Finding Insights in the Garden: Lessons from Mediation Before convening a formal mediation meeting, I always have several private conversations with each party. This approach allows me to delve deeper into their perspectives and uncover the underlying issues. I ask questions that provoke introspection: Did the other person make… Read More »MEDIATION IS LIKE MAKING COMPOST
Ouma van Wyk – Ma – Ouma du Toit. I never aspired to be a mother. To me what was normal was this: Girls grow up, they start dating, they meet a guy, they fall in love, they get married, they have babies. My life started before The… Read More »What is Mothers’ Day to me?
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A minimum of two people and an issue on which they disagree.
Add to the recipe the factors that the people each bring into the relationship:
Our values are what we judge to be important in life: our personal principles. The rules we live by. They typically originate in our culture but over time our values may shift as our relationship with our culture shifts (e.g. young adults and their elderly parents may share a culture but have very different values as regards to how kids are raised; dealing with garbage; ethnic diversity, and so on).
“Culture is the collective programming of the mind that distinguishes the members of one group or category of people from others.”[1]
Triggers: What sets you off causes a quick change in your mood/attitude, rooted often in values or cultural practices you hold dear would be called a trigger. For example a South African grandmother whose half-Japanese grandson slurps his tea. Tea slurping is what one does in Japanese culture. Not so in ‘polite society’ in South Africa.
<1281 words> I have a great deal of respect for wild elephants and am careful to show that respect by backing out of their way when they come walking down the road towards my car. I believe I’ve learned a thing or two about elephant culture in my multiple trips to… Read More »RESPECT & CURIOSITY: On Elephants and Others
<1243 words> FOUR DECADES OF BEING A ‘SENIOR’ WARRANTS A CLOSER LOOK AT THE DIFFERENCES There are more and more forecasts that more and more of us will live to be one hundred. Our eligibility for Canada Pension kicks in at 60. For many of us that marks the beginning of… Read More »Four Decades of Being a ‘Senior’
<436 words> I was recently asked about my background in conflict management/resolution, and specifically, how many years’ experience I have in the field. I help people with all sorts of conflict – The inner conflict you have when you should have stood your ground but didn’t, which you still… Read More »“Eat your peas” and Conflict Resolution
<1160 words> The harsh truth about helping Canada’s Syrian refugees is with us now. The state of their kids’ teeth, our inability to communicate in Arabic, and all that. I’m sure there are many misunderstandings that have the potential to gnaw at the goodwill cloud that swept the Canadian nation… Read More »Syrian Refugees: Who Helps the Helpers?
<520 words> I was at a meeting a while back, in a room with a low ceiling, comfortably seating about 8 people around a board room table; plastic water bottles and everything. During the conversation someone mentioned that there was an elephant in the room – with reference to something… Read More »The Elephant in the Room
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The Paris attacks took place the week before I travelled to St. John’s Newfoundland for some training to upgrade my conflict coaching skills. France had retaliated; some Southern US Governors decided to shut their doors to Syrian refugees; Facebook was full of stories of other massacres that had not received the same level of media attention, with powerful allegations of bias and racism; and some Canadians were calling for Prime Minister Trudeau to renege on his commitment to bring 25,000 Syrian refugees to Canada by year’s end. There have been acts of aggression and violence against Arabs and Muslims.
I admit to sharing some of the African anger at the absence of attention being paid to the massacre in Kenya; the genocide that is building in Burundi; the Boca Haram kidnappings in Nigeria; and the farm killings in South Africa; no doubt because I am an African. But, I remind myself that there is no such thing as truly objective reporting. Everybody has a philosophy and a position. If you think Africa is a lost place full of bloodthirsty and corrupt people who are irrelevant in your life, much as the boat people from Syria may be irrelevant to your life in your comfort zone, then you’re likely to shut CNN down if they dwell on it too much. CNN et al will therefore rather tell you about people and places that you can relate to and maybe even care about because you represent their revenue stream.
The anti-Muslim rhetoric that has escalated on social media is valiantly being countervailed by other postings calling for peace, rationality, appreciation of diversity and tolerance. Quotes by John F. Kennedy and Maya Anjou and ancient sages and current religious leaders are being shared and commented on. I swear my laptop gets hotter the more time I spend reading and then biting my tongue as I see the inflammatory stuff that’s out there (not always successfully biting my tongue as my Facebook and Twitter friends well know).
<4230 words> This is NOT A BLOG. It is a conference paper that I decided to make available via my blog. The PPT (available on LinkedIn) is on a safari theme, so these giraffes suggest we take the long view of where our need for fairness comes from.
FAIRNESS:
A CULTURAL CONSTRUCT OR A UNIVERSAL HUMAN NEED?
The challenge to HR:
Improving workplace fairness by stepping back and taking it all in.
Background paper to a presentation given at the Atlantic Universities and Colleges Human Resources Association (AUCHRA) Conference in Sydney, Nova Scotia, Canada, on 22 October, 2015
Presenter/author: Delphine du Toit. Mediator/Coach/Facilitator.
Fairness is the default position
1. INTRODUCTION
Fairness is a baseline requirement for humans, yet it feels like the harder we try the more difficult it is to achieve. The difficulty with being universally fair is that it is a balancing act. No-one discusses ‘fairness’, generally speaking, unless someone has alleged that something has been unfair. The withdrawal of fairness is a bit like the withdrawal of oxygen: you don’t know you have it until it is taken away.
Unfairness – perceived or real – is a great source of conflict in the workplace. Sometimes it bursts forth in a flurry of accusations; more often it festers in someone’s heart and head, gradually poisoning their feelings about the workplace; being at work; co-workers; management, which then manifests itself in reduction of effort; sloppy work; argumentative responses to requests; squabbling; gossiping; and, in more extreme cases, in absenteeism or overt sabotage.
Read More »Fairness is simple. Bring culture into it and bedevil everything.