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What is mediation and how it can help be solved?
When disagreements have normally gone beyond two or more people's ability to sort their dispute out involving a third party to support the parties to settle their arguments where the mediator in the mediation tries to help both sides come to an agreement. This is mediation.
If you can make a claim or have made a claim about your dispute to an employment tribunal you cannot use mediation.
The Mediation takes place with a ‘mediator’ who is a neutral and impartial person. This means they do not take sides. The mediator seeks to help the parties of the dispute ‘find a solution’ to reach a suitable agreed ‘resolution’ for the parties to agree to.
It’s generally used to resolve a number of disputes where there is a breakdown of working relationships in families, child custody, divorce separation, workplace, commercial, landlord and tenant . Mediation is not judging who was right or wrong in the past, but looks at how to agree on working together in the future.
Mediation is voluntary, confidential, informal, flexible, usually a quick an easy way to resolve a dispute and is:
How mediation can help
Mediation assist to reconcile non-working relationships where solutions that everyone agrees to:
· it helps the parties agree a solution together.
· It helps improve communication between the parties
· It allows the individuals to both be in control of what they finally agree to
The many ‘benefits’ of mediation can help you to:
· relieve and reduce stress
· Maintain your valuable employees
· avoid going to court
· stop more grievances escalate
· both have the flexibility to decide the outcomes of the mediation
· avoid (if a company) employment tribunal claims high costs
Your outcomes may include:
· both parties acknowledge the others point of view
· both sides have a commitment to change behaviour
· a regularly commitment to review both your reached agreements
· a reached agreement to both review the policies and procedures
· an agreement to share work more fairly and provide more responsibility
A voluntary and confidential process
Mediation is voluntary. At the first meeting, a mediator will talk to you about what happens in mediation so you can decide if it’s for you. If you decide you do not want to mediate, they’ll tell your employer mediation is not possible.
Mediation is also confidential. The mediator will agree with both sides which information can be shared outside the mediation and how. If you do not reach an agreement, anything that’s been said during the mediation must be kept confidential and cannot be used in future procedures.
When mediation can be used
Mediation is used to resolve disputes about workplace relationships rather than other disputes, such as pay or issues related to dismissal or conduct.
You can use mediation to resolve:
· bullying and harassment
· communication problems
· personality clashes
· relationship breakdowns
When to start mediation
It’s a good idea to try and resolve the problem informally first, before thinking about using mediation.
Our professional mediation practitioner's are experienced in dispute resolution and can help facilitate disputing parties come to a resolution that is mutually acceptable to both parties where the decision lies in the hands of both parties to want to agree and find a solution.