Mediator Uses Her Cat

• Published date: 01 December 2015
• Date: 01 December 2015
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/crq.21132
• Author: Jerome Barrett

C R Q, vol. 33, supplement 1, Winter 2015 S127

© 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. and the Association for Confl ict Resolution

Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) • DOI: 10.1002/crq.21132

Mediator Uses Her Cat

Jerome Barrett

An inexperienced female mediator disarms grumpy older male

disputants by sharing stories of her cat.

Christina Merchant was a class member of an intern class at the Federal

Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS) in the mid-1970s, for

which I had primary responsibility. I recruited and selected candidates, and

developed and conducted the training of eight to ten interns in two classes.

Following the training, I worked to introduce them successfully to the fi eld

to begin their careers. During the interns’ six months in Washington, I

interacted with them daily. All of the interns were young.

During the six months training, Christina lived in Washington, DC,

with her cat. Almost every day as the class assembled, Christina would

share a cat story with the group. Many stories involved her trying to get her

cat (I forgot its name) into the bathroom with the door closed before she

left for the day. She tried to get ready for the offi ce without the cat know-

ing, because if she didn’t, the cat would hide, and Christina would need to

hunt for her and struggle to get her into the bathroom. We all anticipated

and enjoyed her cat stories.

Once the interns were transferred to a fi eld station, I needed to ensure

their acceptance by their boss and other mediators.  e acceptance and

resistance varied among the regions. With some interns, I stayed in phone

contact for a month or two. With others it was longer. Shortly after

Christina was assigned to Philadelphia and before she was assigned cases

of her own, she phoned me at home one evening very excited to share a

great story.

All the Philadelphia mediators were involved in cases out of the offi ce,

when the regional director got a call from a company reporting that a strike

was scheduled for 1:00 p.m. that afternoon by the Long Shoremen Union.