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Features
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Do lawyers really enjoy certain advantages as mediators? Last month's poll split readers into two camps: those who think it's always the case, and those who find the notion absurd. Here, three leading non-lawyer mediators give their views.
 Mark Jackson-Stops,
In Place of Strife
“The notion that ‘lawyers make better mediators because they engage with a wider range of issues’ is indeed absurd. I am perfectly prepared to accept that there are some outstanding mediators who happen to be lawyers. They are outstanding only because they have managed to expand their vision beyond the narrow focus which the law gives them. They are outstanding in spite of being lawyers.
The time has come to abolish the distinction between lawyer and non lawyer mediator. There are good
mediators and less good mediators, mediators who can engage with a wide range of issues and those who can’t.”
Roger Tabakin,
Independent
“The notion that lawyers make better mediators is no more valid than stating that accountants, architects, academics through to zoologists, are better mediators. Trained negotiators of any discipline are generally better mediators, followed by untrained negotiators.
Sadly negotiation training is not provided as part of the legal educational curriculum, nor for many other disciplines. If this were the case, lawyers may then be able to claim to be better mediators!
Most recommendations for the appointment of a mediator are made via legal firms, often by junior solicitors who, lacking experience, prefer the comfort of proposing a lawyer mediator. This makes it somewhat difficult for the less well known non lawyer mediators to obtain appointments and develop their experience and reputation. “
Frances Maynard,
CEDR
 “Neither lawyers or non-lawyers make better mediators. The notion is absurd. Not better, just different. What matters is getting an appropriate mediator for those parties, on that occasion. Mediators have many mediations but the parties have but one and getting it right for them is paramount.
I used to think that being a non-lawyer was a disadvantage but have come to see it as the opposite. Yes, I get a wide variety of matters but, more importantly, I am not part of the legal hierarchy and can meet and work with silks and solicitors simply as people who are key players in the mediation process rather than, perhaps, the position they occupy in the hierarchy of which I would also be a part as a lawyer. I can also ask the ‘idiot’ questions which might cause offence if asked by one lawyer of another.
Thirdly I suffer none of the temptation that I imagine could be present for many lawyer mediators of making a judgement about the legal merits of the case. I might find it hard to resist allowing that to shape, in some form, the way in which I work. I believe the field has a place for mediators of both persuasions - and long live the difference!”
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