Mediation and Conflict Management (3) (ADV 800)

Professor John Baker

This skills-course approaches mediation and conflict management as a way of avoiding or resolving litigation and of addressing relationships in business or other organizations. The course is appropriate also for anyone wishing to improve his or her ability to communicate and to lead. The course employs a neurolinguistics approach to understanding and improving communications among parties who may not be relating well. The course draws insights from game theory in order to analyze strategic behavior in legal, business and professional relationships.

The classes in this three credit course are compressed into a week’s time. Prior to the first of the class, students will have to prepare an exercise for the first class. The classes themselves will be conducted primarily through simulations. Students will be graded on their performance of the in-class exercises and during a final mediation, plus a ten to fifteen- page paper due a month after the classes end.