Every once in awhile, I blog about how important it is to prepare for mediation and how parties and/or counsel cannot come to mediation expecting simply to "wing it" and succeed. It will not work! A recent mediation is a case in point. It was a straightforward collection case. Plaintiff [Read More]
Readers of not only my blog but those of other California neutrals are no doubt familiar with all of the hullaballoo raised over AB 2025- the California Legislature's attempt to exclude actions for legal malpractice and disciplinary actions from the cloak of mediation confidentiality. At present, that assembly bill has [Read More]
In my years as a mediator, it has struck me that the smaller the dispute, the harder it is to settle. And, I have always wondered why. Well, my friend and colleague, Maria Simpson, Ph.D., in her most recent Two Minute Training, explained the "why" quite succinctly: it is all [Read More]
As a mediator who handles a lot of "lemon" law matters, I have mediated many cases in which an alleged violation of the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act is one of the claims. Last fall, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals issued an opinion involving this Act. Recently, it withdrew its opinion [Read More]
On February 23, 2012, Assembly Bill 2025 (ab_2025_bill_20120223_introduced) was introduced in the California legislature. The intent of the bill was to abolish mediation confidentiality with respect to "... communications between a client and his or her attorney during mediation, in an action for legal malpractice or breach of fiduciary duty [Read More]
One of the major tools in a mediator's toolbox is "persuasion." Either through training, experience and/or intuition, a mediator learns tactics that can be used to "persuade" a party to compromise and settle a dispute. My friend and colleague, Maria Simpson Ph.D., defines "persuasion" as ". . .helping people agree [Read More]
Science never ceases to amaze me. Now there is a study that finds that being too happy is not a good thing. According to an article in the April 2, 2012 edition of The Washington Post entitled "Too much happiness can make you unhappy, studies show", one can be less [Read More]
If you have ever mediated a case with me (and most of you have not), you know that I crack jokes, especially in the opening joint session. There is a method to my madness; to take the tension out of the situation and try to put the parties at ease. [Read More]
