While working on the manuscript for a book published last year (Negotiation: Things Corporate Counsel need to know but were not taught – Wolters Kluwer, 2017), I submitted a draft to an eclectic peer group from all around the world to gauge whether I was on the right track. The group comprised corporate counsel, business…
You can get much farther with a kind word and a gun than you can with a kind word alone. Al Capone This popular quote attributed to the famous US mobster announce the use of force and other dirty tricks in negotiation. I do not especially like it. I would relativise it by the following…
During its 68th session from 5 – 9 February in New York UNCITRAL Working Group II (Dispute Settlement) concluded its work on the preparation of an instrument or instruments on the enforcement of international commercial settlement agreements arising from mediation. In the mediation community we often refer to such settlements as (international) mediated settlement agreements…
It’s not easy to blog once a month, even on a subject I love. Often I sit down to write with no real ideas or inspiration. Sometimes I end up that way too (as you may have noticed!). It becomes easy to dread the approach of my monthly publication date. Often the pressure lies in…
On 12 October 2017, the law numbered 7036 on labour courts was adopted making mediation mandatory in certain types of labour disputes in Turkey. Accordingly, a claim for the collection of receivables or compensation either by the employer or employee or for the reinstatement of an employee, must first be filed before a mediation bureau….
Recently, I was ruminating about analogies between cricket and mediation. Cricket is a much-loved sport in Scotland. Sadly, nowadays, changes in the climate mean that cricket in my home country is more often affected by summer rain and damp conditions than a generation ago. Its future is less certain as a result. I have always…
Readers who are experts on the wartime British Prime Minister or have recently watched “The Darkest Hour” may find the above caption familiar. Yes, it has been inspired by Winston Churchill’s famous quote “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” If you like the caption, feel…
As Chip and Dan Heath describe in their book Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard, we are rational beings with a “Rider” that logically analyzes our surroundings. Our Rider tries to direct our emotional side, “the Elephant.” Although we like to think our Rider is in control at all times, in truth,…
In 1933 Alfred Korzybski wrote: “A map is not the territory it represents, but, if correct, it has a similar structure to the territory, which accounts for its usefulness.” More recently (2006), James Robertson wrote (to reference him once again, this time from ‘The Testament of Gideon Mack’): “We trust in maps because when we…
While I am watching hailstones the size of peas fall in the West of Ireland, a good number of my colleagues are celebrating the culmination of the ICC’s Mediation Competition in Paris, where in excess of 60 teams of mediators and negotiators compete to resolve disputes through mediation. The relevance of this to today’s blog…
