[Excerpt] A newsletter on workplace issues and research from the School of Industrial and Labor Relations at Cornell University

Edid, Editor, Maralyn

English

DigitalCommons@ILR

Cornell University ILR School 
DigitalCommons@ILR 
Policy & Issue Briefs ILR Collection 
January 2007 
IWS briefing, Winter 2007 Volume 7 Issue 1 
Maralyn Edid, Editor 
Institute for Workplace Studies 
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IWS briefing, Winter 2007 Volume 7 Issue 1 
Abstract 
[Excerpt] A newsletter on workplace issues and research from the School of Industrial and Labor 
Relations at Cornell University. 
Keywords 
ILR, Institute for Workplace Studies, IWS, labor, market, employee, managers, Bacharach, management, 
collective bargaining, Esta Bigler, Paul Salvatore, Lipsky, Scanza, ADR, alternative dispute resolution 
Comments 
Suggested Citation 
IWS briefing (Winter 2007) [Electronic version]. New York, NY: Cornell University, School of Industrial and 
Labor Relations, Institute for Workplace Studies. 
http://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/briefs/27 
This article is available at DigitalCommons@ILR: https://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/briefs/27 
1 IN THIS ISSUE
A newsletter on
workplace issues
and research
from the School of
Industrial and
Labor Relations at
Cornell University
1 Professor’s Agenda
1 New Law Program
2 Studying Leadership
3 ADR Partnership
4 Colloquium Series
Winter 2007
Volume 7 Issue 1
continued on page 2
continued on page 3
ILR Launches New
Program for Lawyers
There’s no lack of legal issues
confronting today’s workplace.
Wage violations, discrimination,
collective bargaining rights, em-
ployee litigation, government regula-
tion, and labor and employment
laws are a few that readily come to
mind. Dealing with the applied and
theoretical impact of these matters,
however, requires serious delibera-
tion. So ILR Extension’s new Labor
and Employment Law Program has
a plan.
“We want to bring together
researchers, lawyers, policymakers,
legislators, employers, and labor
leaders to debate and evaluate the
critical legal issues facing the work-
place,” says Esta Bigler (ILR’70),
the program director. Indeed, Ms.
Bigler’s long-term goal is the cre-
ation of a labor and employment law
think tank at ILR. In the meantime,
she and six ILR Extension col-
leagues are carefully building the
foundation that will secure ILR’s role
as a leader in this field.
An evolving partnership be-
tween ILR and Cornell Law School
is a critical first step. That collabora-
tion has already spawned an agree-
ment to jointly undertake research
and educational activities related to
conflict resolution (see “ADR Part-
nership,” page 3). It has also re-
sulted in an educational outreach
effort aimed at labor and employ-
ment lawyers, which is named the
Cornerstone Workshop Series for
Lawyers. This fall marked the intro-
duction of a four-course program
that focuses on key areas of labor
and employment law, including the
National Labor Relations Act, em-
Conflict and Collaboration Define
Professor’s Agenda
IF CONFLICT GETS YOU GOING in the morning, consider the life ILRProfessor David Lipsky leads. As the Anne Evans Estabrook Profes-sor of Dispute Resolution, director of the Institute on Conflict Resolu-
tion (ICR), an authority on negotiations and collective bargaining, an
expert witness in labor arbitrations, a designer and evaluator of conflict
resolution systems, an active researcher of conflict-related topics and a
veteran teacher of same, Prof. Lipsky is enmeshed in some aspect of
conflict throughout most of his working day.
But being the well-versed student of conflict that he is, Prof. Lipsky
also knows a thing or two about preventing conflict. One technique
that consistently produces results for this graduate of ILR (B.S.’61)
and its former dean (1988-1997) requires working collaboratively
with others toward a mutually desired or beneficial outcome. It is an
approach that suits a variety of situations and venues, including the
workplace. “People in an employment relationship often focus on their
differences and may not realize they have common interests,” Prof.
Lipsky says. “In our programs we try to teach people how to identify
their common goals and interests instead of focusing on their differ-
ences. It’s easier to improve relationships if you stress the positives
and downplay the negatives.”
The ICR may be the prime institutional example of Prof. Lipsky’s ability
to blend his research interests with his practical inclinations. As his
understanding of workplace conflict broadened and deepened during the
mid-1990s, Prof. Lipsky was fortunate to obtain the generous support of
veteran arbitrator Theodore Kheel in establishing the ICR. Today, the
institute draws on the collective expertise of ILR faculty and students to
offer training, education, research, consulting, and neutral/third party
services that center on the management and resolution of conflict in the
workplace. The ICR’s expertise in workplace dispute resolution
makes it unique among the 40 or so conflict resolution programs
based at universities and law schools in the United States.
Prof. Lipsky has since pulled together numerous conflict-related re-
search and programmatic partnerships. Associate Dean Ronald Seeber
and Senior Extension Associate Rocco Scanza are frequent collabora-
tors; graduate students and other faculty colleagues often round out
the project teams. To cite two examples: Prof. Lipsky and Mr. Scanza,
2L EADERSHIP COMES NATURALLY tosome people. Take GeorgeWashington, for example. A
surveyor, landowner, businessman,
and farmer, this multi-talented indi-
vidual was also a skillful military com-
mander and an astute politician. He led
the American forces during the Revolu-
tionary War, was unanimously elected
first president of the United States,
established the operational foundations
for our system of government, and gra-
ciously retired to Mount Vernon rather
than seek re-election to a third term.
The characteristics that set him apart
from his peers and assured him near
mythological status in American history
are no doubt the stuff of great leaders.
But giving name to those qualities and
distilling their essence can be a daunting
task. Still, it is one that alumnus Paul
Salvatore (ILR’81, Law’84) was willing to
undertake in his role as guest lecturer for
Prof. Samuel Bacharach’s course on
political leadership and managerial com-
petence, a requirement for the 11 ILR
students who held internships in New
York City this past semester.
Having read Joseph Ellis’s 2004 biogra-
phy of Washington (His Excellency:
George Washington, published by Alfred
A. Knopf), Mr. Salvatore was struck by
the leadership skills Washington dis-
played throughout his military career.
“First, he was able to take a little (in
terms of resources) and make a lot out of
it,” Mr. Salvatore explains. “Second, he
knew when to retreat.” Washington
was a master at cajoling and begging
both government and private citizens to
obtain what was needed to wage a
credible fight against the British, who
boasted the strongest army in the
world. Although Washington lost more
battles than he won, Mr. Salvatore
continues, he held the American “team”
together until forming a “joint venture”
with the French that eventually enabled
him to rout the British at Yorktown and
secure  the colonies’ independence.
The Ellis book was required reading for
the students. Through written assign-
ployment discrimination, wage and hour
law, and arbitration advocacy. Additional
workshop series will be added shortly,
including one on discrimination law. Ms.
Bigler says the classes are intensive
and interactive, appropriate for new and
experienced lawyers, and provide skills
training alongside discussions of the
ethical, historical, and economic con-
texts surrounding the law and its en-
forcement. Each course offers
continuing legal education (CLE) credits;
stand-alone CLE workshops are also
scheduled.
Policy forums, seminars, and con-
ferences are another component of the
Labor and Employment Law Program’s
emerging structure. A recent session in
New York City dealing with the health
care cost quagmire attracted legislators,
health care advocates, union leaders,
and foundation representatives. Policy
experts from Maryland first presented
an overview of legislation that would
have required large employers to shoul-
der a greater share of employees’ health
care costs. They then explained a recent
district court decision, now on appeal,
that ruled the Maryland statute was pre-
empted by the federal Employee Retire-
ment Income and Security Act (ERISA).
Ms. Bigler notes that lawmakers in Al-
bany have also been grappling with
legislative proposals that would shift
more health care costs onto employers
who provide minimal or no medical insur-
ance to employees. The legislators’ intent
is to create some equity in a system that
generates its share of unintended con-
sequences by penalizing employers who
do the right thing (a decent health insur-
ance package is costly to businesses)
and by burdening taxpayers who wind
up subsidizing the medical bills of the
uninsured.
The concerted focus on labor and
employment law and policy is a natural fit
for ILR Extension. With Extension’s long-
standing practical expertise in this field
and its connections to workplace practi-
tioners, including hundreds of ILR alumni
who have become labor and employment
lawyers, this new unit is perfectly posi-
tioned to achieve its strategic goals.
For more information, contact Ms.
Bigler at erb4@cornell.edu or (212)340-
2865.
Students Study Leadership with a Leader
ments and class discussions with Mr.
Salvatore, a labor and employment law
partner at Proskauer Rose LLP, they
derived a list of attributes that de-
scribed Washington’s leadership style
and personality traits. Highlights from
that inventory range from his ability to
find and shape undiscovered raw talent
to his awesome physical presence.
“What struck me,” Mr. Salvatore notes,
“is that Washington was someone who
was able to instill in people around
him an amount of loyalty and trust —
and at some levels, reverence —that we
rarely see in leaders today. Contempo-
rary accounts are just remarkable; he
had certain characteristics that led
individuals to want to follow him.”
Just how these insights can be applied
to the modern workplace is a topic the
students also grappled with. “In the
past we’ve studied Lincoln, Roosevelt,
Truman, and Johnson,” Prof. Bacharach
says. “With the students out in the
field as interns, this is a great opportu-
nity to get involved with the practice of
leadership in different work settings.”
The students also benefited from the
experience of one other guest lecturer
— Ed Watt, secretary-treasurer of
Transport Workers Union Local 100 in
New York City — who talked about
leadership under strike conditions
during the union’s walkout in late
2005.
The students might even have taken
some leadership cues from Mr.
Salvatore, himself. An unstinting sup-
porter and friend of ILR, he was presi-
dent of the alumni association for four
years in the 1990s and most recently
chaired the school’s advisory council.
He has also taught labor and employ-
ment law topics as an adjunct lecturer
in ILR Extension programs in New
York City. “Cornell ILR has produced
many great leaders and George Wash-
ington promoted the idea of creating
institutions to train leaders,” Mr.
Salvatore says. “I think he’d like ILR,
on several different levels.” ■
New Program
continued from page 1
3who directs ILR Extension’s conflict
resolution program, have helped the
U. S. Nuclear Regulatory Commis-
sion design, administer, and evaluate
a dispute resolution system involv-
ing whistle-blowers in the industry.
Additionally, Prof. Lipsky, Mr. Scanza,
and Ph.D. candidate Ariel Avgar re-
cently completed an evaluation of the
internal dispute resolution program for
employees at the U.S. Equal Employ-
ment Opportunity Commission.
Two related assumptions inform Prof.
Lipsky’s theoretical and applied work.
First, conflict is a
commonplace
reality within orga-
nizations, one that
erupts between
individuals or groups and can sabotage
organizational and individual goals.
Second, conflict can be managed
through processes that advance the
constructive resolution of the underly-
ing problem. The processes them-
selves vary in the details but can be
collectively described as forms of
alternative dispute resolution (ADR).
ADR is nonjudicial and undertaken by
private parties in a private setting. The
most common forms of ADR include
negotiation, where the parties engage
in give-and-take until reaching agree-
ment; arbitration, where a neutral third
party decides the outcome; mediation,
where the parties jointly determine the
outcome with a third party helping to
move the discussion along; and facili-
tation, where a neutral actively guides
the parties toward an outcome. And
then there is straightforward collabora-
tion, which entails working jointly with
others — not truly an ADR process,
but rather a mode of interacting that
enables two or more people to get the
job done without disruptive conflict.
“Cornell ADR” is another example of
an ICR-affiliated venture that was
forged through collaboration. A series
of discussions among ILR faculty —
Prof. Lipsky, Mr. Scanza, Prof. James
Gross, and deans Seeber, Harry Katz,
and Susanne Bruyère — resulted in a
decision to move ICR directly into the
labor arbitration business. The institute
has long maintained a roster of neutral
third parties available for mediations
and arbitrations; with Cornell ADR, the
institute is now a full-service provider
offering upstate employers and unions
engaged in contract disputes a vetted list
of arbitrators, a set of rules, access to
hearing rooms, and administrative sup-
port. Prof. Lipsky expects the case
load will grow slowly, largely be-
cause Cornell ADR must first be writ-
ten into existing collective bargaining
agreements as the accepted arbitration
service. Still, he is
confident Cornell
ADR will fill the
void left by the
closing of the
American Arbitration Association’s
Syracuse office in 2005.
Prof. Lipsky’s activist bent is matched
by similarly collaborative conflict-focused
scholarly pursuits. Over the years he
has written or co-authored numerous
papers and books on conflict manage-
ment systems, workplace dispute reso-
lution, and the arbitration profession.
Just now he is beginning a project, with
Associate Dean Seeber, Mr. Scanza, and
Mr. Avgar as partners, on the politics of
the ADR evaluation process. Extensive
experience with organizations that have
instituted dispute resolution systems
has suggested to Prof. Lipsky and his
colleagues that managers often say they
want unbiased and data-driven assess-
ments of the programs but balk when
the conclusions don’t meet their expec-
tations. “There’s a lot of literature on
evaluating social and educational pro-
grams,” Prof. Lipsky says, “but no one
is really thinking about how to evaluate
dispute resolution programs in an hon-
est, balanced way.”
A trove of data on employment arbitra-
tion cases arising under the National
Association of Securities Dealers
(NASD), the private-sector provider of
financial regulatory services, also
awaits analysis. But not for long. Prof.
Lipsky, Associate Dean Seeber, and ILR
statistics professor Martin Wells re-
cently obtained information on the
3,000 employment arbitration cases
heard since 1993, when the NASD
adapted the arbitration process used for
broker-client disputes to handle em-
ployee complaints about workplace
issues. The researchers are interested
in the classic questions about bias and
effectiveness in arbitration: Does arbi-
tration provide a level playing field for
the disputants? Do litigation and arbi-
tration result in different outcomes?
What determines the outcome? Does
arbitration offer the same quality of
justice as litigation?
Other research and program initiatives
are in the formative stages. Prof.
Lipsky has no shortage of ideas, and
his network of professional contacts
ranges far and wide. He is certainly
proving that conflict and collaboration
can be a winning combination. ■
ILR and Law School Form ADR Partnership
DISPUTE RESOLUTION LIES AT THE CORE of a new partnership between the ILRSchool and the Cornell Law School. Following discussions among the twoschools’ deans, Harry Katz and Stewart Schwab, and key faculty, an
agreement was reached in early 2006 that has already produced a joint research,
education, and training initiative centered on ADR. ILR brings its expertise on
workplace matters to the new arrangement while the Law School contributes its
knowledge of all forms of legal conflict. Students and faculty from both colleges
will benefit through greater access to projects and courses. The two schools also
expect that collaborative programming will attract lawyers who want to hone their
ADR skills and deepen their understanding of dispute resolution. A certificate
program in workplace ADR is now being offered; next fall will mark the introduc-
tion of a certificate program in commercial and international ADR. ■
conflict is commonplace
within organizations
Professor’s Agenda
continued from page 1
Institute for
Workplace Studies
School of Industrial and Labor
Relations / Cornell University
16 East 34th Street, 4th Floor
New York, NY 10016
tel: (212) 340-2886
fax: (212) 340-2893
email: iwsnyc@cornell.edu
web: www.ilr.cornell.edu/iws
Director: Samuel B. Bacharach
Editor: Maralyn Edid
Program Director: Sara Edwards
16 East 34th Street, 4th Floor, New York, NY 10016
Nonprofit Org.
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Ithaca, NY
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GO TO➜
www.ilr.cornell.edu/iws for updates about
Institute for Workplace Studies events.
Alumni Speak at Workplace Colloquium Series
THE INSTITUTE FOR WORKPLACE STUDIES(IWS) takes its outreach missionseriously. From its base in New York
City, the institute serves as a link between
the academy and the community. A prime
example of its ability to bring together aca-
demics, labor and management representa-
tives, and policymakers is the annual IWS
Workplace Colloquium Series.
This year the IWS is sponsoring three collo-
quia, each showcasing ILR alumni. The first,
scheduled for February 15, features Douglas
Braunstein (ILR’83), head of Americas Invest-
ment Banking at JPMorganChase, who will
talk about the employment impact of merg-
ers and acquisitions. On March 22, Joseph
Rich (ILR’86), president of Pearl Meyer and
Partners, will address the issue of executive
and management compensation. And finally,
a panel comprised of three alumni, one of whom
is an ILR faculty member, will speak on May 31
about alternative dispute resolution in the work-
place. The panelists will be Jay Waks (ILR’68,
Law’71), a litigation partner and chair of the em-
ployment and labor law practice at Kaye Scholer
LLP; Martin Scheinman (B.S.ILR’75, M.S.ILR’76),
an arbitrator and mediator of workplace disputes;
and David Lipsky (B.S.ILR’61), the Anne E.
Estabrook Professor of Dispute Resolution and
director of the Institute on Conflict Resolution
(see story about Prof. Lipsky on page 1).
Each session is held in the evening and  includes
dinner and roundtable discussion. For more infor-
mation or to make a reservation, contact Katie
Briggs at kb41@cornell.edu or (212)340-7931. ■


IWS briefing, Winter 2007 Volume 7 Issue 1

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