In recent years, much has been made of the fact that we are living in the digital age: we are tethered to our smartphones, iPad, laptops and other devices and are heavily dependent on them. Much like Pavlov’s dogs, whenever our smartphone beeps, vibrates, rings et cetera, we check it [Read More]
Often in negotiating, a party may make a monetary demand without providing any reasoning behind it. I have often found that such a tactic does not work well because the other party will ask me “why”. She wants to know the reasoning behind the monetary demand. So- I return to [Read More]
Several times in the past, I have written on the power of an apology, including the right and wrong way to do it. When I saw an article by Jane Brody (entitled, “The Right Way to Say, ‘I’m Sorry’”) in the New York Times (January 31, 2017) discussing this topic, [Read More]
In the context of a marital dissolution proceeding, is there (or should there be) an exception to mediation confidentiality (California Evidence Code section 1119) for financial disclosures “prepared for the purpose of” and used “in the course of … the mediation?” (Evidence Code section 1119). The Legislature believes so; On [Read More]
A few weeks ago, Counselor to the President Kellyanne Conway used the phrase “alternative facts” during a Meet the Press interview to defend President Trump’s assertion that the attendance at his inauguration was “huge”, the “largest” ever etc. despite aerial pictures of the crowd size showing the contrary. Several months [Read More]
On February 2, 2017, the California Law Revision Commission (CLRC) held its regular meeting in which it once again discussed mediation confidentiality. While the Commissioners seemingly did not make any great strides, at the same time, they did. I make this contradictory statement because at its September 2016 meeting, the [Read More]
I saw a blog on the Program on Negotiation (PON) at Harvard Law School’s web page written by its staff (January 12, 2017) entitled “How Mood Affects Negotiators”. It caught my attention because I had just witnessed this effect in two of my mediations. Recently, I held two mediations on [Read More]
Once again, the California Legislature was hard at work in 2016 passing 893 laws, most of which went into effect on New Year’s Day, 2017. While most of them are probably relevant addressing critical issues, there are a few that provide wonderment, invoking the question, “why?” and “what is the [Read More]
