Nadja Alexander wants to see a quiet revolution in the way lawyers handle their relationships with clients. Similar to the management trend towards coaching employees, Professor Alexander believes many people are looking for lawyers to be consultative and work through options, rather than give top-down advice.  Coaching can be a way to create an entirely different relationship between a lawyer and client in terms of the approach they want to take with their case and how it is resolved. This philosophy is no surprise, given Prof Alexander’s background as an expert in developing mediation systems with organisations such as the World Bank Group in countries with no formal systems of this nature. Prof Alexander’s course in Conflict Coaching offers post-graduate students the chance to learn and practice vital skills for negotiation, mediation and conflict resolution which can be applied from the courtroom to the kitchen table.

Topics covered include:

  • introduction to conflict
  • what is coaching
  • distinguishing mediation from conflict coaching
  • human conflict and narrative structures
  • introduction to the conflict coaching model
  • theory, values, process steps.
  • intake to conflict coaching sessions
  • when is conflict coaching suitable
  • goal setting
  • storytelling: telling the story, exploring the story, challenging the story
  • mapping power relations
  • identity, values and needs in coaching clients through conflict
  • perspective-taking as a turning point for clients
  • Supporting clients to create a preferred future
  • skills: questioning skills for conflict coaches, challenging skills, solution-focussed skills, risk assessment skills and tools
  • confirming appropriate action steps with clients
  • reflection, closure and exit
  • legal and ethical aspects of conflict coaching
  • how to integrate conflict coaching skills into mediation practice.

Nadja Alexander

Nadja Alexander is an international conflict resolution scholar and consultant. She is Academic Director of the Singapore International Dispute Resolution Academy and is listed in the International Who’s Who of Commercial Mediation. Nadja has held various policy advisory roles in Europe, Asia and Australia. She is a longstanding member of the Standards Commission of the International Mediation Institute and a Director and Board member of the Singapore International Mediation Institute.

A multi-award winning writer (New York 2011, 2007) and university teacher (Canberra 1998), Nadja has previously held professorial appointments in universities in Hong Kong and Australia, in addition to visiting appointments in Europe, the US, Asia and Africa. She is Humboldtian Scholar having held research fellowships at both the Max Planck Institute for International and Comparative Law (2014-2015) and at the Europe-Viadrina University (2006-2007) in Germany. Nadja is co-founder of the REAL conflict coaching system.

Course information

Course code
LAWS7930

Course profile

CPD

This course may also be taken as a CPD course or a non-award course. 

CPD details and applications