One of the most important things a mediator must do- if not the most important- is to build trust and rapport with the parties. In pre-Covid days, this was a bit easier; the mediator could sit face to face with each party and schmooze. Now, we are reduced to being [Read More]
One of the courses I am teaching is Employment Dispute Mediation in which I am essentially teaching the students how to mediate. We are at the point of discussing persuasive techniques and bargaining tactics. One of them intrigued me because although I have used it, I did not realize [Read More]
No doubt, you have encountered the situation where you are addressing a group of people and ask a question and are met with silence… absolute quiet! It feels awkward… no one is answering your question.(Indeed, Anglophones can not tolerate more than four seconds of silence while the Japanese can tolerate [Read More]
One value in being a mediator is learning how to think outside the box: to brainstorm. I learned long ago that any problem usually has more than one resolution. So… this is all about Buddy – part 2. Needless to say, Buddy took awhile to recover from the anti-anxiety medicine [Read More]
One adage that I learned early on in my career is that disputes usually arise due either to a lack of communication or to a miscommunication. My own personal experience provides yet another example. I have two English Springer Spaniels: Buddy and Cookie. Buddy is an aggressive male while Cookie [Read More]
Almost one year ago, life for most of us changed irrevocably: we went from commuting to and from our offices and fighting traffic to commuting between our bedrooms and “home” offices and fighting over internet access. We went into “lockdown.” And with it, we all took an accelerated course on [Read More]
Mediations have a lot to do with trust. Not only must each party have some trust in the mediator but also should have at least a minimal degree of trust in the other side. If everyone completely distrusts everyone else in the mediation, there will be no resolution. In fact, [Read More]
Life is full of coincidences. Recently, I agreed to teach a class on cross-cultural negotiation. A few days later, the Harvard Negotiation Project published an article entitled, “Dear Negotiation Coach: How Can I Improve My Cross- Cultural Negotiation Skills?” (February 16, 2021). ("Negotiation Coach") Besides my academic teaching interest in [Read More]
