Services
- Workplace Mediation
- Coaching
- Conflict Coaching
- Mediation Coaching
- Life Coaching
- Training
- Team Support
Workplace Mediation
"John Ford has worked with District staff on several occasions with excellent results. He not only helped the groups resolve their conflict and get back to productive work, he also left the organization with improved skills that we can apply in the future."
-- Donna Wies, Judi Berzon, Joanne Silva, Union Sanitary District
Mediation can be used to resolve a wide range of situations. As an early intervention, it can be effective to address trust and identity issues in relationships before a conflict spins out of control. At the other extreme, as the legal profession has found, mediation can be used effectively to resolve employment lawsuits that have turned workplaces into veritable war zones.
Our practice focuses on conflict internal to organizations. HR managers ask me to mediate disputes between employees, and also to mediate post-investigation or post-hearing. We also mediate employment discrimination disputes where attorneys represent parties and the employment relationship has been or is danger of being severed.
Coaching
“In John's coaching, he has a keen ability to listen to what is said and hone in on unspoken hopes and desires. He understands and supports the practical needs of his clients, while championing and encouraging them to pursue their greatest dreams. John is direct and tactful and provides the focus and structure necessary to target one's areas of greatest priority and importance.”
-- Nicole Lamb, Self Employed Trainer
Three forms of coaching are offered:
- Conflict Coaching
- Mediation Coaching
- Life Coaching
Conflict Coaching
I coach managers and executives who recognize the importance of conflict handling skills for the advancement of their own careers.
We typically address a particular conflict situation. Through a series of conversations we explore your conflict management abilities. We also consider the barriers that are preventing you from being a competent conflict manager.
We may ask that you take either or both of these instruments: The Conflict Handling Style Instrument and The Conflict Dynamics Profile.
The Conflict Handling Style Instrument explores your propensity to use one of the five styles: avoid, accommodate, compete, compromise and collaborate. You discover how to strategize, and make informed choices about which conflict handling style to use in the future.
The Conflict Dynamics Profile focuses on constructive and destructive behaviors that influence how conflict unfolds. This instrument has been endorsed by the Center for Creative Leadership. They consider conflict management as the number one developmental need of managers in their Foundations of Leadership program.
Mediation Coaching
We coach HR professionals to mediate their own disputes. Our goal is to support you develop your knowledge and skills as a mediator. Typically, there is a particular conflict that you are working on. You want support and guidance so you can approach the situation with clarity and confidence.
Life Coaching
We coach anyone who wants to examine the significance of conflict in their lives and liberate themselves from the endless compounding of our emotional pain. When we do, it allows us to live in the moment and enjoy greater health and happiness. This is the ultimate!
Training
“John Ford has been conducting our conflict resolution training for years...he has that rare ability of being able to reach managers as well as front-line employees with a sincerity that helps deliver important messages in a believable and effective way. We'll continue to use John as long as he continues to offer training.”
-- Harriette Heibel, Communication Manager, Central Contra Costa Sanitary District
We provide soft skills training with a variety of focuses, including communication, conflict resolution, emotional intelligence, assertion, negotiation, mediation, dealing with difficult behavior, customer service, nonverbal communication, stress management and cultural sensitivity.
Through our trainings we support your organization be conflict-management competent, which involves:
- Knowing how to identify conflict early so you can nip it in the bud
- Having simple tools to deescalate, not escalate, conflict
- Having a clear path to the lasting resolution of conflict
Team Support
“John was instrumental in helping us address a deep rift between two of our teams that needed to work together. He was able to gain the trust of some difficult personalities and worked with the teams both individually and collectively to gain commitments on how they would cooperate.”To facilitate means to make easier.
-- Rich Cortes, Business Services Manager, Union Sanitary District
When team communication is strained,
When team members are unclear about how decisions are made,
When team members are afraid to ask questions,
When ideas are supported or opposed because of personality and not merit,
It doesn’t feel easy.
We facilitate your important meetings so that you can be productive.
We also facilitate the team development process to:
- Open lines of communication and clarify roles
- Clarifying how decisions are made
- Establishing acceptable group norms for communication and behavior
- Deal with emotional baggage and resolve conflicts
- Restore a productive sense of harmony to the team
- Support the shift from a blame to a learning culture
“From a “mature” students viewpoint I was always looking at my professors with a critical eye; how did they dress, how do they speak to the students, their organizational skills, just to name a few things needed in professionalism. If we, as students, could grade our Professors, John Ford would get an “A+. John is one of my most remembered Professors at Sonoma State University. He is informative and enlightening in the educational process of Conflict Resolution and Mediation. John’s skill in instruction coupled with his charismatic and energetic personality encouraged my desire to learn. He has an exceptional way to foresee into the other persons dilemma, seamlessly apply techniques that will bring a common ground to the surface during mediation, thus for the outcome to be successful to all concerned. I would highly recommend John as far as a professor of learning and as a professional in business matters especially where there is a need for wisdom and ethics.”
-- Linda Wootton, Mental Health Rehabilitation Specialist at ICMS
