AI Issue 9 2017

58 Acquisition International - September 2017 Over the course of more than 20 years in the City of London in senior leadership roles in Compliance, HR and the career transition industry, I’ve seen at first hand the consequences of people struggling to resolve their workforce issues effectively. hat’s what led me to train both as an executive coach and a mediator, and then to set up Sheridan Resolutions Ltd in 2006 with a core offering of coaching and mediation services. Through a team of qualified and experienced associates in a number of related fields it also provides leadership development, supervision and training services to a wide array of clients from financial services to utilities, lawyers to schools and media to retail, across both the public and private sectors. Since 2006 I have become ever more convinced of the power and value of the mediation process and of its importance to the strengthening and protection of personal relationships for business purposes. For that reason, Sheridan Resolutions has operated mainly in the workplace and employment arena, and it was perhaps in recognition of that focus that I was last year elected as Chair of the Workplace Group of the Civil Mediation Council (CMC) , the country’s leading body for all non-family mediation matters, and then to its main Board. Earlier this year, I was invited by CEDR tto address the All Party Parliamentary Group on Alternative Dispute Resolution. Sheridan Resolutions has now been invited to contribute to the Legal Edition of the UK Government’s 2017 Parliamentary Review, so my Al nomination as the UK’s Leading Mediation Advisor has made what was already a great year for the profile of the business, even better. By way of context for what I say below about how Sheridan Resolutions works, a brief word first on the range of workplace and employment disputes. It is tempting to think they are all about cash, but actually they are not. They are about relationships, they are about careers and aspirations, they are about domestic issues, ill-health, self-esteem, all sorts of things; all human life appears in workplace disputes in one form or another. This absolutely is not just about transmitting money from one party to the other. A large majority of the mediations we do are aimed at restoring and strengthening working relationships to the joint benefit of both employees and employers. I find that workplace fallings-out are rarely fatal if addressed swiftly and proactively, but that forcing the parties through formal disciplinary or grievance processes can end a relationship very quickly. Of course, you can also use mediation to Restoring and StrengtheningWorking Relationships T try to resolve actual or threatened employment litigation arising from alleged discrimination or a dismissal, but I see the benefits for most workplace users of Sheridan Resolutions as firmly in restoring working relationships, not in deciding the terms on which they end (except where that is in turn in the parties’ best interests). Sometimes the protagonists in workplace disputes first need persuading of the benefits of mediation compared to formal processes. Too many people still consider bringing or defending a grievance to be a process from which they will emerge wholly vindicated, with the other somehow banished from their lives. The hard reality of course is that the following week, whether the grievance is upheld or not, both parties are still there, they still have to work together and the only thing that will have changed is that one now loathes the other even more. Sheridan Resolutions’ approach is to combine mediation with coaching, where required, to create in the parties the self-awareness and open mind- set necessary to make the best of the process. The key as we see it is to recognise that no two cases are the same – no-one can know all the factors or individual drivers which may affect how a workplace dispute is best resolved – so we will take a while to explore those first. Our logo is the hummingbird because it’s agile, it hovers and it is the only bird that can fly backwards. It can create the time and space to assess a situation from all angles before diving in. Sheridan Resolutions seeks to work with people in exactly the same way. At a broader level, what’s next for workplace mediation? One trite answer is that the abolition of Employment Tribunal fees is going to mean a big upswing in claim numbers, and hence in the work available to mediators in this arena. Maybe, maybe not. I think few people bring grievances with the express intention to proceed to the Tribunal – more do it just to get fixed something in their working lives which currently they see as broken. I see the more robust and proactive use of mediation to address those complaints as likely to dampen claim numbers, not increase them. In my view, there are also wider issues around the mediation skill-set which require mention. To match the possible breadth of issues in a dispute, there’s an equally broad range of people who 1709AI16 Sheridan Resolutions Company: Sheridan Resolutions Limited Name: Caroline Sheridan Email: caroline@sheridanreso- lutions.com Web Address: www.sheridanresolutions.com Address: Sheridan Resolutions Ltd Level 30, The Leadenhall Building, 122 Leadenhall Street, London, EC3V 4AB United Kingdom Telephone: +44 (0) 203 753 5350 5 best practice tips: • Offer mediation at an early stage • Failed or declined mediations can still help both employer and employee • Strengthen reference to mediation in your grievance procedure • Consider conflict management training • Obtain Board and staff representative support UK’s Leading Mediation Advisor