Today I found the following question posted on the Internet.
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Is it better to have a male or female mediator in a contested divorce case?
just wondering… anybody have any experiences with this?
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Here is my answer.
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From my experience as mediator, in the long run the mediator’s gender does not matter.
It is true that initially a spouse feels more comfortable with a mediator of the same gender – male or female. Naturally, such feeling stems from the assumption that it is easier to communicate and establish a personal rapport with a mediator who knows how it feels to be a woman/spouse or a man/husband.
And that’s the main reason why some mediation centers offer co-mediation – with two mediators, one male and one female.
The problem of that approach is that the fact that each spouse feels initially good having a mediator of the same gender does not guarantee that their divorce mediation would be any easier – quite the contrary. Imagine, for example, if the two co-mediators have different experiences, background, personalities, approaches. You may soon end up with two mediations going on at the same time: one between the co-mediators and the spouses, and one between the two co-mediators themselves.
That is why I think that there are other factors that in the long run are more important than the mediator’s gender. Among them,
- The mediator’s ability to remain totally neutral
- His/her ability to create a personal rapport with each spouse
- His/her experience and approach that give a clear sense of purpose and progress to the entire mediation process
In my view, when both spouses recognize those qualities in their mediator, their initial positive (or negative) feeling about the mediator’s gender gradually becomes less relevant, and is replaced by more important feelings – that they are in good hands; they can trust their mediator, who knows what he or she is doing in helping them communicate, listen to each other, develop options to resolve all their divorce issues, and reach a mutually acceptable agreement.
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