Find Mediators Near You:

To Resolve a Dispute, the First Step is to Assess Your Options

Dispute Settlement Counsel by Michael Zeytoonian.

I’ve heard people who are in a business or employment dispute often lament: “I’m stuck in this dispute, and now we’ll have to litigate; I have no options.” If you take nothing else from this post, know this: They are usually wrong about this.

This is like when a retail sales person gives you the company line: “If you want to buy it, that’s the price.” You feel like you have no choice.

My father taught me that everything is negotiable, especially if you are willing to walk away from the deal. His lesson was the core message of what those in the dispute resolution field today refer to as having good “BATNA” (best alternative to a negotiated agreement). When you don’t need to buy what they are selling to you, when you can and will walk away, you have great BATNA.

My dad also gave my wife one piece of advice when she married me: “Make sure you give Michael options; he needs to have options.” This was great advice for her. I am a true Libran in the sense of weighing options before deciding. That’s part of what drives me to provide clients with options for how they should resolve their disputes.

Most people in disputes don’t know they have options and if they do, don’t consider them. They may have heard of mediation and arbitration but really don’t know exactly how they work, what the differences are and when to utilize them. They have probably not heard of collaborative law, conciliation or case evaluation. They usually just start the litigation process, which is like opting for legal surgery.

We don’t approach legal disputes the way we would probably approach medical issues. When it comes to our health, we get advice from doctors we know and trust, and we often also get at least one second opinion. We don’t just call the surgeon and start the prep for surgery first. Yet that is what most people do when they are in a legal dispute.

Legal disputes affect your health and well-being in more ways than one. So why wouldn’t we check what options are available for resolving this dispute and get some good counsel on the pros and cons of each alternative to going to court before we choose a course of action?

Your best “First Step” is finding a legal counselor that will assess your situation, teach you about the dispute resolution options available to you, recommend which one is the right process for you and tell you why. It should be a lot more like the medical process than you think. In my next blog post, we’ll talk more about this critical “First Step” and the legal/medical analogy.

                        author

Michael A. Zeytoonian

Michael A. Zeytoonian is the Founding Member and Director of Dispute Resolution Counsel, LLC and is a lawyer, mediator and ombudsman. He is formerly a partner and now Of Counsel at Hutchings, Barsamian, Mandelcorn & Zeytoonian, LLP, in Wellesley Hills, MA. He specializes in employment law, business law, special education… MORE >

Featured Mediators

ad
View all

Read these next

Category

Back to Basics

From the Blog of Phyllis G. Pollack.A few weeks ago, my colleague Maria Simpson, PhD., in her weekly Two Minute Training (February 15, 2011), mentioned a story she had heard...

By Phyllis Pollack
Category

ABA’s Public Civility Initiative

From the Business Conflict Blog of Peter Phillips.It is curious that, as formal training in private negotiation increases, the quality of public negotiation has fallen into such disrepair. Business people...

By F. Peter Phillips
Category

Tom Stipanowich: Mother Influenced Value of Peacemaking – Video

See interview series DVDs at www.mediate.com/Views. Access all Tom Stipanowich videos here.Tom Stipanowich explains how his mother was the peacemaker in his household and how that influenced his decision to...

By Tom Stipanowich
×