After over 20 years as a mediator, my passion for dispute resolution and assisting parties resolve conflict burns brightly. I find it as exciting and rewarding now as I did 20 years ago. I look forward with anticipation to upcoming mediations.

The passion I have for mediation extends to my role as a mediator. As part and parcel of my role as a mediator, I must remain calm, mindful, balanced and not take things personal.

As an example, I recently conducted a mediation between two parties who had not spoken in 4 years and they were both very frustrated, angry and bitter.  Their goal was to “win at mediation” at any cost. The mediation took over 6 hours but ended up being a complete success and the parties reached resolution on all issues and at the end were chatting with each other. They both gave me glowing feedback. One of the things that I am amazed by is that time goes by so quickly. It did not seem like we had spent 6 hours – maybe 2-3 hours.

It is such a wonderful feeling to know that about 90% of the mediations I facilitate resolve. It reaffirms my faith in the process and my abilities to work with the parties towards the goal of resolution.

I look forward to another year and many more years of mediation and assisting parties with resolution.

Happy and joyous holidays to one and all.