Issues Workshop A.

Course schedule/Objectives

	Course schedule	Objectives
Class 1	1. 21/Jun(Wed) 18:00-21:00 (venue will be informed you later) The world trading game Students will play an experience-based learning simulation game of world trading in which groups of students play the roles of the assigned country. All countries are different in terms of economical/technical resources. After the gameplay, students will reflect on personal behaviors and discuss how to make it more effective. 2. 8/Jul(Sat) 13:45-18:45 and 22/Jul(Sat) 13:45-18:45 (venue will be informed you later) Negotiation and consensus-building workshops - The basic theory of negotiation (lecture) While success and failure of negotiations highly depend on how much you prepared, you can't script negotiation - due to changes in the ideas and situations of the other party and oneself. Therefore, it is necessary to improvise while having a certain strategy. You will learn the basic theory of negotiation and learn how to put ideas together and make strategic decisions. - Distributive negotiation (role simulation) If your goal of negotiation is to maximize own gain, this type of negotiation is called “distributive negotiation” or “win-lose” style. You will learn the essence of this approach through a role play with other participants. - Integrative negotiation (role simulation) Integrative negotiation is an approach to create value in deals and disputes. It is a collaborative process and also called “win-win” style. You will have an opportunity to learn problem-solving negotiation through a role play with other participants. - Mediation (role simulation) Mediation is a process in which an impartial third party act as a catalyst to help others constructively address and perhaps resolve a dispute, plan transaction, or define the contours of a relationship. A mediator facilitates negotiation between the parties to enable better communication, encourage problem-solving, and develop an agreement or resolution by consensus among parties. You will experience the essence of mediation through a role-play of three parties.	Feedback Report

Course schedule

Objectives

Class 1

1. 21/Jun(Wed) 18:00-21:00 (venue will be informed you later)
The world trading game Students will play an experience-based learning simulation game of world trading in which groups of students play the roles of the assigned country. All countries are different in terms of economical/technical resources. After the gameplay, students will reflect on personal behaviors and discuss how to make it more effective.

2. 8/Jul(Sat) 13:45-18:45 and 22/Jul(Sat) 13:45-18:45 (venue will be informed you later)
Negotiation and consensus-building workshops
- The basic theory of negotiation (lecture) While success and failure of negotiations highly depend on how much you prepared, you can't script negotiation - due to changes in the ideas and situations of the other party and oneself. Therefore, it is necessary to improvise while having a certain strategy. You will learn the basic theory of negotiation and learn how to put ideas together and make strategic decisions.
- Distributive negotiation (role simulation) If your goal of negotiation is to maximize own gain, this type of negotiation is called “distributive negotiation” or “win-lose” style. You will learn the essence of this approach through a role play with other participants.
- Integrative negotiation (role simulation) Integrative negotiation is an approach to create value in deals and disputes. It is a collaborative process and also called “win-win” style. You will have an opportunity to learn problem-solving negotiation through a role play with other participants.
- Mediation (role simulation) Mediation is a process in which an impartial third party act as a catalyst to help others constructively address and perhaps resolve a dispute, plan transaction, or define the contours of a relationship. A mediator facilitates negotiation between the parties to enable better communication, encourage problem-solving, and develop an agreement or resolution by consensus among parties. You will experience the essence of mediation through a role-play of three parties.

Feedback Report

Study advice (preparation and review)

To enhance effective learning, students are encouraged to spend approximately 100 minutes preparing for class and another 100 minutes reviewing class content afterwards (including assignments) for each class.
They should do so by referring to course material.

Textbook(s)

None

Reference books, course materials, etc.

None

Evaluation methods and criteria

1. Class attendance and attitude in class (50%)
2. Feedback reports (50%)

Related courses

TAL.S505： Recognition of Social Issues Workshop A

Prerequisites

This course can be applied by the students who completed TAL.S505 Recognition of Social Issues Workshop A.