I found this terrific interview by Katie Couric of CBS News with Ellen Galinsky on a new book about life skills for children called Mind in the Making: The Seven Essential Life Skills Every Child Needs. Happily, the ability to resolve conflict is included (you will find the reference at about 32 minutes). It also echoes my own research into the skills of a mediator which place competence in the skills Galinsky talks about at the top of the list.

The book has been called “the best thing since Emotional Intelligence”. In the book, Galinsky identifies 7 life skills:

1. Focus and Self Control – pay attention and the ability to inhibit the desire to go on automatic.
2. Perspective Taking – knowing what others think, feel. Empathy is part of that but Ellen goes further to include the Theory of Mind (understanding what is going on in other people’s minds).
3. Communicating – the ability to put aside your own thoughts in order to understand the other, knowing how your words will be heard and know how to frame your own words so that you will be understood.
4. Making Connections – the ability to see the connections and the ability to make unusual connections which is the basis of creativity
5. Critical Thinking – looking for valid and accurate information – how to challenge and discern what is right and useful.
6. Taking on Challenges – resilience, risk taking, having a growth mindset, not giving up when that would be the easy thing to so.
7. Self Directed, Engaged Learning – curiosity, “I don’t know everything” mindset, I am not the expert, humility.

The things that stand out for me in making my own connections from this interview to my work as a mediator is that I notice the lack of these skills in my work and it is increasingly common with younger people. This suggests a change in the education system which may have something to do with the narrow focus of education to achieve higher levels of literacy and numeracy and the emphasis on measuring those to meet political agendas. The laudable intention seems to have had unintended consequences.

Despite all the books and courses on communicating skills, mindfulness, collaboration, my experience is that they are expressed less often in practice. Most of all, I notice how difficult it is for people to be empathetic as they struggle with their conviction about their rights or for them to be curious or to make unusual connections unless they are coached and encouraged to do so. I also agree with Galinsky when she says in the interview that it is never too late to learn these skills. They are essential skills not just for life but for dealing with the challenges that face us from the workplace to our relationships with other countries.

So to my mind whether we are mediator, lawyer, manager or employee we all need to

1. Show up and pay attention.
2. Put aside your own thoughts in order to understand the other and make a habit of seeing other perspectives.
3. Be humble and curious because whenever we start to think that we know best, or there is nothing to learn, we fail to inhibit the desire to ‘go on automatic’.
4. Practice giving praise and encouragement but not about the people themselves but rather on the approaches and strategies they use.

I think giving praise and encouragement to “grown ups’ is one of the most difficult things to do well without sounding patronising or inferring labels. Appreciation of effort and outcomes is a huge part of keeping people engaged and it requires real skill to do that.

Here’s the video.

Watch CBS News Videos Online
Ellen Galinsky, president and co-founder of the Families in Work Institute speaks to Katie Couric about her new book, “Mind in the Making: The Seven Essential Life Skills Every Child Needs.”

This article first appeared in a free magazine called Boss Bishop (Oct 09) produced in London by a commercial property agent specialising in restaurants and cafes. The magazine is designed to be something you read over coffee in one of the many cafes and restaurants around London and the content provokes thought and curiosity. It has poetry, jokes, illustrations and very short articles on interesting people and places. It is produced by a wonderful lady called Giny Spivak. In a world which is increasingly electronic, it is so good to find something in print which you want to hold because it is beautiful, and you want to read from cover to cover.

I came across the first edition and I had to hunt high and low to find this person who had conceived such a lovely magazine. Eventually I found her and told her how much I had enjoyed it. She asked me what I did and I told her. She had never heard of mediation before and this was how I described it.

Mediation is commonly associated with the legal process, yet it is a “human” process designed to resolve conflict which has become a dispute.

Far from negative, conflict is part of human nature, and it is the fuel for creativity and innovation. The feelings we have about a dispute come from personal interpretation, and a very particular way of perceiving “the experience”: our own way.

If we could accept that everyone’s beliefs and actions are in fact reasonable to them, then we are half way there. If we can go one step further and take the risk in allowing others to tell how and why they feel that way, then we might just learn something that will point us to another view. Just by listening.

It is human nature to state our position. We want our side of the story to be heard in order to feel validated. Often, that is all we need. Until something changes, there can be no resolution.

Change brings conflict and change is what resolves it. Change is inevitable and most of the time it will come about unannounced, unexpectedly. Other times, we can sense its approach, smoke signaling the end of a commitment, the arrival of an overdue finale.

We tend to ignore the signs in the hope that we are mistaken. Eventually, our disappointment overshadows the memories we had of all the good feelings we felt when we first engaged and committed to a contract or relationship. They are forgotten and replaced by new, less comfortable feelings of anger, fear and mistrust. If those feelings remain unacknowledged, eventually all becomes an unremitting cycle of complexity and confusion which we try to rationalise and in doing so we make it fit our feelings. It is simple: there is no conflict without emotion and emotions are complex.

One way to cease further pain and confusion is to hand the decision to a judge. That will be an imposed decision. In mediation, however, negotiation includes both parties telling their stories. Each party having the opportunity to be heard, to express their valid and personal view. By narrating their experience, creativity flows and anger, fear and mistrust are replaced with acceptance and willingness towards finding an agreement. Both parties need help to complete the process. All need to commit to the process.  As a mediator my job is to guide people towards agreement. The outcome is that both parties can win and sometimes the greatest prize is dignity.

I am the third party. The conduit for understanding that brings acceptance and ignites the reason to try and agree.

At its best mediation is an opportunity to be entirely human, productive and efficient through innate creativity. After all, creativity is the best of human nature

This evening I joined Tammy Lenski, Diane Levin and Jeff Thompson in the second of our Cafe Mediate conversations. We had a lively and fun debate round “what makes a great mediator?”

Thanks to all for some great insights and raising some interesting questions.You can find more of their thinking and ideas on their blogs.

For some further thoughts and perspectives on what makes a great mediator, I recommend IBA Survey Results posted at The Mediator Magazine penned by journalist Matt Rushton and my own research available from the archives on this blog Part 1 and Part 2.

I hope you enjoy the podcast. It lasts about 30 minutes. You will also find our first conversation Value-Based Billing which looks at how we might reconfigure the way we charge for mediation to reflect more closely and more clearly the value that mediation brings.

It takes less effort to include people than it does to exclude them – in the long run. As Deepak Chopra said in a recent article ‘I know it’s tempting to tune out difficult people, but that’s the main reason they keep being difficult.’ I know exactly what he meant.

As part of my preparation for a recent mediation, I was speaking to the claimants’ legal advisers. During that conversation we talked about who should attend and she and her colleague were adamant that I should agree to preventing someone from the defendant’s group from attending. I had an idea that there would probably something very important that that person could contribute. I was curious to find out how that person might add value and why they should not be ‘tuned out’.  It also made me aware that there was something important going on for the people who had asked me to exclude him in the first place. I discovered that the man in question had a lot of knowledge about the dispute from the beginning, in fact he was unique in that regard. We agreed that he could attend.

On the first day of the mediation and during the opening meeting, I asked the ‘excluded person’ if they had anything to add to what a considerable number of people had already said. He started to speak and as soon as he did the advisors waved frantically at me across the table saying that he shouldn’t be allowed to speak. There aren’t many times when a mediator gets to decide things but making sure everyone is heard is one of those times. The session continued with the contribution and without falling apart. One the contrary, I believe it gave others at the table a strong sense of even-handedness and inclusion and many more felt able to tell me things throughout the mediation.

During the course of the following two days, the person they wanted to exclude turned out to be a most valuable ‘knowledge bank’.  He just needed to be heard, his knowledge and expertise appreciated and given encouragement and guidance on how he could add value to the process of reaching agreement without running away with the time available.

I learned the value of what so called ‘complainers’ can bring to productivity and problem solving many years ago when I put together a project team comprised entirely of ‘complainers’ and ‘cynics’. They were, without doubt, a most effective group who achieved the implementation of a complex nationwide IT system within 12 weeks from concept to working order and at a cost which was pennies compared with similar projects that came after that one.

People were amazed at the software, impressed with the delivery timescales and astonished at the cost. They wanted to know the ‘trick’. I told them. The project team was made up of people who were known to be difficult, argumentative, critical, outspoken and knowledgeable. I told them they had been some fire-filled project meetings but that we had made time to help people express their concerns and reservations and we had used that information to improve the processes. In the end if we could generate commitment within this group doing the same nationwide would be much easier.

I recommend an article on collaboration by Joseph Leary at www.emergentstory.com.

It was particularly relevant today.

I had three very frustrating conversations with genuinely helpful people at call centres about some (as I perceive it!) shortcomings in their companies’ service provision.  All three were genuine in their appreciation of my frustration. All three quoted “procedure”.  All three said they could do nothing about the underlying causes and it was hopeless telling anyone – they didn’t take any notice. One of them confided in me that he was so fed up with understanding the customer’s point of view and not being able to do anything about it that he was leaving before he became ill.

Putting aside my own frustration for a moment, for those who have the responsibility of dealing with customers and no authority to change things it is a recipe for stress and illness. The costs to them are significant, the hidden costs to their employers are equally significant in terms of staff turnover and absence due to sickness.

So will there be a revolution from the front line? Will the wisdom of the many triumph over the expertise of the few?  Will we ask the audience instead of phoning a friend?  Here’s an excerpt from his article about the changes that he sees coming.

• Attempts at “perfect” planning and execution will be replaced by rapid prototyping and feedback systems.
• The goal of management will change from the predictable permanence of procedure to the productive permanence of change.
• Employees will become providers; employers will become clients.
• Trials and feedback (scientific process) will replace conventional wisdom.
• Orders for change will come from the bottom, not the top.
• There will be no arbitrarily assigned “managers.” There will be self-assumed or appointed “directors,” “connectors,” and community “leaders.”
• There will be more questions than directions.
• By default, the answer to change is Yes. Evidence will be required to justify a “No.”
• The best providers will not be those who do what they are told the best; they will be who adapt the fastest, and produce the most efficiently.