Below the line

  Offers in mediation are too often approached with all the coyness of gauche teenagers at a school dance (acknowledging that this metaphor may reveal too much about my own youth!). It need not be…

I am not really one for elevator pitches. But I did hear one the other day about creating impact in a very short space of time, and I was struck by its relevance to mediation. Essentially, the…

I blogged recently on the importance in mediation of not forgetting what is happening in the other room. It’s an easy mistake to make. Here’s another one that is easy to make. “Assumed motivation”…

  Mediation can be an intense experience for parties and their advisers. Often there is a lot on the line. In the substance there may be money, control, reputation, pride. In the process, there…

Twice today I've found myself responding to mediator reflections in these terms: the money's not about the money. Both cases involved financial negotiation, even haggling, but that's deceptive. The…

This is the first in a short series of how parties and advisers can best deploy the “assets” at their disposal in a mediation. Naturally, it is written from my perspective as a mediator, and so I…

  One of the privileges of mediating is to watch leaders at work. Every party, every team, has its leader(s). And as any mediator will tell you, the way in which they choose to lead during a…

Pollyanna/pɒlɪˈanə/ noun/an excessively cheerful or optimistic person. "what I am saying makes me sound like some ageing Pollyanna who just wants to pretend that all is sweetness and light" Every…

Bloomberg (not my usual reading fodder, I confess) carried an interesting piece a couple of months ago, entitled “Meet the Real Force Behind the Brexit Talks”. Yes, it was about Brexit (yawn) but it…