Strategic Escalation
Ever wondered why sometimes when you are about to go to a meeting of a "negotiation" nature, your supervisor / boss would tell you to attend the meeting without him / her and never to commit anything at the meeting?
Well, this is known as strategic escalation. Basically the game play is such that because the boss doesn't want to be forced into a commitment (knowing that he's is the decision maker) in that meeting. Hence he sends you (the representative which does not have the decision making power) to attend the meeting, to negotiate without commitment, and in the event that you're forced to make a commitment you can always say "I need to clear with my boss on this first". Sounds good?
Some vendors are also familiar with this technique and hence they sometimes insist to have a authorised decision maker to sit in the meeting in order not to waste their time. Then again, there are ways to go around this demand.
Such techniques are also used by bosses in inter-departmental meetings for the same reasons. Hopefully, issues could be settled at the operational level so that bosses need not to go through the challenges of a negotiation. It gets challenging as the escalation process go to higher levels as the higher level bosses needed to maintain a cordial working relationship while also trying to resolve a conflict between the departments at the operational level. In the end, the outcome would seemed like a win-win situation (sometimes it is a real win-win) but usually one party will lose or all party lose.
Under such situations, it is also a good chance for you to prove your own capabilities at handling issues. If all goes well, it shows that you are capable of handling issues and getting things done (plus points if you are being targeted for a promotion). If you are able to escalate a situation at the appropriate time, it also shows you know when is the time to let the bosses take over (another plus point) and not make the situation worse.
If you're a boss, this is a good technique to empower your worker and test his capabilities.
If you're a worker, this is a good chance to prove yourself and show your boss what you can accomplish.
Either way, this is a useful technique that had been used very frequently in both the public and private sectors.