First part of an interview with David Richbell. Part of the Master Class series.

The Mediation Times is a blog for commercial mediators. You will find a lot of what you might be interested in, in one place. For me it is about doing what I like almost as much as mediating - encouraging the professional development of mediators and creating a forum for shared learning.

4 years ago I set up the Learning Community Online forum to support the CIArb/MATA mediator training course. It was the first information site in the UK for mediators. Forum design has developed a great deal since then and we have better software that allows for greater interaction with the people who use them

There are two main ideas behind this blog. The first is to pull together all the events, conferences, CPD events and networking opportunities without it being a major task for one person. You will find an RSS feed on this site so that updates can be delivered to your desktop very efficiently.

The second is to promote and widen the debate about issues which affect us in our work and professional development. Other features will be videos of the MATA debates and Masterclasses.

I hope you will join me, spread the word and most of all contribute by providing links to interesting sites and adding events to the calendar and short reviews and feedback about them.