The Improving Dispute Resolution project has launched its 'Toolkit'.
We welcome comment and suggestions for improving this aid for HEIs keen to streamline their own practice and learn from the experience of other HEIs.
We are planning two workshops and a conference during the next few months in which experience and good practice can be shared.
Download the IDR Toolkit (PDF Document, 1mb)
Forum for comments on Toolkit
We shall be grateful for comments. Please send to Project Administrator indicating clearly whether you are willing for your remarks to be posted on the website in this Forum.
We have had comments to the effect that the Toolkit seems to assume that the complaint always has substance.
We do not suggest that. All HEI’s are familiar with disputes where the complainant has become obsessive and even vexatious. As is always the case with disputes there are at least two sides to an argument; higher education disputes are no different.
In disputes it can be the case that the objective by-stander looks and sees that a claim is ill founded - a person may be upset, disgruntled, aggrieved, even if they have not been wronged in any way. Their claim (whatever it is) is based upon their internalised, subjective view of a set of circumstances that other people cannot see as giving any form of claim/grievance, etc. against another person. A decision has been made, for example, within a framework, applying a set of criteria, fairly and in an
even-handed way. But the person affected remains unhappy.
In the case of an ill founded claim that clearly will not succeed the person should, if at all possible, be counselled at an early stage and encouraged to recognise that that is the case. "Drop it and move on". Can early stage intervention help in this? Can a mentor step in? Can the union advise that there is no case (in employment cases)? Can any of these work? Is it possible to filter such claims out? Who is to make the judgement and at what stage?
Are these scenarios a category separate from any other claim and with a need to be dealt with in a different way? Some feedback to The Toolkit has suggested that this is the case. Certainly such categories do exist.
Professor Tim Birtwistle
David Bleiman, a member of the Steering Group, has written a discussion paper for trade union members entitled “Should I try mediation?”
He looks at the range of issues which any employee could be encouraged to consider in order to be able to participate in mediation on the basis of informed consent and with appropriate safeguards. He goes on to discuss the issues which union reps could raise where mediation is being introduced. Unions are still generally at an early stage in considering mediation in issues affecting individual employees, so David is publishing his guide as a discussion document and would welcome comments to the dedicated email address provided in the guide.
http://www.scottishmediation.org.uk/resources/article.asp?id=83
British Academy Reponse to the RCUK consultation discussed in the Toolkit may be found at:
Comment from Roger Brown (Professor of Higher Education Policy and Co-Director of the Centre for Research and Development in Higher Education at Liverpool Hope University.):
"At 2. Pathways, institutions should have systems/ procedures for dealing with frivolous or malicious complaints, where they can be distinguished."
Comment from Project Leader: Most HEIs make reference to this problem in their existing procedures, but it seems to move into new dimensions when a dispute escalates to the point where a complainant may become obsessed and send emails couched in extreme language about essentially peripheral aspects. What do HEIs see as current trends in this area?
Comment from Roger Brown
"Reference is made to my article on the governance of the new unis. [ The governance of the new universities - do we need to think again? perspectives 5 (1) pp 42-47 2001.] Even better, or as well, my chapter on Southampton Institute in the book 'Managing Crisis' edited by David Warner and David Palfreyman and published in 2003 by Open University Press."
"At 'Checklist: Operational arrangements relating to academic matters and the academic infrastructure' it might be worth mentioning that [ as Vice-Chancellor of Southampton Solent University] I made an annual report to Governors on quality and standards, using the same information and analysis that had gone to Academic Board. I suspect that this is still pretty rare."
Comment from Project Leader: This seems good practice and a sensible way to ensure that governors are in touch with the academic dimension of the work of their institution. Are other HEIs doing this?
Comment from Roger Brown
"At 5. Looking to the future, I think we can safely predict that disputes will increase as marketisation intensifies and trust declines."
Comment from Project Leader: Input on effects of marketisation and the types of dispute arising will be welcomed.
Comment from Roger Brown:
"The section on the role of the unions is eloquent for its scope and content. Unions could and should play a much larger role in helping to resolve disputes (is there no guidance from other unionised sectors?). In my experience, however, they are either reluctant (because these are often member- member conflicts) or underresourced. At my institution I found it hard even to get the unions to subscribe to general statements about bullying. UCU and UNISON should be pushed on this: can the TUC (Tom Wilson) help?"
Response from Steering Group member, David Bleiman: At present there is little guidance available in the UK on mediation, looking at it from a trades union/ union member perspective. I am developing a union guide on mediation which I hope to put into the public domain over next few months- this will be of a generic nature, not specific to higher education. There is a wide range of views about mediation in the campus unions. Certainly I have found that some full time officials and experienced local reps find mediation helpful and indeed it may be especially helpful in a member against member case where local reps for each party are otherwise having to be adversaries and where, if not resolved, the union may incur legal costs, even in the extreme on both sides of the same case, however absurd this may seem. I have discussed mediation with Tom Wilson and his colleagues - Sarah Veale and Hannah Reed at the TUC. Unions, as I guess Roger knows, cannot be "pushed" into anything. However, now that the Toolkit is on the IDR website, I shall be using this as a basis for briefing and consulting the HE campus union national officials. Our project conference in the Spring will also provide an opportunity for unions to be briefed on and engage with the development of mediation in HE.