21st March is an important day, as it’s International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. In this blog, one of our mediators Derek shares his own personal insights from arriving in the UK as a black teenager through to how mediation mediation really is making a difference.

Whilst there are well-known advisory services who say that discrimination cases can’t be mediated, they’re completely wrong! What they mean is such conversations can be harder to facilitate so they shy away from them, which is where proper professional mediators come into their own.

Often people call us having attended a mediator training course and ask us how to do workplace mediations! That’s because they’ve been sold a civil and commercial mediator programme and reassured it will cover them for workplace mediation. It simply isn’t true! 

Whilst there is the option to do a further day of training after those courses, it isn’t enough to give you the dedicated skills and competence to be a great workplace mediator!

People often ask what the secret is to gaining a successful outcome in mediations, and as with all people situations it isn't one thing - it's the combination of a number of factors. 

Just like a good chef knows their ingredients and the best combination, a good mediator looks at every situation and every person involved to apply just the right amount of their skills to get the best results.

In this blog our Director Pete shows some of his baking skills to help you find that perfect recipe for any mediation...

Every organisation needs leadership and every leader needs trust to get the best results, create the right cultures and to avoid needing mediators like us to resolve disputes!

Have a listen to some amazing tips from the wonderful Andy Goram - this is definitely worth a watch!

If it isn't covered in thick dust then you really do need a different approach! Driving an issue resolution culture rather than grievances isn't all about having to change the policy, it's about a different philosophy. 

Unfortunately, we have learned behaviour, which is to deal with employee issues through formal grievance processes. It's what HR professionals are taught at college, and it's what the increasingly litigious culture in the UK is driving - we have to go into defence mode and get the policy out so we stand the very best chance if this goes to tribunal.

Forget the tribunal or the formal grievance procedure - you can cross those bridges if you get to them - taking the right approach with people will mean you can leave the policy to gather more dust - that's a good thing!