Who benefits from Mediation?
Many people deal with disagreements and difficult conversations on a daily basis as part of their work and family life. Unfortunately, disagreements can lead to disputes in many different areas of people’s lives. It is a fact of life that we won’t always agree with someone else. We all hold different values, have different needs and wants, hold different belief systems and have different cultures and religions.
When disputes become entrenched it is difficult to get on with life at work and at home. Family and friends are often dragged into the issues, not intentionally of course but when disputes entrench you they will indeed affect people close to you. The dispute over takes you and it is difficult to ever think of anything else. If the dispute is a commercial or workplace dispute, organisations and businesses suffer. Disputes lead to poor production, loss of management and leadership time, loss of motivation and concentration which in turn leads to a loss in wealth creation for everyone involved.
As it is widely known disputes often find themselves within the legal framework and end in litigation (the courts). A process which is extremely expensive and massively time consuming for everyone involved. Litigation can take weeks, months or even years to conclude with no certainty that the outcome will satisfy the parties involved. It has been known that people have risked their homes and their life savings fighting cases in court only to lose everything and sometimes over very little or no money at all. The worst situation is where the legal costs far outweigh the claims of the parties; this is an awful situation but unfortunately happens very regularly.
Mediation on the other hand allows parties to settle their own dispute quickly, efficiently and cost effectively. Mediations generally settle in 1 day! (8 out of 10). This allows the parties to move on with their lives, both at work and at home. Paul has heard so many times that what people in dispute really want is to ‘get on with their lives’. Litigation can take years, mediation generally takes a day!
For businesses and organisations mediation can mean avoiding long and very expensive legal costs. Management and leaders can get on with what they are hired and paid for, producing and generating wealth, not wasting time defending or fighting disputes.
Solicitors and lawyers benefit from mediation too! Mediation gives their clients the best chance to settle quickly and cost effectively and with any business, happy clients mean repeat business. Mediation allows law firms to assist their clients to a successful agreement.
Therefore, mediation benefits everyone; family, colleagues, businesses and organisations. It assists people to move on with their lives, to look to the future and not to be entrenched in the past.
Mediation makes sense.
