Transforming New Zealand Employment Relations: At the Intersection of Institutional Dispute Resolution and Workplace Conflict Management

In New Zealand, the contemporary shift from highly regulated, collectivist employment rights to individual employment relationships included statutory direction to mediation. Good faith negotiation in the workplace and state provision of mediation were to be the primary mechanisms for resolution of ‘employment relationship problems’ (ERP). This paper investigates the intersection between workplace conflict management and institutional provision of mediation. We investigated ERP resolution by drawing on empirical evidence from 38 narrative interviews where participants recounted experiences of employment relationship problem (ERP) resolution. We analysed 243 ERP by comparing settlements to end employment relationships with resolution of ERP where relationships endured. We sought to understand why some ERP remained unresolved and/or escalated. We found that collaborative reflective sense-making had a positive impact on early workplace problem resolution while investigation and confidential settlement negotiations risked injustice. We present, therefore, some suggestions for embedding collaborative conflict management in the workplace

The IDEA and the Use of Mediation and Collaborative Dispute Resolution in Due Process Disputes

This Comment discusses the future of alternative dispute resolution in special education conflicts by first examining a brief history of the IDEA and the areas it covers. Due process complaints under the IDEA and mediation as a solution to due process complaints will then be addressed. Then, it will focus on mediation and its impact on parents and schools, particularly the advantages and disadvantages of mediation, and the presence of attorneys in mediation. Finally, it will look towards collaborative law, when two attorneys and their clients collaborate to reach an agreement, and the future of collaborative dispute resolution in the special education field. This Comment will show that mediation has a better chance of succeeding when attorneys represent both parties. Furthermore, collaborative dispute resolution may be an ideal solution that reaps the benefits of alternative dispute resolution while avoiding the drawbacks of traditional mediation in special education disputes

Learning localization through Trans-Atlantic collaboration: bridging the gap between professions

In light of what has taken place since their presentation at the IEEE International Professional Communication Conference in 2005, the authors describe additional requirements and merits of matching technical writing students in the US with translation students in Europe in a collaborative assignment. Where the original article dealt with how to set up and organize the collaboration, this tutorial delves into the pedagogical challenges and the process dynamics involved in such an exchange, including mediation, power, and teamwork issues

Taking things into account: learning as kinaesthetically-mediated collaboration

This paper presents research on participant learning processes in challenge course workshops using the framework known as Cultural-Historical Activity Theory (CHAT). CHAT views learning as a shared, social process rather than as an individual event. Participants\u27 experiencing and learning was mediated by the physical and social conditions of the experience and by the contributions of other participants. The concept of mediation suggests that the meaning participants make of experience is not an individual event, but instead is enacted as a creative, collaborative process using cultural and institutional tools. The recognition that people\u27s physical, social and reflective learning processes are mediated, challenges longstanding assumptions about the radical autonomy of learners, about ‘direct experience,’ and about the centrality of independent, cognitive reflection in experiential learning. Empirical data showing processes of mediation are presented, and the implications for research and theory are discussed

Design and handicrafts: The importance of interdisciplinarity in collaborative design practice

The focus of this article is on the relationship between design and craftsmanship in the Brazilian scenario of social projects with craft production. It presents the importance of collective and collaborative actions as forms of mediation in this scenario. The article argues that in order to develop a design mindset that expands beyond projective practices and takes into account the social and political context for more sustainable solutions in environmental, social and economic levels, the mediation has to be collaborative. In the paper, a parallel is outlined between this collective, collaborative and complex work of design and the multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary approaches. To address the complexity of this subject, practical examples are identified to show the important strategic role that the designer plays in these social innovation processes.Keywords: crafts, collaborative design, social innovation, interdisciplinarity

A Study Of Behaviour Management: The Effect Of Transformational Leadership To Employee Innovative Behaviour Through Collaborative Human Resource Management And Adhocracy Organizational Culture

This study aims to resolve the research gap between transformational leadership and employee innovative behavior by combining the mediating variables of collaborative human resource management and adhocracy organizational culture as research novelty. This study uses primary data in the form of a questionnaire distributed to employees of Indonesias processed food industry. The sample in this study were 131 respondents using the purposive sampling technique. Partial Least Square data processing techniques use several data analysis, namely validity test, reliability test, and hypothesis testing. The test results show that transformational leadership has a significant positive effect on innovative employee behavior. Second, transformational leadership has a significant positive effect on collaborative human resource management. Third, collaborative human resource management has a significant positive effect on employee innovative behavior. Fourth, transformational leadership has a significant positive effect on employee innovative behavior through collaborative human resource management mediation. Fifth, transformational leadership has a significant positive effect on adhocracy organization culture. Sixth, the adhocracy organization culture has a significant positive effect on employee innovative behavior. Seventh, transformational leadership has a significant positive effect on employee innovative behavior through the mediation of an adhocracy organization culture. Eighth, transformational leadership has a significant positive effect on employee innovative behavior through the mediation of collaborative human resource management and an adhocracy organization culture

Constructing collaborative ecologies: how selection, practice, and mediation assemble and shape social and collaborative software

This dissertation examines how a user experience team at a multinational corporation transforms a collection of software applications into a socially usable collaborative ecology. Collaborative ecologies are sociocultural systems that consist of persons, activities, tools, and ideas that are mutually constructive. The metaphor of ecology, which has emerged in the disciplines of human computer interaction, computer supported cooperative work, and rhetoric and professional communication, informs an ethnographic inquiry that includes seven months of daily immersion and ten hours of qualitative interviews. Drawing on a diverse reading of interdisciplinary theory, including traditional usability studies, genre theory, activity theory, and actor-network theory, the dissertation distills the construction of collaborative ecologies into three mechanisms: the selection of tools, the development of practices, and the mediation of ideas about those tools and practices. Applying selection, practice, and mediation in the context of the ethnographic study generates insights about the user experience team\u27s activities, about the collaborative ecology that support them, and about how selection, practice, and mediation operate. These insights are useful for the design and facilitation of social and collaborative software systems because they suggest a way to understand the role that users, activities, tools, and ideas play in constructing their ecology

We Can Work it Out : Using Cooperative Mediation - a Blend of Collaborative Law and Traditional Mediation - to Resolve Divorce Disputes

Elena Langan, We Can Work it Out : Using Cooperative Mediation - a Blend of Collaborative Law and Traditional Mediation - to Resolve Divorce Disputes, 30 Review of Litigation 245 (2011). Divorce in modern day America is a product of legislative creation, designed as an adversarial process focused on rights and responsibilities