An Improbable Tale Of Alien Romance
This short story was my 2005 birthday gift to a friend. In 2008, mediate.com made an exception to its nonfiction content rules to publish it. In 2013, I added it to… Read more An Improbable Tale Of Alien Romance →
TV guide to conflict competence
A key message from Coaches is that we control only ourselves. Managing ourselves sounds easy and simple, and is hard and complicated. When someone’s in our face we get defensive.… Read more TV guide to conflict competence →
Updating a useful metaphor
Words are words, right? Wouldn’t you assume that using words was a skill transferable from one career to another? With words, I manage conflict and write. Yet, switching from Conflict Manager to writer… Read more Updating a useful metaphor →
The Mind Of A Mediator: my novel in progress
At work, I make dozens of considered decisions about and during each intervention. Think about any conflict, and there was perhaps some heart stopping moment when you realized that someone needs to do or say something. But what? Each intervention, reframe, summary, or caucus, has potential to be a change leading the parties somewhere, with no returning to the prior state. Seventeen years ago, I wrote a 90,000+ word novel about a Conflict Manager’s thought processes at work, the in-the-moment decision-making. Editing those words has been my 16 year obsession since. If… Read more The Mind Of A Mediator: my novel in progress →
Professionalization of Conflict Resolvers
Those of us speaking out against creating certification for conflict resolvers don’t seem to have a lot of allies. The weight of popular opinion is that certification with standardized credentials should (must) be done. Here are the reasons I disagree and have a cautionary point of view:
Conflict management helps reduce stress
Question posed: A co-worker and I have jobs that rely on each other for success, yet we can’t seem to work together. We either trip over each other doing the same task, or think the other person is doing it and it falls undone between us. What needs to change? Answer: Let’s say you divvy up the tasks exactly fairly and make a detailed list of who does what and when. If the issue is “we can’t seem to work together” then a list, however detailed, won’t solve the problem. Here are some… Read more Conflict management helps reduce stress →
Deborah Sword 