A New York Times article with that headline observes that we are “in a political season when ethnic, racist and sexual slurs, not to mention general insults, seem to have become part of everyday chatter.” Dealing with offensive comments can be hard for people generally and there are particular challenges for dispute resolution professionals. The … Continue reading Lessons in the Delicate Art of Confronting Offensive Speech
I got hooked on listening to podcasts this year and one of my favorites is the NPR TED Radio Hour. (As a reminder, there was a wonderful session at the ABA SDR conference about podcasts and Rishi Batra compiled a list of podcasts that you might be interested in.) I recently listened to an extremely … Continue reading The Gift of Listening
The ABA Journal profiled Cleveland-based law firm Thompson Hine and its managing partner, Deborah Z. Read, highlighting their “SmartPaTH” process to manage cases and satisfy clients. This is part of the Journal’s “Legal Rebel” series. It is both amusing and sad that these ideas would seem radical, especially these days. Here’s the description of the … Continue reading Law Firm Uses “SmartPaTH” to Manage Cases and Satisfy Clients
I recently talked with Nancy Rogers, one of the pioneers in our field, who is living her version of what I have called “unbundled retirement.” Nancy described Ohio State’s Program on Law and Leadership, which she directs along with program coordinator Mary Rose Sullivan. I was particularly intrigued by Nancy’s description of leadership embodied in … Continue reading Training Law Students to be Leaders
Thanks to this post on the Best Practices in Legal Education blog, I learned about an impressive effort by Brian Sites (Barry University) to collect all the resources on experiential learning he could find. Here’s the link where you can download his document. You will see that he includes cites to the LEAPS Project, which … Continue reading Extensive Collection of Resources for Experiential Learning
Peter Benner and I will do a free webinar on Thursday, July 28, at 3 pm Eastern Time, entitled Streamlining Disputes: The Mediator as Case Manager. Although it’s free, you have to register for it. This webinar is sponsored by the International and Commercial Sections of the Association for Conflict Resolution.
Once again, Sharon Press and Bobbi McAdoo, of Mitchell Hamline, organized a resource share at the Legal Educators’ Colloquium at the ABA conference earlier this month. They compiled all the suggestions that people shared in this document, which also includes suggestions from prior conferences. Lots of ideas for your courses next year. (But first, summer!) … Continue reading Legal Educators’ Resources Galore!
Jim Coben was shocked, shocked that I didn’t mention multi-stage simulations (MSS) at the Legal Educators’ Colloquium Resource Share. (I was dutifully following instructions to focus on new stuff.) To help Jim recover from his shock, I am posting this item. Also to jog your memories and provide an update. After last year’s conference, I … Continue reading Multi-Stage Simulations and Enjoying Grading Redux
Heather and I have been talking about what law schools can do to help students develop “ADR careers.” In our last episode, Heather responded to my question about what she meant by ADR careers and she suggested that it may be more useful to focus on skills than specific jobs. (In that post, you can … Continue reading Conversation with Heather Kulp About ADR Careers – Part 5
Newly elected Speaker of the House of Representatives Paul Ryan invited Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi to dinner the other night. “A Ryan aide said the two lawmakers talked shop for a short time and spent most of the evening getting to know each other.” This is consistent with my suggestion that counterpart lawyers have lunch … Continue reading Getting to Know You
Recently, I was asked to write a post for a state bar association blog with highlights from my article, My Last Lecture: More Unsolicited Advice for Future and Current Lawyers. Then I thought, heck, I should post it here too. Understand Your Clients’ Interests. Lawyers often assume that they know what their clients want–to get … Continue reading Tips for Lawyers Who Want to Get Good Results for Clients and Make Money
I just came back from the bi-annual training retreat of the National Academy of Distinguished Neutrals (NADN), where I was one of the speakers. I caught the second half of the program and each of these sessions was fascinating, as I describe below. I had never heard of NADN before, and I was impressed … Continue reading Early Neutral Case Management, Tony Piazza, Biases, and Thanks for the Feedback