Employee Dispute Resolution: Mediation through Peer Review

Have you ever been in a workplace situation where a supervisor has made a decision that you didn’t agree with? Did you wish that you could ask someone else what they thought of the decision; whether they would have done the same thing? The peer review process offers employees just that chance, using a formalized procedure to ask, consider, and resolve just these sorts of questions. This two-days workshop will teach you everything you need to know about employee dispute resolution through mediation.

• What the peer review process is
• A process for employees to file grievances and for management to respond
• How to choose a facilitator and panel
• What is involved in the hearing process, from preliminary meetings to the hearing, and the decision process
• What responsibilities and powers a panel should have
• How to apply professional questioning and probing techniques
• Why peer review panels fail and how to avoid those pitfalls

This course is intended to offer participants a general overview of the peer review process. Participants should be encouraged to customize the process and its application for their organization.

We will spend the first part of the day getting to know other participants and discussing what will take place during the workshop. Students will also have an opportunity to identify their personal learning objectives

To begin, participants will discuss what the peer review process is and is not.

This session will look at the first three stages of the process: filing a grievance, informing the defendant, and obtaining witness statements.

During this session, participants will learn who should be on the peer review panel.

Next, participants will hone their questioning and probing skills.

This session will introduce participants to the remainder of the peer review process: preparation, the hearing itself, and the decision making process.

The bulk of the afternoon will be spent role playing a peer review scenario.

To wrap things up, participants will explore common reasons why the peer review process fails and how to avoid or resolve these problems.

At the end of the day, students will have an opportunity to ask questions and fill out an action plan.