Arbitration & Mediation

She Negotiates Holds an Open House with Door Prizes!!

Posted on July 10, 2010
Do come visit us and consider enrolling in our July 19, month-long, coached negotiation course here. The blog, which is today offering prizes, is here. Testimonials It's the quality instruction, real world experience, and bevy of resources brought to you by Victoria Pynchon that makes this course a stand out...

More American than I -- a Fourth of July Tale

Posted on July 04, 2010
"I'm more American than you are," my new friend the Argentine exile was saying over desert at a local Los Angeles eatery.  I'd been dodging his phone calls for at least two months.  We'd met  at the downtown Biltmore Hotel where the Democrats were celebrating Bill Clinton's first Presidential victory...

Mediator Explains the $20 Million Dugard Settlement to the Press

Posted on July 02, 2010
From Yahoo News . . . . I'm assuming the parties to the settlement waived mediation confidentiality on this one . . . Seems odd though. "It is compensation for three people for the rest of their lives who have been horribly damaged over a period of 17 or 18 years," mediator Daniel Weinstein told The Associated Press...

Discussing Hot Button Issues without the Heat

Posted on July 02, 2010
Immigration Dialogue 2010 July 23, 2010  (3:30-5:30 pm PT) at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles Featuring: Arizona State Rep. John Kavanagh (Rep.)  and Arizona State Rep. Kyrsten Sinema (Dem.)        Moderated by: Lee Jay Berman President, American Institute of Mediation   Please join us for a very unique and special event where we will discuss the Immigration Issues facing us in 2010, and Arizona State Law SB 1070, which is scheduled to take effect on July 28, 2010...

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Negotiating War: a "False and Sloppy Consensus"

Posted on July 01, 2010
Let's take a workplace teaching moment from the Obama-McCrystal dust-up as provided to us by the New Yorker in this week's Talk of the Town piece, Team Effort.  In reporting the dysfunction on Team Afghanistan (McChrystal vs. American Ambassador Karl Eikenberry with President Karzai as a manipulative by-stander) the NY'ers George Packer recalls a description of governmental decision-making provided by Obama's special representative for the region, Richard Holbrooke, last year: People sit in a room, they don't air their real differences, a false and sloppy consensus papers over those underlying differences, and they go back to their offices and continue to work at cross-purposes, even actively undermining each other...

Support WLALA's New ADR Committee by Attending the 2010 Awards Dinner

Posted on July 01, 2010
Save the Date!!  Buy a Table!!  Support Women Lawyers!!  Congratulate Edith R. Matthai on the Ernestine Stahlhut Award and Eileen M. Decker on her Distinguished Service Award!! Advertise in the Tribute Book to Celebrate the Creation of WLALA's first ADR Committee (and congratulate its new chair, Victoria Pynchon!)

Notes on Breaking Impasse: Build a Golden Bridge

Posted on June 30, 2010
Build a Golden Bridge (from Getting Past No by William Ury) first the problem other side is stalling/resisting lacks interest in your proposals makes vague statements delays renegs on agreements responds with a flat "no" now the likely explanation for the problem four most common reasons for impasse of this type: it's not their idea you're overlooking at least one of your counterpart's basic interests your partner fears losing face the decision seems too overwhelming; is too big and the time is too short, making it easier simply to say "no" "Your challenge is to persuade the other side to cross the chasm that lies between their position and the agreement you want...

Kagan: the Business Angle

Posted on June 28, 2010

Let the Kagan Games Begin: Whitepapers from SCOTUS Blog

Posted on June 27, 2010
(pictured:  the bread and circuses part) Thanks to the SCOTUS Blog for the following resources on the upcoming Kagan hearings.  Follow SCOTUS Blog all week for commentary.  Why should negotiators be interested in the composition of the Supreme Court?  Because the freedom to negotiate requires a strong rule of law culture...

"Politics is the art of saying 'we made it tougher' without making it really tough.

Posted on June 24, 2010
Volcker Rule under Attack as Lawmakers Seek Loophole:  full analysis from Bloomberg at the link; double-speak excerpt below. 'There's pressure from both sides to toughen and to soften the Volcker rule, and politics is the art of compromise,' said Lawrence Kaplan, an attorney at Paul Hastings Janofsky & Walker LLP in Washington...

Ingratiation: a Contentious Negotiation Tactic

Posted on June 22, 2010
Acknowledging his own hyper-competitive spirit, a fellow dispute resolution colleague once told me if they wrote #1 in red ink on a Styrofoam cup, you and I would fight to the death for it. Too sadly true.  Hence my posting the "Top 100 Dispute Resolution Blogs" ribbon from an outfit called "The Daily Reviewer...

"Winning" Workplace Arguments is Really Just Consensus Building

Posted on June 22, 2010
In  Workplace Negotiating Secrets From Bethenny's Shrink over at Forbes.com, Xavier Amador, the therapist on Bethany Getting Married? gives his "secrets" for "winning" workplace arguments.  What Amador suggests (below and at the link) is really just collaborative interest-based negotiation, but his catchy acronym - LEAP - is a good one to remember for all negotiations, whether you're brokering peace in the Middle East or getting your guy to put the toilet seat down...

Can a Checklist Lead the Adversarial System Into the 21st Century?

Posted on June 21, 2010
Recently, I suggested that surgeon-author Atul Gawande's Checklist Manifesto pointed the way toward a more effective and efficient means of responding to frivolous claims than potentially protracted litigation. Skeletal checklists for just such dispute resolution processes are already in daily use by peer mediators in our public schools...

Fincher on Diversity on Mid-Summer Night's Eve

Posted on June 21, 2010

Worth the Paper it's Written On? SCOTUS' Rent-A-Center West Decision

Posted on June 21, 2010
Asher Hawkins over at Forbes On the Docket legal blog foresees trouble for class action plaintiffs in the Supreme Court's Latest Arbitration-Friendly Ruling.  As Hawkins explains: A minor Supreme Court victory this morning in an employment-related arbitration case has left the pro-arbitration camp hopeful that the justices will see things their way in a hotly anticipated consumer-related legal battle the court will hear next term...

The Bet Din: Religious Dispute Resolution

Posted on June 20, 2010
Los Angeles has large orthodox and ultra-orthodox Jewish communities.   I have, on more than one occasion, been introduced by mediation clients to the Jewish justice system - the Bet Din.  I have mediated business disputes that have already been to the Bet Din and those that were destined to go there...

The Next Craving Balance Negotiation Workshop Starts July 19

Posted on June 19, 2010
Lisa Gates of Craving Balance and I are doing it again!  An entire month of negotiation classes that will change your life.  When Lisa and I planned our first month-long course (you can see the testimonials here) I told her that the women participating in it would make back the cost of the class in the first negotiation they conducted after the course ended...

Give Your Market What it Wants and How it Wants It

Posted on June 18, 2010
Mediator:  You cannot mediate in the manner the Straus Institute taught you do.  You have to come to terms with that. Galileo was ordered to stand trial on suspicion of heresy in 1633. The sentence of the Inquisition was in three essential parts:  Galileo was found "vehemently suspect of heresy," namely of having held the opinions that the Sun lies motionless at the centre of the universe, that the Earth is not at its centre and moves, and that one may hold and defend an opinion as probable after it has been declared contrary to Holy Scripture...

Negotiation as Rationalizing Numbers

Posted on June 18, 2010
Old.  But.  Priceless.

Negotiating Your Divorce? There's an App for That

Posted on June 14, 2010
Thanks to Bob Ambrogi for the best law blog post of the year - Getting Divorced?  There are Apps for That.  Bob's also among the best lede crafters in the blawg business. Here it is: If you're married to your iPhone but not so sure about your spouse, then DivorceApps...

Women's Attitudes, Skills and Fears about Negotiation

Posted on June 11, 2010
The numbers below represent an unscientific poll of women in business concerning their skills, attitudes and fears about negotiation.  The women were asked to rate their agreement with the statements on a 1-10 scale with 1 being the least agreement and 10 being the greatest agreement...

Mandatory Mediation Foreclosure Workout Bill Defeated

Posted on June 07, 2010
  On Friday, a proposed Facilitated Mortgage Workout Program quietly passed from the California legislative scene after its defeat the day before, three votes shy of passage. Although the bill's proponents thereafter won a short stay of execution, the law making body's failure to reconsider the bill by Friday's deadline made it dead on arrival...

Framing as an Act of Ethical Significance: "Consumers" Against Retail Discrimination

Posted on June 06, 2010
I see that the Forbes Blog Network is running a political ad on my blog this week. It's that ad up there that says BIG GOVERNMENT blah blah blah . . .   I'm always suspicious of groups purporting to represent the interests of consumers while opposing the regulation of an industry...

Failure = Success . . . that's what I'm sayin'

Posted on June 05, 2010

Are You a Negotiator or a Bureaucrat? Clients Care

Posted on June 04, 2010
I'm lifting the entirety of Ken Adams' post The Connection Between Contract Drafting and Negotiation, along with the insightful comments to it. The contract man!  Put his blog in your newsreader and pick up his Manual of Style for Contract Drafting today...

Live Together, Die Alone: Things to Do in Response to the Oil Spill

Posted on June 04, 2010
Thanks to Yahoo Green's "how to help wildlife threatened by the oil spill." I'm walking to my appointments today.  Because I can and because I can't get down to the Gulf to help out there.  Let's each do one small thing today.  And tomorrow...

If You're a Woman Ambitious Enough to Take This Course, $375 is Chicken Feed

Posted on June 03, 2010
There's still time to sign up for the roof-raising "She Negotiates" online negotiation course.  Here's what the women already in a position to close the income and wage gap will spend $375 on without batting an eye lash.  Marc Jacobs drawstring handbag:  $378...

Closing the Wage Gap Rocking Your World

Posted on June 02, 2010
As the June 10 negotiation workshop in Pasadena nears, I realize that the one force keeping our attendance low is the same force the workshop is designed to (and will inevitably) resolve: the effect of the recession on women's already reduced earning power...

New Steve Forbes Multimedia Fact & Comment over at Forbes.com

Posted on June 01, 2010

No Woman, No Matter How Successful, Ever Has a Pure Business Negotiation

Posted on May 31, 2010
Yesterday at the She Negotiates blog, I posted two quotes by a woman executive (President and CEO) who is blazingly successful in one of the most male-dominated industries in the world - construction of sports arenas. Here they are again: After she'd been in business for 15 years, a colleague told [Alvarado] she had two problems...

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