Nina has worked with many cultures in her decades of mediation work. She will share concepts such as the different ways of looking at fairness, how cultures respond to conflict and why they have dissimilar desires as to their goals and outcomes, how people express the same emotion in a variety of ways, and why it is a common mistake to "pretend to be in someone else's…

It turns out transformative mediation is the most effective approach when lawyers are involved.  It allows for the bad news about the other side's commitment to their perspective to be communicated directly and clearly; and it allows for the good news that the other side isn't pure evil to be communicated; and it allows for the highest quality conversation possible about both the heart of the dispute and the possibilities for improvement.  …

As more and more teachers in the area of negotiation and dispute resolution consider taking their courses (or, parts of them) online, I’ve received many queries of the “How do you get started?” variety. And, I’m not the only one fielding these questions. I'd like to share a resource, addressing these questions.

Together with co –presenters and –authors Jennifer Parlamis (University of San Francisco), Roy Lewicki (Ohio State University) and…

Bill Warters, an expert on conflict resolution in higher education, will describe the Master of Arts in Dispute Resolution program based in the Department of Communication at Wayne State University in Detroit. He will review dispute resolution in Higher Education generally and…

Tips for Lawyers When Working with a Mediator

In his column in the latest issue of The Professional Family Mediator, Chip Rose writes about the idea of “The Perfect Mediation.”

As a highly experienced mediator, Mr. Rose acknowledges that a…

In our latest blog entry, available here, Janet Mueller describes her participation at an International Mediation Conference in Slovenia.

When to compromise and when to hold fast to our principles is one of the most difficult challenges we face when dealing with conflict. Listen in on June 24 at 8 pm Eastern as mediator, professor and author Bernie Mayer considers how these two values…

We have all experienced the drama when we engage in destructive and dysfunctional conflict. It is draining, damaging and downright unhealthy. Zena Zumeta will talk with the Texas Conflict Coach, Pattie Porter to discuss her new Minibuk…

I must admit something: I’ve been known to watch some reality T.V., most of it on the Bravo network. I’m not particularly proud of it, but I’m glad I tuned in the other day because I happened to catch an ad for a new show called, “Untying the Knot.”

I

It’s about a divorce attorney and “top mediator,” and, of course, I HAD to watch!

I caught the first show today, and I watched as a California mediator helped a divorcing couple split up the last three assets in…

As a mediation trainer for fifteen years, I must have had these words come out of my mouth thousands of times: Don’t try to fix it for them. As anyone that trains mediators knows, problem solving is such a hard habit to break when you are first starting out. You listen intently to what the parties have to say and the predicament that they find themselves in and when you…

The Alliance for Peacebuilding (AfP) is seeking to create a new Affinity Group for international mediators. The International Mediators’ Community of Practice (IMCP) will provide an informal platform for…

Our latest blog entry, which you can read here, observes how tempting it can be for a mediator to give advice to certain clients.  But should we?  

Many people have encountered great challenges and unbearable pain from disputes as a result of strongly held values, belief systems and personal principles. And yet, people have the courage and ability to break through these barriers and create a common bridge. Eric Galton, renowned mediator, is a catalyst for these breakthroughs providing people with a safe…

(First published in Conflict Conversations blog)

A recent Supreme Court of Canada decision, Union Carbide Canada Inc. v. Bombardier Inc., 2014 SCC…

Power, in the field of conflict resolution, is defined as the ability to bring about a preferred outcome. Mediation practitioners further differentiate between the use of power to impose an outcome and the use of power to bring out the conflict parties’ preferred outcome...Read more

SAN JOSE, CALIF. – April 29, 2014 – Modria, provider of the world’s leading online dispute resolution (ODR) platform, announced today that it has acquired Netherlands-based Juripax B.V., an online mediation software provider. Juripax has the leading European online dispute resolution platform, helping mediators and dispute resolvers, companies, and consumers resolve disputes…

If you'd like to know more about transformative mediation, here's a free chance to learn from some of the leaders in the field.  Read about these free teleconferences here.

Read this great blog post by on Indisputably, by Jen Reynolds at University of Oregon School of Law. Jen describes an exercise that she presented at the ABA’s recent conference, which aimed at helping students develop “critical patience”, which dispute resolution practitioners need so much. Sure, we say “patience is very, very important” all the time – but how do we teach it, or help our students develop…

Check this out: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2419712

I've always thought that end-of-course activities should go far beyond the classic wrap-up – a teacher reviewing what s/he thinks was included on the curriculum…