Transformative Conflict Resolution

Jane Beddall
Dovetail Resolutions
LinkedIn
Crafting Solutions Podcast

Jane Beddall, M.A., J.D., is the founder and principal of Dovetail Resolutions, LLC, where she focuses on preserving and improving relationships in extended families and family enterprises. Jane is a certified CINERGY® Conflict Management Coach, seasoned transformative mediator, facilitator, and consultant. Jane is also a certified Conflict Dynamics Profile® Practitioner.  She holds Certificates in Family Wealth Advising and Family Business Advising from the Family Firm Institute.  In January 2019, she launched the weekly podcast Crafting Solutions to Conflict, providing a practical and positive perspective on conflict, available through all major apps and its dedicated website.

Jane’s work with wealthy families offers a range of services, from consulting with the family in creating an environment that minimizes negative conflict, to assisting with difficult conversations about succession planning and estate planning, to coaching individuals to better address ongoing conflict, to family wealth mediation over inheritance and other issues.

Jane is a member of the Purposeful Planning Institute, the Family Firm Institute, Attorneys for Family-Held Businesses, and the Association for Conflict Resolution. In 2014, Jane received The Honorable Robert C. Zampano Award for Excellence in Mediation, which recognizes and celebrates leadership, initiative, and creativity in mediation in Connecticut. Jane is a past President of the New England Chapter of the Association for Conflict Resolution and past Co-chair of the Alternative Dispute Resolution Section of the Connecticut Bar Association. She formerly served on the Professional Advisory Board and faculty of the New York City Family Enterprise Center (NYCFEC). She is a past member of the Advisory Board of the Connecticut Mediation Association.

Jane graduated from Trinity College (Hartford, CT) with a B.A. in Economics. She received her law degree, cum laude, and her M.A. in Public Policy Analysis, with a concentration in Conflict Resolution, from the University of Pennsylvania. She has taught at the University of Connecticut School of Law and at the University of New Haven.

Jane enjoys speaking about handling conflict effectively, as well as writing about conflict-related topics. She lives in Naples, FL and works locally, throughout the U.S., and beyond.

Kirby Rosplock

Welcome to the Tamarind Learning Podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Kirby Rosplock, and today we're talking about how to normalize conflict, something we all probably need help doing better. And I'm so thrilled because today we have Jane Beddall here with us, who is an expert in conflict resolution. She's a certified conflict coach. She's a seasoned mediator. She's used all forms of approaches to managing conflict and mediating conflict, and she's done so many different speaking, and she has her own podcast as well. So we're really thrilled to have you here today. Jane, thanks so much for being on the Tamarind Learning podcast.

Jane Beddall

Well, thank you, Kirby, for inviting me. I'm looking forward to this a lot.

Kirby Rosplock

So, Jane, you founded Dovetail Resolutions back in 2006. So you've been doing conflict resolution for a long time. Tell us a little bit of more about how you got into this work and more about your background to support individuals and families who are trying to work through some difficult times.

Jane Beddall

Well, Kirby, I'm going to date myself when I tell you that I know that I was interested in conflict from 1981 onward, because that was when I was working with the advisor in my master's degree program about, what is it exactly that I want to study? And we came up within this particular school with the gee, here's a phrase, let's call it conflict resolution. Well, of course, today I could go get a degree in that, but back then, I was ahead of the curve. I was in a joint degree program with a law school at the University of Pennsylvania. But very early on, I was more interested in when people are in conflict and they want to stay together. So let me pause and say, I have never been a divorce mediator. Say it again. I've never been a divorce mediator. People can't believe it, so I say it twice. People have known me for ten years, think I do divorce mediation? No, never done that. Wonderful, valuable work. My interest is in people who want to stay together. So logically, that is not, for me, couples. I'm not a therapist. It is extended families, it is intergenerational families, wealthy families, family enterprises, situations where they do want that connection to continue, but they're in a tough spot.

Jane Beddall

Or best of all, they think a tough spot might be coming. Let's start to get better at how we communicate, deal with conflict, because it's part of life, before things get ugly.

Kirby Rosplock

Well, conflict is just innately uncomfortable, right? So we have a fear of it. We recoil from it. We have a taboo of talking about it. So when we think of normalizing conflict, what does that look like? And why is conflict so taboo?

Jane Beddall

It's the fear, for sure. I like to think in terms of, well, first of all, it's inevitable. There is just no possibility that we will all agree on everything, even our closest family members, even the people we work with. And when there's overlap, that's even more to make things exciting. Of course, the fear piece is in part because it feels especially frightening. If I admit to the conflict, if we try to grasp it, we try to deal with it with someone I really care about.

Jane Beddall

Now, my conflict, if I happen to be looking for a used car, the cheapest possible price at the dirtiest car lot I can find, there is no relationship here. This is all about a one off transaction. It's just about the money. That's it. That's very different from the type of work I do with people who care about each other. So I always like to start with the idea of to me, conflict comes into three flavors good, bad, and ugly. I'm going to start with ugly because that's the one that scares us the most. If we start to think about this hard, oh, no, will we be down the road of Succession, the show, that is a car wreck, and it's fascinating, and we watch it on TV and say, oh my goodness, that's the ugly.

Jane Beddall

The bad is when it is destructive, possibly permanently damaging. We're in a bad place. We don't talk well. We don't talk at all sometimes. One we should focus on is the good conflict, the collaborative kind, the creative kind, where we are saying, okay, I don't agree with you, but I value what you have to say because I value you. Let's talk about it. Let's see where we can go from there. So that's where I start in thinking in terms of what is this conflict thing all about?

Kirby Rosplock

So it sounds like with the ugly conflict, there might be just like serial bad behavior, derisive communication, toxic energy, you name it, throw it in the kitchen sink of Ugliness. And that's not resolvable typically when you're just unless you want to.

Jane Beddall

Unless you want to. And sometimes, and this is what's really interesting to me, occasionally people will say to me, Jane, there's no way these people can resolve anything. They're too angry. And I'd say, maybe they're not angry enough, because sometimes if they really are at each other but one feels I'm winning, why would I agree to engage in any type of mediation? For example, I do a specific type of mediation. It's not very well known. But why would I agree to that if I think I'm winning? Well, sometimes it has to get painful enough that I'm no longer winning. And the win, the loss of the win may not be about money or power. It may be about the partner at home who says, you need to deal with this situation with your brother. I'm sick to death of it. You bring it home every day. I'm done with this. Do something. Or it's a health issue because sometimes the churning can affect someone's well being, their physical well being. And then finally, okay, I am now willing to think about exploring. But you're right, Kirby. Those tend to be the really big, really fascinating to look at from a distance, entertainment.

Kirby Rosplock

Entertainment. Keep it in the entertainment category. Don't live it, right? I feel like so many families really want to avoid, if at all possible, those types of super toxic exchanges. Tell me about some of the things that you see help normalize or how can we shift the energy so that we can have a healthy discourse, we can have healthy conflict or good conflict. As you talk about, what does that look like?

Jane Beddall

So it starts before there's trouble of any kind. It starts with some very simple things. For example, staying in contact, communication of the simplest of kinds, especially as families grow in number and as they spread out and their age span becomes quite large. Staying in touch. And it doesn't have to be fancy or complicated. There are families who do big, wonderful newsletters. Mitsy Purdue knocks my socks off with the work she has done with her extended family. It doesn't have to be that level. Text, phone call, birthday card, email, simplest things. I'm thinking of you. How do things work out? Really easy. Stuff that shows it's an ongoing commitment and connection. It also is so useful to have a foundation, when things aren't bad. If there are families who only get together to talk, whether it's in person, phone, video, whatever it is. When there's trouble, they don't know each other, except when things are troublesome. I don't know you, Kirby, except when you're about to pull your hair out and you don't know me except when I'm near tears. That's really tough. But better to build a foundation where, okay, we know each other.

Jane Beddall

And then making it a very clear, policy, is a little strong. But a habit, a cultural habit of this family that we respect other people's opinions, which does not mean for a moment that we agree. I can listen to an opinion and think, wow, I would never think that, I could walk 100 miles in that person's shoes. No way. Still, in all, I value that person. So if they have that opinion, I will not squelch it. I can disagree with it. I can perhaps have a polite conversation about why facts and that opinion don't line up. And sometimes families get worried that if we let everyone talk, especially about a big decision, oh, no, it's not veto power. It's an opportunity to speak and to be heard respectfully. Human need to be heard. So big. Those are great places to start.

Kirby Rosplock

And tell me a little bit more, and I hear you when there isn't conflict. But I'm sure your practice has a lot of people who already are at each other. And talk to us about normalizing when you know there is an elephant in the room called conflict. And we don't agree and we haven't agreed, and we continually bang our heads against each other, fighting over something. What are some steps that might be taken to start to break that cycle of conflict?

Jane Beddall

So the very first thing is to me, acknowledging that it happens. You're not a bad family, because I will be contacted by families and, oh, my God, I can't believe can't believe we can't agree on this. And I will say you contacted me. Blue ribbons all around because you want to try to do something about it. So first, it happens. It doesn't mean you're bad and it doesn't mean we need to nominate a scapegoat. This must be all so and so's fault. Well, probably not. Sometimes the parent scapegoat is actually saying things that everyone else is feeling, but that one, that person is willing to say it out loud. So the very first thing is, to my mind, is that commitment that we're going to work on it, we're going to try to work together on this situation, which is very different from, I know the answer and I will tell you what it is. So sometimes families can just work individually. They don't need to work with someone like me, but if they do want to work with someone like me, to my mind, it's never a one off. Unless everybody's dying the next day, there will be something else.

Jane Beddall

So I am not interested in any type of mediation which is going to bring you all together. We're going to get everything hashed out now and forever in one long day or even in a weekend where we "just resolve everything". I don't think it's feasible, I think it's foolish to try. And an essential part of my work, is the conflict coaching piece, because this is about helping individuals get better at handling conflict without someone like me. The whole idea is so useful. The particular model that I use is called cinergy c-i-n-e-r-g-y. And the most useful piece to me is it's all about people. You know, it is all about, as people will say to me, oh, my goodness, my brother has been picking on me since we were preteens. Why would anything ever change? Well, first you have to if they say want to change, if you want to have a productive conversation. You, the one who feels picked on, need to think about what's he going to say, that sets me off, because it always does. And how do I help myself not go there? We actually practice and you get to be both people, yourself and your brother.

Jane Beddall

And then your brother needs to think about, well, if I actually do want to have the conversation, be productive, how do I not say the things that I know will make her nuts? And then you apply it to yourself. It's a wonderful cycle that tries to get you out of the so called not so merry go round of conflict, where we do the same thing again and again. But it is remarkable, Kirby, to see people practicing and they will start to say, oh, no, I can't say it like that. And they have to use their own words. There's no point in having me tell you what to say. It has to be your words. It has to roll off your tongue with comfort. What I would say, that's my own personal thing. So that's an important piece of the work that I do, is helping people get better.

Kirby Rosplock

I love that you work with both parties, versus so often, and I'm going back to divorce, but when you're mediating a situation or there's two attorneys involved, they're representing each party. And therefore you're not necessarily communicating smoothly across those different parties. But when you have the ability to potentially coach and counsel, then you have a lot of insights from the other side that can say, hey, well, I hear you. And when you say these kinds of things, what makes you want to say those things? Because, you know, those are the triggers. But how do we think about shifting and getting to you what you want, without necessarily damaging or hurting the other individual? Which quite honestly is really how this whole infinity loop continues, is because the reaction is, in part, what that one party wants to get out from the other party, but it doesn't necessarily get them to resolution or get them to what ultimately fulfills them.

Jane Beddall

And the reason why they're having that conversation in the first place. There is a reason that this topic has come up, especially when that comes up again and again. And it can be anything from succession planning to the next gens to what do we do about mom and dad? It can be all sorts of things, and some of them, the more emotional ones, of course, are tougher than the investment portfolio questions. You can kind of worry about what the professionals have to say and let them figure that out as a big picture. But I also want to say something about the mediation that I do. You're right. I always love it when people approach me, when things aren't a mess and they want to get better before things are tough. It happens. It doesn't happen all the time. So sometimes it's mediation, sometimes it's just conflict coaching. If it is mediation, there will be some conflict coaching. That's the only way I'll do it is so I can help you get better for the future. And what is interesting about that is sometimes I'll be approached by one person who says, we need help. We're going to have you help us.

Jane Beddall

We're going to do mediation. I say, that's fine, and then there's at least one other person that says not on your life. I won't even talk to you, Jane. What are you talking about? We're not going to do that. I can't force anyone to do that. But what I can do is work with the one, or more, who want to get better at the coaching piece and then have those conversations, because they're going to happen whether I'm involved or not.

Jane Beddall

And as you know, changing one person in the system is going to change the system. I will not be a direct part of that conversation, but there will be changes, and we hope there are good changes. But if I am doing mediation, there are three main types of mediation. What's called a valuative, and that is all about the money. Those are high value litigated cases. Judge, retired judge says it's a $2 million case. Find a way. You're over here at $500,000, you're over there at five. This is where you should be. Not terribly creative. It's very efficient to get things out of the court system.

Jane Beddall

Then there's the one called facilitative, and that's about finding an answer that people can live with. The example I like is there is construction going on next to a residential neighborhood every morning, the beep, beep, beep of the trucks going in starts at 6:30. The people who live there are really unhappy. A facilitated resolution of that might be okay until nine, the trucks go the long way and don't back up. Inconvenient for the truck driver, less misery for the homeowners. Not perfect for either, but okay. Better than where we were.

Jane Beddall

The type of work that I do is called transformative mediation. Not well known at all. It is all about the relationships, and the concept is two main things,2 empowerment and recognition. The empowerment can be, as we talked about a moment ago, I don't agree with what you're saying. I don't understand it very well. But I understand that it is valuable to you. I'm recognizing that part of you. And when you are able to have me say, I get this matters so much to you, Kirby, I don't fully understand, but I respect it. You are empowered to do the same for me. It's a wonderful cycle of tell me more. I'd like to understand better, but it is important to me that I treat you with respect and value you.

Jane Beddall

So it's not your everyday approach to mediation. There are very few people out there who do it, and that's in part because it's very hard to get the education and training in it. I don't know if they even still do it. But when I learned quite some years ago, the place to learn was... The US. Postal Service. Yes, they had created a program. It was not from people going postal. It was, in fact, about a class action lawsuit where they were sued over how slow they were to handle discrimination complaints. They created this program, and then once you learn from them, because that's the only place you could learn, you had to do some for them. And I did, and it was fascinating. People who took their jobs very seriously, not necessarily high paid, but it was very rarely any kind of discrimination. It was bad communication. And then once people get in the room and start to talk, okay, I get it.

Kirby Rosplock

So it does sound like a lot of this comes back to communication, back to having connection, back to supporting trusting relationships, to mitigate sort of differences, going way off the rails. Right?

Jane Beddall

Absolutely. Sooner is always better than later. People would like to pretend that it'll take care of itself. That rarely happens. Denial is very popular. No, it's not that bad. No, it probably is that bad. And pretending is not going to help. Letting it linger. We can think in terms of a volcano. We know we need to do something if we have an actual eruption, but that underneath tremor, that is really affecting the foundation of the relationships, is not a healthy thing. And the sooner you get to it, the better. Perfect? No, probably not. We're not going to get to perfect. But people can get better. And once you start and first, as you say, normalize it, we're going to work on this. That's what people do. It's okay. We're not bad because we decide to work on this. Actually, we're pretty good because we've decided to work on this.

Kirby Rosplock

I think owning conflict and just recognizing that we don't get agree, we have differences, we are strong in our opinions, doesn't mean that we are weak or infirm or obstinate. And I think if anything, some of the times I find a scarier place is when families become apathetic and they just don't care anymore.

Jane Beddall

It doesn't matter. Yeah. It's interesting because sometimes what I find fascinating is, well, what does keep them together? Is it simply the bloodline? Well, maybe that's not enough. As we know some people have written about that may not be enough right there, but sometimes there's a catalyst. Something happens to make it worthwhile. A family I worked with many, years ago, siblings had split in half. And that was because dad had told everyone, everyone takes equally under the will. That was true. Didn't mention the things that passed outside of the will. The huge IRA, went to two out of four. And for reasons, who knows what was going on in Dad's head, he decided to name as executrix the only person of the four, who was just wifty. Just wifty. Why? So after his death, she stumbles upon these papers in his office. Oh, look at that. Tells everyone that she could have tried to hide that she didn't. And so the two who were not named aside, you manipulated dad this that probably it had to do with the fact that two of them took care of dad in his later years and the other two were far away.

Jane Beddall

So angry. By the time they got to me, they had already gone through litigation in another state where they fought over, among other things, the value of a ten year old Honda Civic. They were so angry and they came to me, only because the next generation, there was a big event coming up for one of these kids who said to the parent, I know you don't talk to your siblings. Does that mean my cousins can't come to this big celebration? And that was the wake-up call that brought the siblings to hmm, maybe this does matter. Maybe I don't need to spend the rest of my life refusing to speak to two of my siblings.

Kirby Rosplock

Yeah, I think there are so many powerful examples of where conflict really railroads, growth and forward thinking and progress, and so finding ways to not be afraid to address it, finding ways. And I love what you brought up about how even if you work with one individual, or even if one individual really works hard themselves on not feeding, not playing into it, not reacting, it's very hard for someone to fight against something that does not fight back. Right?

Jane Beddall

Absolutely true. Absolutely. You're right. Kirby. It's fascinating, the whole realm of how we behave and how we can shoot ourselves in the foot, but we can also take a moment to say, okay, that was a mistake. Let's have a little reset. It doesn't mean we have to give up. And that's where the idea of having the foundation and the strong connection comes from. At the beginning, we're all going to make mistakes, and we most frequently make them with people we know and love the best. And that's when it matters the most. So let's have that strong foundation. Let's be able to say, I'm sorry, I made a mistake. Let's move on. Can we find a way to either agree to disagree on that or we'll deal with that? We don't have the answer right now, but we will come back to it at a scheduled time, not some day, because that doesn't really help. That just allows it to fester on and on.

Jane Beddall

But there are satisfactions, I think, in making progress. I'm thinking of a coaching client who came to me because originally it was to be a mediation, and then, a particular very narrow dispute resolved itself.

Jane Beddall

And so others said, done. Okay, fine. Everything's hunky dory now. And this person said to me, there will be something else, and wanted very much to get better at, how do I have that conversation with a person who has a lot of power in that family? Was actually that person's uncle, without just wrecking it. The other person didn't want to talk much about anything difficult. It was fascinating because it was so personal. We figured out that the conversation should be happening when they were on a walk outdoors, because that's where the uncle was most comfortable. And where they had had many happy conversations over the years, many years, that trying to do this by phone wasn't going to work. Definitely not in an office of any kind. Maybe not even the kitchen table. There was something about as we walk along, we're looking at these other things. We're in nature where we both feel so comfortable, but it was specific to them. Someone else, it might be something else. But there are ways to make this work for you, ways to set yourselves up for success.

Kirby Rosplock

I love it. I think it's so empowering and it's so needed. And I know that in my work, I see a lot of clients where there's sort of a peak of emotion related to, you mentioned things like succession, related to transfers, related to leadership retiring, or next gen owners sort of stepping up. And there is so much emotion, right? Wrapped in those moments of like, if we can help work through and diffuse some of that, then we don't get locked in conflict around the task, versus the relationship. And I think that is another piece that I find so fascinating about how you bring down that emotion to really focus on really what people are trying to achieve.

Jane Beddall

And I think what's interesting, Kirby, because you're touching on it, I'll go there for a moment. Which is, sometimes there'll be an argument over something that is a very objective, you just decide or guess what? You don't have a vote. You just don't. You wish you did. Wouldn't we all like to control everything that touches on our lives? But, because it's personal, the interpersonal relationship is having an effect on that. And what I think of as communication and the work that I do, some of it is all about decision making. It is not governance in any formal, structured sense, but it is how do we talk together and decide things together? Whether they're very simple things. Are the grandparents going to go to this child for a holiday? Well, no, because that shows favoritism. And by the way, I know that you're just setting this up so that my brother takes over as CEO. Well, maybe it has nothing to do with that, but if you can have conversations and you find out that actually it's because mom and dad really had it with cold weather, they're going to see the adult children who live in a warm place, it could be something else altogether.

Jane Beddall

But you have to be able to talk and figure it out. And that to me, is what makes the ordinary, I'll call them decisions about, well, how do we do this? Things that people decide all the time and they decide outside of families; that's how it gets more complicated with families because there's always that relationship piece.

Kirby Rosplock

Yeah, the relationship piece is really an underpinning to so much of what works well and so much of what doesn't work well. So I can't believe,qsx we've covered a lot of ground. Jane, I could have you on for 17 more podcasts because there's so much richness to this conversation and this topic. If you had some closing thoughts that we wanted to leave listeners, viewers with today, what would you want to share most from your work in conflict.

Jane Beddall

First of all, that families should not beat up on themselves. That has to be the most important piece. Families are going to disagree, and you're not bad because you do. So you don't need to beat up on yourself. The fact that you don't know that anyone else is doing it is because no one else will talk about it either. They're doing it. They just don't talk to you about it. So accept that you're not bad people. Conflict is going to happen. We can't all agree. We can work towards a spectrum of more good, not too much bad, and we're going to stay away from the ugly, but we don't have to be afraid. Figure out how to build those connections, keep them going before there's trouble. And if there is a little bit of a move away from the good to the bad, don't expect it to solve itself. Do try to work on it. Get a commitment from other people to work on it.

Jane Beddall

And one thing I think I didn't touch on, but it's important, is if you're going to have one on one conversations, do that. Don't humiliate anyone. That never helps to call someone out in a group. You can say things to them in a different way. You don't want to make things worse. Think about how you would like someone to speak to you and keep going. It will get better. You'll get more natural and comfortable with this if you think about it, if you try, if you practice, and there is a lot of advice out there, all different perspectives, all different ways of phrasing it. If you are interested in this whole world of how to get better at conflict, I encourage you to look around. There are so many resources, it's difficult for me to say, this is the best, this is my favorite. Just take a look around a little bit, see what really sings to you, because they are different and because I'm fascinated, kirby, I'm always talking about conflict on my podcast. Every week there's something else to talk about. I have wonderful guests, and I have much shorter pieces that are just me talking about a particular topic.

Kirby Rosplock

Fantastic. Well, Jane Bettel, we are so grateful for your presence today. Founder of Dovetail Resolutions. You do incredible work with individuals and families to navigate some tricky waters and manage conflict. And we loved having you today here as the Tamarind Learning Podcast guest. I can't wait to join you on your podcast at some time in the future, and I really appreciate you being so open and authentic and sharing so many great insights with the folks that are listening and watching today.

Jane Beddall

Well, thank you, Kirby. It's been my pleasure.