I "don't know" and I'm going to run with that

  I felt crappy even before the face-to-face mediation began, this week.  Fighting some seasonal bug, I was hoping the mediation would be a short one, no matter the outcome, and I would soon be on my way home, to a hot apple cider and a bed. It was not a short one.  Yet, what […]

The Cloud and Mobile are the Mediator's future office

I mediated a trans-national business dispute last week.  The mediation took place over several days, and was conducted online, over the Internet.  There was zero physical paper exchanged.  I worked from my laptop, from my home office.  Essentially, all the software I used was based in the “Cloud”, and either free or low-cost.   I’m grateful. […]

Creative Thinkering: Video Book Review

Are you a problem-solver?  Do you find yourself struggling to come up with creative ideas?  Then I recommend you check out Michael Michalko‘s books.  I did. Here’s my video report on his latest book, Creative Thinkering: Putting Your Imagination to Work.  (video not displaying? click here). And, here’s a short summary of some of the […]

Ken Kelly: Connecting Communities in Downtown Victoria

Like any city centre, downtown Victoria is a place where people from different communities intersect; residential, visitor, business, service, cultural.  Each community is diverse. Residents may be living in high-end condos or in short-term residence at Our Place.  Visitors include tourists, local shoppers, and the transient homeless. Businesses range from big bank office to small, […]

Silence: Pattern Interruptus

When conflict is all around, resolution seems distant, and the voices ring loud, sometimes the best way forward is to say nothing silence. As a mediator, I’ve found silence can be an effective pattern interrupt technique, a way to break impasse, especially if the parties in a dispute aren’t listening well, are locked onto negativity, […]