Workshop on Conflict Resolution in Family Businesses

March 21, 2019

In mid-March, Beth Fisher-Yoshida, Academic Director of the Master in Negotiation and Conflict Resolution offered by Columbia University’s School of Professional Studies conducted an  interactive workshop entitledFamily Business and the Business of the Family” in which she discussed how to prevent and address conflict in family businesses. The event was organized by the Santiago Center in association with the Columbia Business Alumni Club of Chile.

Fisher-Yoshida is a facilitator, educator, mediator and executive coach, who partners with clients to develop initiatives that will strengthen their core negotiation skills and effectiveness. During this interactive meeting, she identified six typical types of conflicts in family businesses, including sibling rivalry, fairness in sharing resources, and disregards for emotions of family members. She then used a model to frame the problems, introduced a negotiation preparation checklist, discussed methodologies to help parties ask the right questions in a resolution process, and explained the when/if a third-party mediator was needed.  The workshop ended with attendees working on a case study proposed by Fisher-Yoshida.

See Beth Fisher-Yoshida’s PowerPoint presentation and the Photo Gallery of the event.