The Development of an Industrial Relations Teaching Game

A teaching game was designed to demonstrate that the manner of a management message can obscure perception of its substance. Numerous trade union shop stewards played this game as the central part of a negotiation and bargaining exercise. The game was found to work as intended by the designers and was assessed as an effective and interesting means of training by the shop stewards. It is argued that O.R. workers can assist in the design of further games of this type and therefore make a useful contribution to difficult and very important real world problems.