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09 February 2012 / Tony Allen
Issue: 7500 / Categories: Features , Profession , Mediation
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Keeping it neutral

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Tony Allen uncovers new ways for lawyers to use a neutral mediator

It is easy to fall into set ways of thinking about jobs. Mediators and those who hire them tend to think that unless they are resolving disputes in the time-honoured way, they are not on the job. But there are many more uses for a skilled neutral mediator than simply at a “pure” mediation, and there are mediation skills which have a wider application, something under-realised and under-valued by mediators, disputants and their advisers alike.

Joint settlement meetings

Take joint settlement meetings, where there is an inevitable risk of a free-for-all without a neutral chair to suggest how the process should start and develop. A neutral chair with no stake in the outcome is free to attend to questions of balance in participation by each person, and able to dissuade wasteful theatrical walk-outs when progress is still possible.

A good neutral chair will also ensure that the important people present (often not the most vocal or articulate people) are given

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