Business, Communication, Cooperation, Dialogue, Economics, Governments/Public Sector, Mediation and Society, Public Policy, Trust

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Given Peter Drucker’s memorable observation, how valuable an asset is trust in shaping a culture? What role could mediators play in strengthening it? From a purely economic perspective there appears to be a strong relationship between levels of trust and output per head (as the chart below from ‘Our World in Data’ demonstrates). As with…

Book Review, Business, Causes of Conflict, Cognitive Bias, Commercial Mediation, Dialogue, Economics, Governments/Public Sector, Mediation and Society, Partnering, Public Policy

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“The road to hell is paved with good intentions” was a saying I heard quite a few times while growing up, as another childhood wheeze bit the dust. I returned to it while reading Michal Sandel’s recent book ‘The Tyranny of Merit’, in which he takes a very critical look at the notion of meritocracy….

Business, Communication, Cooperation, Creativity, Dialogue, Economics, Mediation and Society, Partnering, Policy, Trust, Uncategorized

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Might we get better results in many of the tasks we undertake if we gave more thought to the way we do things before focusing too early on what to do?  As mediators we know that spending sufficient time on the process of problem solving and negotiation pays dividends in terms of the content. There are…

Business, Cooperation, COVID-19, Dialogue, Economics, Mediation and Society, Public Policy

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“in the wreckage left behind by the coronavirus pandemic, a new era is beginning. What does it hold?….What is clear is that the old economic paradigm is looking tired. One way or another, change is coming.” The Economist This quote relates to the way in which economies are managed at a macro level – where the…

COVID-19, Dialogue, Economics, Growth of the Field (Challenges, New Sectors, etc.), Mediation and Society, Public Policy, Uncategorized

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“Value will change in the post-covid world. On one level, that’s obvious: valuations in global financial markets have imploded, with many suffering their sharpest declines in decades. More fundamentally, the traditional drivers of value have been shaken, new ones will gain prominence, and there’s a possibility that the gulf between what markets value and what people…

COVID-19, crisis negotiatons, Dialogue, Economics, Environmental Mediation, Game Theory, Governments/Public Sector, International Mediation, Mediation and Society, Public Policy

(Core Solutions Group / Scottish Universities Insight Institute)/ /1 Comment

So ended a recent article in the FT by Martin Wolf on the economic response needed in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. In it he argues that Governments acting in the collective interest must be the buyer of last resort as well as the lender of last resort to prevent the economy imploding as…

Creativity, cross-border mediation, Dialogue, Environmental Mediation, International Mediation, Public Policy, Scotland, Transformation, UN and International Organizations

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The start of a new decade offers a great opportunity to reflect and plan. There is a growing consensus that the 2020s will be crucial in transforming the way we live and work if we are to have any chance of ensuring the planet is able to accommodate our species. Nearly everything we do is…

Business, Cognitive Bias, Creativity, Economics, Efficiency, Environmental Mediation, Game Theory, Mediation and Society, Public Policy

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If the natural resources of the planet and its capacity to cope with our waste are finite, is it reasonable for mediators to be encouraging people to search for positive sum solutions which can benefit all parties to a negotiation? If you can achieve a win-win in one case could it, on a global scale,…

Brexit, Causes of Conflict, Cognitive Bias, Impasse, Non-violent communication

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In an increasingly turbulent and polarised world, where fear and anxiety are on the march and divide and rule is more in evidence, it is tempting to circle the waggons to keep those who disagree with us at bay. In this sort of environment differences are magnified, positions become entrenched, interests are overlooked and others…

Bias, Cognitive Bias, Creativity, Decision making, Fear, Guitar, Intuition, Neuroscience, Time Pressure, Uncategorized

(Core Solutions Group / Scottish Universities Insight Institute)/ /2 Comments

“If two people are in a room, there are actually six to consider: “What each person is; what each person thinks he or she is; and what each person thinks the other is.” So began a recent Guardian editorial on relations between Iran and the USA. This observation is attributed to the late wife of…