The field has always variously and blithely described our work as “conflict resolution, dispute resolution, conflict management” and other epithets. But what is conflict, what is dispute and are they different?  Gordon Sloan leads a discussion about experiences with each, making meaning out of these terms and, if there are differences, getting a handle on that. Discover whether conflict and dispute need to be addressed differently.

About Gordon Sloan
Gordon Sloan is a retired dispute resolution practitioner, teacher, and designer of systems and policies.  For forty years he facilitated, mediated and led dispute resolution events with large and small client groups, from couples to provinces and Indigenous nations in every province and territory.  He developed and trained participants in internal dispute resolution systems in Department of National Defence, RCMP, Canada Post, Canada Revenue Service and many other organizations, both local and national in scope.

Gordon founded ADR Education, Canada’s premiere dispute resolution firm working in both official languages in every corner of the country.  Its partners address dispute situations in every context of life.  Its work has been panoramic – including Prime Ministers, film stars, chiefs, Premiers, sports icons, and thousands of “ordinary” people all of whom have turned out to be extraordinary.

He has always taken pleasure in fighting elitism in education and the professions.  He has mentored many young practitioners and fledgling groups. He likes to push the restrictive attitudes of established organizations in order to encourage tired, dated old wood to get out of the way.

His background and degrees are in Law and Religion.  He feels strongly about the identity of mediation and its appropriate applications as a non-interventionist forum.  He is fascinated by the role of intense values and core beliefs in the development of philosophy and social behaviour.

In retirement, like most old people, he has been astonished by how quickly the field has developed and changed.  In particular, it has been eye opening to realize that almost overnight his relevance in the field has waned and how third party assistance has morphed into more muscular approaches to dispute.  That has well served his present state – enjoying his wife, adult children, grandchildren and market garden full of new potatoes and artichokes.