I have the acquaintance of two vice presidents of a large nonprofit. Both are very talented and dedicated people that work very hard to advance the goals of their company. Let’s call them “Tess” and “Jacob.” Jacob was the more senior of the two.

A couple of years ago the working relationship between Tess and Jacob became strained. Both felt the other was hindering their success. In several private meetings their discourse became heated. Ironically they liked and respected each other, but simply were having a difficult time working together cooperatively.

They could agree on some things. They both agreed that for the best interests of their organization they had to develop a productive working relationship; they agreed they've been unable to work out their differences on their own; and agreed that a mediator might be able to help them work out their issues.

They agreed to have private meeting with Francisco, their director of human resources. Francisco suggested a neutral, off-site meeting location for privacy. As Tess and Jacob later told me everyone arrived with great hopes to work out their issues and move forward.

The “mediation” lasted all of thirty minutes when Tess got up and left. Francisco’s approach was to determine why Tess was “causing problems.”

Francisco lost the opportunity to help the disputing parties work out their issues by focusing on why one of the parties was causing all the problems. Francisco was in no way a neutral third party.

Mediators do not represent the interests of either party or as an advocate for either side. It has long been acknowledged that a mediator must be impartial and not display any favoritism. Because Francisco was not impartial, the mediation was not successful.

In this case, Tess soon accepted a position with another nonprofit. Ironically, Tess and Jacob maintain a professional friendship, but the organization suffered. It took many long months to find a replacement for Tess and, unfortunately, he simply “didn’t work out” and was terminated, which only lead to another long talent search.

I believe anyone can use mediation skills in their personal and professional lives, but acting as a mediator requires more. It requires training and application of the theory, practice and ethics of mediation. In other words, seek out the professionals.

Many people are surprised to learn of the extent that mediation is conducted online and that the face-to-face experience of mediating virtually can be successful. In fact, mediators have long used technology, such as telephone conference calls and closed circuit television. For example, when couples could not be in the same room together due to a history of abuse, family court mediators had one parent report from an undisclosed location while the other did so as well. The mediation proceeded via closed circuit television.

Mediators even made early use of email to mediate with disputants living in remote areas. But it wasn’t until the explosion of digital marketing that online dispute resolution (or ODR) became common use. In 1999, eBay sponsored a pilot program to mediate disputes between buyers and sellers. eBay and Paypal found ODR to be an effective way to resolve disputes involving small amounts of money between parties at different locations.

Some online dispute resolution is in the form of automated and assisted negotiation. Millions of disputes have been successfully handled in this manner. If the process was not working for the parties, a human neutral mediator was available either by way of chat rooms or email. And ODR has become the predominant form for dispute resolution in the realm of e-commerce.  

In Europe, ODR is used in housing issues, landlord-tenant, divorce proceedings and family violence. In 2013 a website was introduced for consumer disputes purchased either on or offline across all of the EU’s member states.

In Canada, British Columbia’s Legal Services Society recently launched a website for a wide variety of issues. For example, couples can negotiate a separation agreement in a chat site without meeting face-to-face. When the parties agree on terms, the site generates the agreement. British Columbia’s Justice Ministry is considering a proposal to make ODR mandatory for all civil cases.

In the U.S., New York, Michigan, Texas and Utah are exploring expanding ODR into their court systems.

Does ODR work? The simple answer is yes. Millions of disputes have been resolved using this approach and in the future, ODR may become the first choice in the dispute resolution process.