Featured Workshop Presenter
18th Annual Northwest Dispute Resolution Conference

 Negotiation and Mediation Training Services, Bainbridge Island, WA

www.mediate.com/ninameierding

nina@meierding.com

"Real world."
"She really gets it!"
"Been to dozens and dozens of trainings over the past forty years as a lawyer, best one yet."

Why Can’t They Just Say They’re Sorry? The Art and Science of the Apology

Session 1.3 Friday, April 29, 2011 1:00 – 2:15 p.m.

This interactive workshop will explore the many types of apologies (including rapport, transactional, full and partial) as well as the effect of timing, delivery, emotionality and sincerity. We will focus on how different cultures view fairness, truth and forgiveness and the impact of these beliefs on both giving and receiving apologies. With a more complete understanding of the intricacies of an apology we can lean how to help our clients move beyond numbers and seek a greater level of resolution and closure by giving and receiving apologies in a way that is both strategic and sincere.

Session 4.1 Saturday, April 30, 2011 8:30 – 10:00 a.m.

*Mediation Advocacy Track

This session will initially identify and explore multiple sources of underlying resistance to settlement. We will then focus on customized techniques to move beyond the specific sources of impasse – including anchoring, reframing, risk assessment with BATNAs, WATNAs and MLATNAs, macro and micro questions, situation-specific rules of fairness, unbundling, linkage, high uncertainty avoidance v. situational distrust, strategic use of separate and joint sessions at impasse moments, the art of unilateral concessions and methods for saving face. These techniques apply to all types of mediations – whether family or commercial, multi-party or team bargaining. Come learn about how to move your clients to a durable agreement. 

Q&A with Nina Meierding

NWDR: How do you describe your workshops?

NM: Very interactive, skills based, process oriented.

NWDR: What's different about it?

NM: Real world approach, discuss specific situations - theory meets practice.

NWDR: With thirty-plus wonderful workshops at the conference, what would you like those attending to know as they make their selections?

NM: Go to a workshop where you want to hear a particular presenter even if the subject matter may not be exactly in your area. Go to a workshop that stretches you and makes you think differently. Who knows? You may find a whole new area of interest!

NWDR: Are there particular "takeaways" - materials or skills - that you'll be offering to those who attend?

NM: How to move into "conscious competence". How to be more knowledgeable and aware of what we may already be doing intuitively. How to use those intuitive skills in a more thoughtful way. Each course will have a materials that will be provided.

NWDR: What got you interested in the topic?

NM: I have been a mediator for over 25 years with about 4,000 cases "under my belt." I have learned that conflict is unpredictable and changeable. That there is no fixed "toolbox of skills" that will fit all circumstances and no linear "stage by stage process" that can be scripted. That first we must patiently discover what the clients need and then we decide what techniques would be the most helpful and effective.

NWDR: Anything else you'd want us to know?

NM: I always look forward to meeting and working with people at conferences in the dispute resolution field. There is a spirit and energy that is invigorating and motivating.

See the full list of all 2011 Workshops here.

On-line registration. Conference brochure.