Negotiations have reached an impasse, but both sides agree on one thing: you need help resolving the dispute. You engage a neutral mediator to do just that. Rather than acting as a judge who decides who “wins” or “loses,” a third-party mediator assists parties in reaching an agreement.
Negotiators often feel unprepared for mediation. The very
mediator
An impartial, mutually acceptable third party whose goal is to help conflicted parties resolve their dispute. Mediators lack the power to coerce or bargain, but they can use facilitative power to influence disputants. (Michael Watkins and Susan Rosegrant, Breakthrough International Negotiations [Jossey-Bass, 2001], 93)
The following items are tagged mediator.
How Lawyers Affect Mediation
How does the presence of lawyers affect the process of mediation? You might guess that when one or both sides bring an attorney to a mediation, the process would become more contentious and adversarial, with impasse more likely, than if the parties worked solely with a mediator.
That conventional wisdom is contradicted by new research by
“Med-arb”: An Effective Tool for Resolving Disputes
The problem: You’re not sure which of two common dispute resolution processes, mediation or arbitration, to use to resolve your conflict. Mediation is appealing because it would allow you to reach a collaborative settlement, but you’re worried it could end in impasse. You know that arbitration would wrap up your dispute conclusively, but it wouldn’t
Peter Kamminga
Peter Kamminga is Associate Professor of Law at Amsterdam University in the Netherlands and a PON Postdoctoral Research Fellow, specializing in negotiation and contracting of complex infrastructure projects. In his current research Dr. Kamminga examines the influence of legal governance mechanisms on contracting and dispute resolution processes. He has a particular interest in the negotiation and contracting processes of stakeholders involved in infrastructure development and water projects.
Alain Lempereur, PON Executive Committee
Alain Lempereur is the Alan B. Slifka Professor at Brandeis University, and the director of the Masters’ Programs in Coexistence and Conflict at the Heller School for Social Policy and Management. He is a member of the Executive Committee of the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School, where he was also a visiting professor. His current research is devoted to responsible negotiation.
Why your lawyer could be wrong about apologies
If you’ve ever had a minor car accident in which neither you nor the other driver was obviously at fault, familiar advice may have run through your head as you got out of your car: Don’t say you’re sorry! Don’t say you’re sorry!
Most of us have been cautioned in such contexts that an apology can
Dr. William Ury and Dr. Gary Slutkin speak at the PON screening of The Interrupters
The Program on Negotiation Film Series recently screened The Interrupters, a documentary film that follows three “violence interrupters” as they work to prevent violence in Chicago’s neighborhoods. The interrupters are outreach workers who were once notorious for their past gang-related experience, but who now work for an organization called CeaseFire, an initiative of the Chicago
Mediation and conflict resolution
It’s often the case that when two people or organizations try to resolve a dispute by determining who is right, they get stuck. That’s why so many disputes end up in court.
There is a better way to resolve your dispute: by hiring an expert mediator who focuses not on rights but on interests—the needs, desires,
PON Film Series presents “The Interrupters”
The PON Film Series presents
“The Interrupters”
followed by a post-screening discussion with
William Ury, co-author of Getting to YES &
Gary Slutkin, Executive Director of Chicago’s Ceasefire
Date: Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Time: 6:30 PM
Location: Ames Courtroom, Austin Hall, Harvard Law School Campus
The Interrupters tells the moving and surprising stories of three Violence Interrupters who try to protect their Chicago
Involving mediators in settlement talks
Adapted from “The Mediator as Team Adviser,” by Stephen B. Goldberg (professor, Northwestern University), first published in the Negotiation newsletter, May 2006.
When faced with a trial, a corporation sometimes engages one law firm to represent it in court and a second law firm to explore settlement possibilities. According to conventional wisdom, the second law firm
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