Tag: mediation

I Coulda Been…

Lucy Moore

Even if you’ve had, or are still having, the perfect career, you may find yourself wondering about other options you might have taken. I have been so lucky to have spent much of my adult life mediating. Come to think of it, I spent a lot of my not-adult life mediating, too, between parents, friends, roommates. I was always the one in the middle, seeing both sides, comfortable with the gray areas, knowing that black and white was too simple. It is wonderful, challenging, fascinating work, and for someone insatiably curious about people, it is perfect. But there have been times in the midst of a seemingly unresolvable dispute, or confronted by a particularly difficult participant, when my mind has wandered down the path not taken.

What would I rather be doing, I ask myself? And for decades what has popped into my head is “delivering mail.” I drive by a mail delivery person, bag slung across shoulder, or pushing a wire basket filled with mail, moving jauntily along, and I think how relaxing it would be to walk your beat, chatting with a neighbor or two, dropping mail in boxes or slots, breathing deep, enjoying the clouds, the flowers, the sun, the rain, the falling leaves, whatever the season brings. Maybe in the spring I would wear uniform shorts, revealing well-developed calves. Maybe I would even be whistling.

I coulda been…

The appeal of this career for me is obvious: 

  • Get exercise without going to a gym
  • Uniform provided, no agonizing decisions about what to wear
  • No conflicts to resolve. If neighbors are fighting, I just whistle and move on.
  • Contact with people is superficial, which doesn’t mean that I don’t care. It just means that I don’t have to know more than I want.
  • Everyone, almost, would be happy to see me. I would smile a lot, and say “you’re welcome” to the dozens of “thank you’s” every day.
  • Permission to be nosey. Who gets which catalogs, who actually still corresponds by letter, who gets the most Christmas cards, who peeks out from behind the curtain hoping to catch the mail before it hits the floor, who has pets, babies, teens, who likes classical, rock or Taylor Swift.
  • Opportunities to be a hero. Sometimes it’s the mail carrier who notices the mail piling up, or hears a cry for help inside the house, or smells smoke, or notices the family car has a flat tire, or finds a latch key child on the porch with no key. Just google “mail carrier saves” and you’ll find amazing feats, rescuing numerous elderly women who’ve fallen, saving a dog from a snake bite, catching a baby falling from a window. The possibilities for saving the day are endless.

But wait, there’s more. No reports to write, no meeting discussions to summarize, no agendas to draft, no long phone calls with distraught disputants, no flights to DC. Yes, it would be such a relief to have each day a completed task. Fill up basket in the morning, deliver during the day, fold up empty basket, and go home. Of course, the day might start earlier than I’d like, there might bickering at the post office about whose turn it is to make the coffee, a customer might accuse me of stealing her Vogue magazine, I might develop fallen arches, the weather might be sleet, rain and snow, … but I’d be out there doing my red-blooded American duty, and I’d be proud.

And what if I had chosen that fork in the road?  By now, would I be hobbling down the sidewalk, dragging my rickety basket of junk mail behind me, wishing for a nice cushy desk job, where I could give my feet a break, look at the raging weather through a window, have friendly colleagues to banter with, get to wear something that was red or purple or green for a change?

I’ll never know, cuz at my age the civil service examiner would burst out laughing. Or maybe she would offer me a nice desk job, in HR, mediating office squabbles.

No thanks. I’ll stay where I am.

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Are We There Yet?

Lucy Moore

Maybe you remember family car trips with the periodic chorus from the backseat “Are we there yet?” The answer was always “Almost,” and somehow you knew that wasn’t true. And yes, you squirmed and asked many more times before the car pulled into the motel, your aunt’s house, a state park, whatever the destination of this trip.

This chorus has been running through my head for the past few weeks as the major project I have been working on draws to a close. On November 1 the final report from the Not Invisible Act Commission was submitted to congress and the Departments of the Interior and Justice. The report addressed the crisis of murdered, missing and trafficked Indigenous people and offered dozens of recommendations to the executive and legislative branches of government.  

“So, Lucy,” I tell myself, “the answer is yes, we are there. Your work is done, your contract complete, the final deliverable delivered.” As facilitator I have reached the destination, but the question “are we there yet?” still hangs over me.

The problem is that the report is only one step on a long journey and the real destination is taking action, implementing those recommendations, making significant change that will reduce dramatically the numbers of suffering Indigenous people and families who are impacted by this epidemic of murdered, kidnapped and trafficked Indigenous people. Until that happens I don’t think we’re there yet.

I’ve had this worry before in my decades of mediating and facilitating all kinds of disputes. I’m hired to do a discrete task – hold a listening session, mediate a negotiation, bring adversaries together to draft a plan for moving forward. The outcome may be good, citizens’ voices heard, an agreement reached, relationships built for future work together. But these are just beginnings; they are not the destination. The problem, the need that brought them to the table is still there. Without a monitor, someone responsible for seeing that the agreements become reality, the parties may be left with little or no progress. And in the case of Indigenous and other groups they may simply chalk this up as another broken promise, eroding whatever trust might have been built.

I would like to see the mediator/facilitator be able to take on a follow-through function. With authority to monitor the implementation of the agreement, they could check on progress and help get past obstacles. They could communicate regularly with the parties, reminding them of where they’ve been and where they’re heading, maybe even bring them back together to review, or modify, or celebrate. It’s possible that some participants don’t want to be reminded, are overwhelmed by the newest crisis, or have moved on in another direction. That’s understandable but the work they put in on these processes deserves a careful and caring follow-up. Someone needs to check the road map and ask “Are we there yet?”

From the cover of the Not Invisible Act Report, “Not One More.” This is a picture of a small part of the Honoring our Medicine Paddle Blanket, created by Pacific Northwest Tribes to remember and honor murdered and missing loved ones. The Puyallup Tribe cares for the blanket, which travels throughout the country. It was hung at the MMIP hearing in Billings, Montana, and family members were invited to add their own paddles in honor of lost loved ones. The blanket has many hundreds of paddles, each sewed on with care by a member of the Puyallup Tribe’s Domestic Violence Program.




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Reconciliation – Small Steps

Lucy Moore

A colleague called the other day to ask about reconciliation. No, we had not had a fight or a feud. He lives in Hawaii and works with thorny issues involving Native Hawaiian communities. He wanted to talk about my experience working with Native Americans on the mainland. Was reconciliation part of the mediation process and if so how did it work? We exchanged stories but came to no conclusions. We weren’t even sure how to define reconciliation. Did it need an apology? By whom? Written or spoken? How about a process for hearing stories, like the Truth and Reconciliation efforts? Should there be some legislation or memorials? An annual day of observance? Plaques, monuments? Should money – or land—change hands?  All good questions, and all possible parts of the whole.

Pope Francis at Lac Ste Anne, near Edmonton, Canada, a stop on his reconciliation trip. Photo by Antonio Denti.

Today there is a lot of talk about reconciliation, in the US and other countries dealing with historical abuse and displacement of Indigenous people. The shocking boarding school deaths and mistreatment, (physically, psychologically, emotionally and spiritually) are the latest revelations, among many others, in Canada and the US. Indigenous groups demand justice, compensation, reconciliation; government representatives seem often paralyzed, not knowing what is needed, who should provide it and how to go about it.

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Mediator Out Takes

Lucy Moore

You know how some movies have out takes at the end? The hero misses the punch and jams his hand into a bowl of fruit. The kissing scene is interrupted by a giant moth who wants in on the action. Or, lines are flubbed again, and again, until everyone dissolves in laughter. I love those scenes. They show us a glimpse of reality, what it is really like to make a movie. And they show us that these are just human beings doing a job, however imperfectly. That got me thinking about my profession – mediation and facilitation – and out takes that I could show at the end of the movie titled, “Lucy Saves the Day,” or “Mediators: Warriors for Peace” or … well, you get the idea. So, I’ll spare you the movie, and just give you the out takes, moments from my decades of practice that make me smile.

“Hmmm…where is that place?” – I was facilitating a meeting for the Forest Service in northern New Mexico. About a dozen very rural, somewhat eccentric community members were standing in front of a wall- sized map of their local national forest. The Forest Service staff were there hoping to find out how and where local people used the forest. I was proud of this interactive tool, primitive by today’s standards but in the 1980s quite a novelty. I asked people to come forward, take a marker and indicate on the map the spots where they fished, cut wood, hiked, hunted, etc. There were different colored markers for different kinds of uses. The maps were covered with clear plastic, so they could erase and re-draw if they needed to. No one wanted to break the ice, or make the first mark. I was worried my great innovation was a flop. I saw an aging hippie woman, spilling out of her bib overalls and with a head of wild gray hair, staring at the map for a long time, the marker dangling in her hand. I encouraged her.  “Do you want to put something up there, some forest use?” I asked innocently. “Well,” she said dreamily, “I’m just trying to remember…a long time ago… where it was that I laid that man at….” I suggested we could call that “recreational use” and she marked the spot.

Fond memories…
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Expanding the Tent

Lucy Moore

How big is your tent? Who and how many can fit under it?  And how does someone qualify to be one of those lucky ones?

My rural neighborhood outside Santa Fe, for instance, is small, maybe 20 houses. I say “maybe” because our tent size is a bit fluid.  We draw artificial boundaries based on tradition; one street over is too far, but another may be included that is no nearer. We include those who have moved away and we were so sorry to see them go that we still invite them to the annual Pie Bake, even if they are now in Florida. Who gets to be under our tent? Those with whom we share common ground – physically, but not always in other senses. And, those who are familiar, comfortable, reliable, although a newcomer may not have started out that way.

I’ve been thinking about “professional tents” lately. I have spent decades safely under the “mediation/facilitation tent.” This has given me the connections and status that enable me to make a living doing what I love. Those of us under the tent are on federal rosters of providers invited to bid on federal contracts. We speak at conferences, write articles, hobnob with leaders in the field, all of which increases our chances of landing the next job. It is a great club to be part of – for pleasure and profit.

But exactly what are the boundaries of the tent and do we need to do a little remodeling to expand our size?  

My eyes were opened recently thanks to a project with Johns Hopkins University (JHU). The project included a series of zoom meetings with seven communities around the country representing different demographics – Latinx, Native American and African American – to learn how these groups make decisions about whether or not to take a vaccine. I was part of a team of experienced facilitators – all securely under the tent — ready to do the job, but it was clear to us that dropping into these communities, with no connection and no credibility, was not the way to go. We worked with the client to identify and hire local community members to fill the role. The group of seven recruits included a pastor, a community health worker, a clinical psychologist, a professor, a city administrator, and others. None was a trained facilitator.

My role shifted to that of coach and back-up for these “non-facilitators,” who would be facilitating their community conversations. I held three zoom calls where the facilitators could get some help from us established facilitators. The joke was on us; they needed none of that. They shared stories from their meetings and exchanged tips about how to handle certain situations. Whatever I offered was outweighed by what I received in new insights and inspiration. Although none was a facilitator in the professional sense, they facilitated beautifully, each in their own way, bringing their own identity and experience to the role. The community members felt they were in good and caring hands and engaged honestly, openly and with a vulnerability that would not have happened with an outside facilitator.

Expanding the tent for new members

Would it be so hard to expand our tent and explicitly include these non-facilitators who nonetheless facilitated skillfully in our (often self-promoting) club ? It would be a win-win for the client who would get more robust and authentic engagement and a more useful product, for the participants who could relate to that person in the front of the room/screen, and for the profession which would at last begin to reflect the diversity of those we are working with.

So what are the barriers to expanding the tent to include these talented, unrecognized practitioners? Unlike lawyers, doctors and others there are no degrees or exams required to call yourself a mediator or facilitator. A few states have certification programs for mediators, but almost all of us under the tent are not carrying around a license to practice. So it is not that lack of certification that is keeping them out. I think it is more insidious. As with any club, or neighborhood, there is an expectation that those who join will fit in. This may mean having certain degrees and /or impressive experience in the field. It also may mean that the new member under the tent will relate easily to the existing members. There will be a familiarity, a comfort level; the new member will not pose a challenge, will not rock the boat, but will embrace the status quo whatever it might be.

This is not a sign of good health for the profession. It is increasingly clear to me that there is bias built into the system. Those from different backgrounds, who look or sound different, whose skills manifest differently, may not pass that comfort and familiarity test and may not be invited into the professional tent. They will not have access to the status and connections, and hence the jobs and contracts, that come with being under that tent. The diversity, the insights, the skills that those local facilitators brought to the JHU project are exactly what we need inside our professional tent. Of course, not everyone is lining up to get into the tent, but for those who are, we should throw open the flap and welcome them in.

Expanding our tents to embrace the other is the right thing to do for so many reasons –a stronger group, a sustainable future, and a more inclusive and just way of doing business.

There’s always a way to make room for more

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Eyes on the Prize

Lucy Moore

The social justice movement is rolling forward at what sometimes seems like lightning speed. I am thrilled that concepts that used to be so hard for Whites to swallow – like systemic racism and white privilege – are now rolling off the tongues of politicians, newscasters, academicians and ordinary people. There is an explosion of great books, articles and podcasts on the subject of how to be a good “White ally”…but, as I type the phrase I think I remember reading that “allies” is out. We’re not supposed to say that anymore. I can’t remember what is in, but I know that the words “diversity and inclusion,” which I was so proud to have taken on as a mantra many years ago, are also no longer acceptable either. And just when I had learned to say “D&I” and felt as if I truly belonged in the club.  

For years I have happily co-trained in “Building Intercultural Communities” with my friend and colleague, Roberto Chene, who is Hispanic, oops, I mean Hispano, I mean Latino, I mean Latin-x …. you see the problem. I have a Latina friend who wants to be called Latina, not Latin-x, because the female ending is an important part of her identity. I have another friend, also native New Mexican, who prefers to be called Chicana for its political implications. I am grateful to both of them for making clear what they prefer. In this world of labels it is really helps to know which ones to use. But I have to admit it’s getting really complicated out there in the land of undoing racism.

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Miracles Happen

Lucy Moore

There are intractable conflicts rooted in history all over the country. Conflicts over flags, over statues, over celebrations, over naming of public places, over school curriculum, and on and on.  Sometimes it seems that only a miracle could resolve them. Well, I am proud to announce that a miracle has happened, right here in Santa Fe. But I must begin with the history, because as with many conflicts that’s where it all began.

In the late 1500’s Spanish conquistadors marched from what is now Mexico north in search of the famed cities of gold. Anyone they met along the way was astounded at the sight of these armored, spear-carrying, bearded strangers and sent them on. “Oh, the cities of gold? Yes, they are about 100 miles to the north.” Reaching as far north as what is now Colorado and as far east as what is now Nebraska, they finally gave up the search and settled along the Rio Grande, running north to south through what is now New Mexico.

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