Key Highlights Class #7 (10/28/06)

Paraphrase, Listen and Ask Questions
The groups of three felt like a group negotiation except with a referee - the mediator - in the middle. During the first round, the mediator tried talking to both sides separately regarding the dry cleaning/damages dispute and asked leading questions which suggested certain solutions to the problem. Ultimately the owner of the dry cleaner agreed to pay a small amount and offered free dry cleaning going forward. When I was the mediator in the role-play, the hardest thing to do was to not suggest solutions but simply ask probing questions to both parties. Jumping into the role play was hard for the mediator because the opponents had their own way of framing the disagreement. The mediator had to take control of the situation and find out what was going on in the dispute in an unbiased manner. I found it interesting and a little surprising how little the mediator actually knows about the situation before starting the meeting. In addition to being neutral, the Mediator is responsible for setting the Ground Rules in terms of not interrupting and the goals of the meeting (i.e, to find an agreement). The Mediator’s biggest challenge was in asking the right questions and trying to discover as much information as possible. By asking each party for their point of view and practicing active listening by summarizing both sides, the Mediator should focus on the important facts to facilitate an agreement.

Techniques
Because the opponents were adversarial during the role plan, the Mediator decided to pull us separately out of the room for a private one on one conversation pretty soon after the conversation began. Overall, the Mediator should ask each party for their point of view and practice active listening by summarizing both sides of the story. As a Mediator, it is most important not to take sides and use non-threatening language to encourage active participation by both parties.

Key Highlights Class #6 (10/21/06)

Areas of Common Interests are Challenging to Discover in Multiple Groups Cases: The Deeport Case (I was fighting for Environmental Interests)

The Deeport case started out with the Company man posturing for the dominant position and provide the first offer - the offer was Medium Industry Mix which was unacceptable from my point of view as the environmentalist; Maintain and Repair Ecological Impact which also not my first choice but I could live with, No Union Preference which was not relevant in my eyes nor were Federal Loan and No compensation. Having put this offer on the table was a chance to see where the other parties stood with regard to their own positions and right away everyone voted No to this particular proposal. When the first offer made by the company failed, I attempted to get the Union and the Governor into an Alliance along side with me thinking they could help by voting to improve the environment. After discussing, we collectively agreed on only one area where we could all to accept 2:1 Union quotas. It was challenging to find common ground with varied interests such as the Company, the Governor and the Union and in the end the conversation did not help my cause. We successfully whittled the list of demands within our little alliance but hit a road block when the Governor was unwilling to accept “Improve Ecological Impact.” At that point, I decided we would not find a common area of interest and moved onto working with the Other Ports. My rationale was that if Deeport could get a bigger loan than we could pay out a bigger sum to the Other Ports and by agreeing to voting for that, I figured the Other Ports would vote to improve the Environment. Asking questions was the key to getting the conversation moving and trying to move the conversation towards solving the problem so there would not be an impasse.
After much discussion among mini-alliances and individuals posturing for power, we collective came to a satisfactory agreement of Medium Industry Mix, Improve the Ecological Impact, Union quota if 2:1 and a $2 billion loan and Post settlement – making adjustments after the agreement. By asking lots of probing questions and creating Alliances, the two weakest parties (Other Ports and Environmental) appeared to have more leverage and power with their vote. The tone of the negotiation was tense initially but turned friendly when the Governor tried to include everyone in the decisions. It was surprising how long it took to figure out how to get the Deeport Deal done.