Colin Russ Before becoming an independent commercial mediator, you were Head of Litigation at DLA (now DLA Piper) in their Birmingham office for 20 years. How has being a litigation lawyer shaped your approach to mediation? It is important to understand how everyone involved is seeing and feeling about the dispute. My background as a litigation lawyer enables me to understand the lawyer’s perspective and speak their language, and mediating for 22 years has helped me understand the way in which parties bring different motivations and interests to their dispute. It also means I can speak from first-hand experience My Legal Life The Key to Effective Post-COVID Mediation Even as mediation grows in popularity as an alternative to costly litigation, there remain various barriers to even greater uptake in the wider legal and business sector. These barriers are not insurmountable, however, as was proven when COVID-19 lockdown restrictions led to a surge in remote mediation. Prolific mediator Colin Russ comments on this and other facets of modern mediation in this article, which explores his own practice and his advice for making the most out of mediation. There is, of course, no secret magic ingredient to effective mediating – and if there was, I probably would not share it!
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