In todays episode, I am thrilled to introduce to you JOLENE HILL. No, Jolene is not a mediator, but she does something that every mediator should be very aware of: the importance of listening. The importance of allowing a person to talk. To say what they really wish to say.

Jolene is a creator of YOUR LIFE TALKS, a program through which she encourages people to share their life stories. 

In her signature talk, ‘Your Story Matters’, Jolene shares why she was inspired to create Your Life Talks, with a mission to raise community awareness of the importance of initiating meaningful conversations within families, to recognize our intrinsic need to remember and celebrate our life and achievements.

Greg Rooney 

Greg has been a practising mediator in Australia since 1991. He has mediated more than 1,500 disputes in a diverse range of conflicts including multi-party disputes involving government institutions, commercial and industrial disputes, agricultural disputes, franchise disputes, matrimonial disputes and disputes involving conflict in the workplace. Greg has served a six-year term as a Director of the Mediator Standards Board that regulates the Australian National Mediation Accreditation Scheme. He has since 2004 conducted over 200 face-to-face meetings between religious and military leaders and individual survivors of sexual abuse in religious, government institutions and orphanages as well as abuse within the Australian Defence Forces. He has lectured in mediation, dispute system design and project Alliancing in a number of Australian universities, including the University of Queensland and Southern Cross University. Greg has conducted dispute resolution training for a number of public and private Australian institutions. He has conducted mediation training and retreats in Australia, Europe, Asia and North America. He together with colleagues Margaret Ross and Barbara Wilson run annual mediation retreats in Tuscany, Italy. He has published papers on a number of mediation-based topics in a number of national and international journals copies of which can be downloaded from his web site Papers - Greg Rooney Website: www.gregrooney.com.au 

LOUISE MATHIAS

Louise Mathias calls herself an ‘Ambassador For Ambition’ She is an advanced trained mediator, a multidisciplinary barrister and High Performance Coach and Consultant, and she’ll tell us more about it shortly.

Louise became a lawyer in 2010 and went to the Bar in 2012. After a cancer diagnosis in 2014, she had an epiphany as to what was most important in her life and the direction she would now head in. She appreciated, that in addition to legal skills, there are other essential skills to get optimal results more often while having more fun in conflict resolution, leadership, life and practice.  When I approached her for this interview, Louise told me ‘I’m not your ordinary barrister’ – which made me be even more curious.

Louise coaches lawyers, leaders and doctors to Discover Their Most Powerful Assets, To Skyrocket Their Confidence, with the Total High Performance Blueprint, The Confident Lawyer programs and Consults for organisations with the Daring Leadership Method.

She is an experienced mediator trained in the gold standard Harvard negotiation style. She specialises in family law, family provisions, institutional abuse and medical negligence cases.

Dear Listeners

In today’s episode, I’ve decided to interview a person who is a mediator in a number of areas we have not touched or discussed much so far: business, finance, accounting, management, property and elder mediation. It’s my pleasure to present to you Dennis TERRACINI, Proprietor of 'Mediation with Purpose'.

His areas of expertise include:

In demand as a specialist Mediator (Businesses, Families and Individuals)

· Commenced with The Institute of Arbitrators & Mediators Australia (IAMA) – 2013

· Practitioner’s Certificate in Mediation - 2013

· Professional Membership of the Resolution Institute

· Special interest in Finance, Property and Elder Mediation

· Financial Abuse Awareness Certification (FBAA) - 2019

Enjoy!

Vesna Cvjeticanin

NMAS Mediator

Producer, Mediation Today

This is the second part of my interview with Dr Dale Bagshaw, in which she talks about the importance of Elder Mediation, why it is different from other types of mediation and how we could best practice in this field.

I thank Dr Bagshaw for her time and for sharing her wisdom.

Vesna Cvjeticanin

Lawyer, NMAS Accredited Mediator

Creator and Producer of Mediation Today

Dr Dale Bagshaw is an accredited Elder Mediation practitioner and an academic, who leads the work in the elder mediation and ageing sectors. Her work has been dedicated to all aspects of alternative dispute resolution in the area of ageing for many years now. As a Nationally Accredited Mediator, Dale combines her extensive academic work and expertise with a love of Elder Mediation and a well-recognised desire to educate and train others to work in this sector. Her academic background enables Dale to understand the underlying challenges that face practitioners of any profile who decide to work with ageing issues and older population.

Dale is a nationally and internationally accredited mediator and has been a member of the international Association for Conflict Resolution since it was formed.

There is an impressive list of achievements, recognitions and awards that our guest has received throughout her distinguished career. Over the past few years, Dale has been awarded a number of awards, to mention only some:

- In 2019, she was a recipient of the Association for Conflict Resolution's John Haynes Distinguished Mediator Award which is presented annually by the Association for Conflict Resolution in the US

- the Michael Klug Award by the Board of LEADR for her innovation and national leadership in the dispute resolution field (2014);

- in 2015 was awarded the Resolution Institute’s Practitioner Award for development and mentoring of dispute resolution practitioners…

Liz KEOGH - Biographical notes

Liz told us this abut herself...

"...Helping separated families has been the centre of my professional life, but my role in the family law system has (like my musical taste!) been quite diverse.

I started my professional career as a lawyer, working in the family law team within a generalist practice.  I spent 10 years working as a family lawyer, working in all the ‘main’ areas of family law, but also with a niche practice in surrogacy, donor conception and adoption. During this decade I also had a brief foray into the public service where   I worked as a policy officer in the branch of the Department of Family and Community Services responsible for Parenting Payment policy and as a legal officer in the Attorney-General’s Department (where I was fortunate to be involved in the establishment of the fabulous interdisciplinary Family Law Pathways Networks).

During the time that I was working as a lawyer I also founded and ran a grassroots lobby group (Good Process) which represented the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex community of Canberra during a period of major legislative reform in Canberra, including the removal of discrimination against same sex families in adoption, surrogacy and donor conception legislation.

In 2011 I made a big shift into academia.  I worked at the ANU College of Law for 9 years.  My main teaching responsibility was in the Family Law elective of the Graduate Diploma of Legal Practice, but I also taught in Family Law, ethics and clinical legal programs in the LLB and JD programs.  In my teaching role I had a particular focus on developing highly authentic simulated learning environments which were designed to help students develop skills in managing the emotional dimension of family law work. There was a small research component to my academic role, which included being part of a research team investigating the s60I certificate process in family law mediation.

My career as a mediator and family dispute resolution practitioner (FDRP) began in 2016.  I initially combined this with an ongoing role as an academic (part-time positions at the ANU and as an FDRP at the Canberra Family Relationships Centre (FRC)).  I also had a very small private practice (Keogh Mediation) running from late 2016.  In early 2020 I decided to give Keogh Mediation the opportunity to grow fully and resigned my positions at both the ANU and the FRC.

These days I have a lovely diverse mix of roles.  In addition to private clients who I assist through Keogh Mediation I also provide mediation services as a member of Legal Aid ACT’s Family Dispute Resolution Conference Panel and as a Sessional Registrar at the Family Court and Federal Circuit Court.  I am also lucky to have a small piece of teaching back in the mix as I work as an oral assessor within the Graduate Diploma of Legal Practice program provided by the College of Law..."