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 Leading mediator and former chairman of the ADR Group, Phillip Howell-Richardson, is to join Independent Mediators on 1 March 2010, following a five-year stint at City law firm SJ Berwin. The move brings Independent Mediators' total to six mediators, all of whom are recognised as market leaders by The Legal 500.
Commenting on his decision to leave an established City law firm in favour of a virtual chambers established only three years ago, Howell-Richardson was succinct: "I want to take the chance to get out on my own and to create more time to work with a wider spread of solicitors and clients so that I can increase the number and range of the mediations I do."
A former senior partner at Morgan Cole in Cardiff, and latterly London, Howell-Richardson's move to SJ Berwin in 2005 signalled a shift in his practice towards City and international work. Underlying the latest move is a wish to tie together the two strands of his career. "I will continue to undertake international and City based mediations, they bring challenges I enjoy, but I would like also to be more readily available to those regional firms who instructed me in the past " he said.
His move is the latest high-profile endorsement of the chambers model, and of Independent Mediators in particular. The organisation is now home to half of the Legal 500's top-tier mediators, and represents the market's greatest concentration of quality.
While describing the "law firm consultancy model" as very good for the firm, the tie-up with Independent Mediators will relieve Howell-Richardson of much of the admin he currently handles personally. "At the moment, working in this way, I do everything. From initial calls to follow through, from top to bottom. It's great to have that taken away and to concentrate on mediation, and that is a significant plus."
Howell-Richardson, 59, rubbishes any suggestion that the move is a shift towards retirement: "No way," he says. "I've no interest whatsoever in retiring. The new position will give me more time and greater opportunities to develop my mediation practice"
Howell-Richardson will remain available to SJ Berwin as an ADR consultant and will continue to support the firm in its ADR activities.
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 Following our theme of hybrid mediations, Paul Johnson of Kings Chambers, Manchester, outlines the challenges of one such mediation as day four beckons...
I mediate all kinds of disputes. One of the most challenging categories of dispute is the family bust-up over the family business/ assets. The mix of fact, law and emotion is just toxic.
I recently spent 3 days mediating such a dispute.
I shall call the parties A, B, C and D. They were equal shareholders in a company and B, C and D were partners in another part of the family business. C managed the company and B managed the partnership. After years of simmering tension, B and C fell out in a very serious way, accusing each other of serious financial wrongdoing. Matters came to head when A and D (neither of whom had any active part in running the family business) resolved, together with C, to remove B from the family business. B issued proceedings for unfair prejudice/ equitable winding up of the company. C and D completed the circle by issuing proceedings to dissolve the partnership.
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Those interested in submitting details of their mediation practice for consideration in the 2010 edition of The Legal 500, are invited to do before 19 February. Publishers Legalease Ltd have set out mediation-specific submission guidelines for the first time this year. Copies are available here:
http://www.legal500.com/assets/images/research/guidelines_mediators.pdf
Research will be ongoing during March and April prior to publication in September 2010. |
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From a talk by Matthew Rushton for the Standing Conference of Mediation Advocates Norton Rose 16 September 2009 First, thank you for inviting me to be here this evening.
Let me kick off with a little background. As you'll gather from the title of my talk this evening - Six Things I'd Change if I Could - I believe that if mediation is to thrive, then change is necessary. I don't expect what I'm about to say will make me popular, so before I'm chased from the room under a hail of biros and Blackberrys, let me at least offer some background as to how I came by these views.
The first thing you need to know is that I am basically a journalist. So if you find me unbearably sanctimonious, sensationalist, and hypocritical, please understand that I'm only maintaining the best traditions of my profession.
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Conversion courses offer hope to the UK's glut of under-used civil/commercial mediators. Do they deliver? The Mediator Magazine finds out
On 26 and 27 January 2010, mediation training and service provider Globis ran its first workplace mediation conversion course for civil and commercial mediators. At the same time, the ADR Group announced a course for civil-commercial mediators to convert to being family mediators, run by Henry Brown.
[Click title to read more]
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 Laurence Boulle and Miryana Nesic, authors of Butterworths' renowned ADR text "Mediation: Principles, Process, Practice" have brought out a new text aimed at ADR training organisations and practitioners. The book, "Mediation Techniques: Triangle of Influence" came out in December. Talking to The Mediator Magazine, author Miryana described the book as a "a skills book - a how to - with checklists, exercises and appendices." "It's very much a practical book rather than a theory/legal/policy review," she says.
A review of the book on YouTube by Phillip Taylor of Richmond Green Chambers is available here.
A flyer is available here. |
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 From a presentation given to the IBA Mediators' Section
6 October 2009, Madrid Specialisation is an inescapable fact of modern life. One shouldn't however, conclude from that that specialisation is either approved of, or desirable. One can make a case, for example, that the current financial crisis is a crisis of over-specialisation. In the UK, disdain of the specialist is somehow a tradition. Some of it is caught up in a misty-eyed nostalgia for the era of the "gentleman amateur" - a long-gone figure, if he ever existed, who had the time and money to cultivate and indulge a tremendous range of interests. Some of it, let's be frank, is snobbery: part of the British mindset has never got to grips with the fact that some people work for a living. Something of that mentality led comedian Kenneth Williams to lament that 'these days, people are becoming more and more expert in less and less. Very soon,' he concluded, 'it'll be possible to be the world's leading expert in absolutely nothing.' [CLICK TITLE TO READ MORE] [DOWNLOAD PDF OF SLIDES HERE] |
 Mediation privilege is once again under scrutiny following Mr Justice Ramsey’s judgment in FarmAssist Limited (in liquidation) v The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural affairs (No. 2) 2009 EWHC 1102 (TCC). Is confidentiality in mediation now hopelessly compromised? Writing for The Mediator Magazine, Michel Kallipetis QC and William Wood QC offer views from either side of the argument. Download the full article here. |
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