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A secondary school
(Details have been changed in this account
to preserve confidentiality.)
By the time the school asked Mediation
at Work for help, the rift between the head teacher and his
deputy was seriously hindering the performance of the school’s
senior management team.
Their long-standing dispute had been inflamed
by a formal grievance procedure, which had failed to improve
the situation and had exacerbated the breakdown of trust and
communication.
Three meetings were arranged. An initial
individual session with mediators would explore the perspective
of each party, while a subsequent joint meeting, with mediators
present, would look at both the difficulties in the past and
how a better working relationship could be built for the future.
It was essential that the mediators used the first two sessions
to build sufficient trust in the process and themselves to
enable both parties to talk openly at the later joint meeting.
At the joint session, both the head and
his deputy had the opportunity to express how they felt about
the situation directly to the other party, and to begin to
understand how their own behaviour had affected the other
person. Having been excluded from a number of key meetings,
for example, the deputy head was feeling de-skilled and undervalued;
he provided specific examples on how the head’s management
style contributed to him feeling ‘no good at his job’.
For his part, the head explained how the deputy had on several
occasions ‘blanked him’ in meetings, leaving him
feeling very uncomfortable and undermined.
The discussion led to a number of
concrete outcomes aimed at building a better working relationship:
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The
deputy agreed to halt the grievance procedure. |
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The
head agreed to review the way meetings were set up, and
how attendance was determined. |
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They
both agreed to meet informally on a fortnightly basis
to aid ongoing communication. |
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They
both agreed on the importance of bringing any issues of
concern to that meeting in order for them to be addressed
as they arise. |
Once both had had a chance to understand
how each had (mis)interpreted the other’s actions, they
were able to begin working together to set down some agreed
behaviour for the future.
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studies index.
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