Tactics

  Fisher and Ury’s Getting to Yes (first published in 1981 and never out of print)  was followed ten years later by Ury’s Getting Past No.  Both made a significant impact on our negotiation…

Mediators are well acquainted with parties blaming one another for problems.  Scapegoating in particular can get in the way of coming to terms, instead leading to an escalation of bad feelings and an…

This article was prepared by Christian-Radu Chereji and Constantin-Adi Gavrilă. The monologue situation We have all met the person in our mediations. The one that comes to the table and monopolizes…

It's been a while since I wrote about practical tips for mediators. Yet when I ask people what they want from training or teaching the commonest answer is... practical tips. I offer some below on…

While it is obvious that law is significant in legal disputes, how the law is used is not so obvious. This piece uses Oliver Wendell Holmes's famous definition of the law as “prophecies of what the…

I was puzzled to get an email from a mediator thanking me for my recent post, which advocated using a unified conceptual framework of unbundled mediation interventions. The puzzling part was that she…

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…

  Alright, idiots, what's the problem? And don't waste my time! “Hi, I’m Rick. I’m your mediator for today. I can’t decide what happens in this dumb dispute or how you resolve issues. My job is just…

  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…