Despite the beautiful summer sunshine outside the window, the end of holidays always bring us back to the unavoidable reality of the new year: hard work. January is time to go through the large number of data and information that is published every year end, picturing not only the previous year (in this case, 2012),…
A potpourri of mediation-related reflections as the holiday break fades from memory. Hockey Mediation – With last Saturday’s puck drops in 13 cities the National Hockey League has commenced its lockout-shortened season. Full arenas around the league confirm the strength of the game’s drawing power if not the forgive-and-forget sentiments of long-suffering fans. Readers of this…
Mediating complex employment cases is like rehearsing for a concerto. The conductor spends a substantial amount of time reviewing the score, while the musicians practice the piece both individually and collectively. Hours and hours of practice result in one concert. Malcolm Gladwell, in his recent book ‘Outliers,’ describes the phenomenon of hugely successful people and…
I read a long time ago that lessons for life can be found everywhere as long as we look for them. As with many of these quotes that we read, my response was to nod sagaciously, file it away for future reference and then forget all about it. I was driving the other day, about…
Well, the New Year is a time for reflections, making new resolutions and fresh starts. In Hong Kong the 1st of January 2013 saw a fresh start for the mediation regulatory regime with the coming into force of the Mediation Ordinance (MO), which I wrote about last month. But it’s not just the MO, which…
Edinburgh is one of the world’s top tourist attractions. To quote its own website “Edinburgh is an multi-award-winning, world-class tourist destination. A must-see cultural capital. From stunning skylines to sandy beaches, festivals to fireworks – the city has something for everyone, day and night.” So, it can hardly have been good for business when, during…
It is not often that one has the satisfaction of witnessing mediation attracting so much public attention as has been the case lately in Canada and the US. All this thanks to Mediator, Scot Beckenbaugh, credited for his ‘extraordinary contribution’ to resolve the NHL Lockout dispute. Some observers have already nominated Mr. Beckenbaugh for the…
In previous posts I had pointed out how difficult it is in my area to make mediation taking off and despite the fact that Switzerland has been known as a “neutral” country with a long standing practice of promoting peace in the settlement of dispute, at least viewed from an international perspective. A figurehead of…
The last months of 2012 saw three young girls end their own lives in the Northwest of Ireland. Bullying, particularly via social media, was implicated in all three deaths. Around the same time but by coincide, a national television programme focused on bullying and its effect on the victims, their families and the bullies themselves….
Down here in New Zealand it’s high summer and most of the country will spend until the end of January at the beach. I remember, when I was still at my law firm 10 years ago, the feeling of brief respite at this time of year before having to put on my boots again and trudge…
