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]
I have had several mediations lately in which the approach of the parties clashed. The clash can be labelled as the one-shot player vs the repeat player.(See: Is That All There Is? The Problem in Court-Oriented Mediation by Leonard L. Riskin and Nancy Walsh, 15 George Mason Law Review ___ [Read More]
Thanks to “safer at home” orders, I, like many other mediators, have spent my time learning the intricacies of video conferencing and more specifically Zoom as it has become crystal clear that mediations by telephone or video conference will be the “new normal”. It will be many months if not [Read More]
In preparing to teach a class on mediation ethics, I read Mediation Ethics edited by Ellen Waldman (Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, 2011). In it, she makes a point I had never thought about: The Model Standards of Conduct for Mediators are inconsistent. (Id. at 13-14.) (“Model Standards”) While the Model Standards [Read More]
Several weeks ago, I attended the annual fall conference of the Southern California Mediation Association (SCMA). While all the sessions were very good, one of them on emotional intelligence (presented by Harold Coleman, Jr. Esq, Debra Dupree MFT, Psy.D., and Matt Argue, Esq. entitled “The Modern Mediator: Interplay of Psychology [Read More]
Recently, I conducted a mediation in which defense counsel was very candid with me by advising that she was there only because the court ordered the mediation and her client would just assume take the matter to trial. In this connection, she further advised that her client has been taking [Read More]
Although as a full time neutral, I usually get paid for mediating, as a way to give back to the community, I am on various state and federal court mediator panels in which parties can utilize my services for a certain number of hours on a pro bono basis or [Read More]
On Saturday, March 19, 2016, the Southern California Mediation Association held a Town Hall on two topics: mediator certification and mediation confidentiality. It is the latter that I wish to discuss. The Supreme Court of California has repeatedly held that mediation confidentiality as set out in California Evidence Code Sections [Read More]
