A recent Scottish Universities Insight Institute project looking at regional innovation strategies featured a presentation by Peter Wostner from the Institute of Macroeconomic Analysis and Development in Slovenia. He framed the development of innovation ecosystems as a collective action problem. This type of problem has been defined as “a situation in which all individuals would be…
Tribalism is often referenced as a significant factor in much of the conflict we see around us at the moment. Perhaps this isn’t so surprising when we look back at the story of human evolution as described by biological anthropologist David Samsom in a recent book “Our Tribal Future: How to channel our human instinct…
In recent years we have learned a lot more about what have become known as cognitive biases and how they may play a part in negotiation and mediation. These are mental shortcuts that save energy and get us out of tight spots that have evolved over thousands of years. Well over a hundred have been…
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…
In a few weeks’ time I will come to the end of a two-year mediation engagement in South Eastern Europe. The conflict in question relates to environmental pollution. The issues are complex and heavily contested, and there are many stakeholders – government, city authorities, environmental groups, investors and business, to name a few. It has…
Christmas is a holiday and a time for reflection and relaxation for many around the world, so in this blog post I won’t focus on mediation as it is practiced and trained. Instead I make two recommendations for films to watch, both of which are centered around the theme of empathy. Both touched me and…
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…
“Adi, I will be honest with you. When my lawyer suggested to try and mediate this case, I had no idea what she was talking about. At the time, I was blinded by fury and all I wanted to do was to teach my wife a lesson, given all the pain she caused me. I…
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 are challenges such as influencing other parties, getting the best deal possible, making well-informed judgment calls about risk, developing effective offers, and…
Forced into quarantine due to COVID-19, thousands of miles away from home; I have struggled with silence, but eventually made peace with it, thanks to my Jesuit upbringing. Over a decade ago, as a Jesuit novice, I ventured on a reflective journey called the ‘Spiritual Exercises’ – a month-long retreat that is the hallmark of…
