Empathy and compassion fatigue and the conflict practitioner
Empathy and compassion fatigue exists across a diverse range of professionals, particularly those who deal with clients who are experiencing strong emotions. Practitioners who work with people in conflict are no stranger to strong emotions, particularly those that are considered “negative” such as anger and frustration. It is important that conflict practitioners are aware of the
The practitioner’s emotions in conflict
Along with the people involved in conflict, the practitioners supporting them also experience emotions before, during and after any interactions. The practitioners’ emotions may have an impact (positive or negative) on the clients, and the reverse is also true – the clients’ emotions may have an impact (positive or negative) on the practitioner. Why is it
WHAT I’VE BEEN READING: Star Wars and Conflict Resolution by Jen Reynolds and Noam Ebner
When I saw the title of this book, I had to buy it! I always love links with popular culture as a way of teaching and exploring concepts. Whether or not you’re a Star Wars fan, this book will intrigue and delight you. It includes chapters with such provocative titles such as “Lightsabers and fighting
Strategies for working with emotions in mediation
I’ve recently been exploring different ways that mediators can work with emotions in conflict. It’s surprising how many different things mediators do! Here’s a compilation of strategies I found that mediators reported using. Which ones they used seems to depend very much on the model of mediation, the personal style and preferences of the mediator,
WHAT I’VE BEEN READING: No Hard Feelings by Liz Fosslien and Mollie West Duffy
This book is so much fun to read, not least because of the clever cartoons interspersed throughout to illustrate various points. It’s a very clear, common sense approach to working with emotions in the workplace. The chapters cover the topics of health, motivation, decision making, teams, communication, culture and leadership. While the book does reference
WHAT I’VE BEEN READING: Expert Mediators by Jean Poitras and Susan S. Raines
In this book, the authors Jean Poitras and Susan Raines, present a compilation of “best practices” from expert mediators across the world in dealing with common mediation challenges. They surveyed 186 experienced mediators across the world and from these results identified the most common challenges they faced in their practice. They then selected 101 of