Thursday, March 4th, 8 am Pacific / 11 am Eastern
Our special guest this week, John Ford, will present on:
Empathy and the Art of Tracking: How Mediators Follow the Trail of Emotion
Mediators are trackers. We listen not only to words, but to tone, posture, silence, intensity, and story, following the emotional trail toward what matters beneath the conflict.
Drawing from his new book, Tracking Triggers: From Reactivity to Responsiveness, John Ford introduces a tracking approach to understanding what happens when people become triggered and how mediators can follow the trail without getting caught in the story themselves.
A triggered reaction often arrives wrapped in interpretation: “I feel disrespected.” “I feel betrayed.” “I feel ignored.” Ford calls these storied feelings. They are not false feelings to be corrected or dismissed. They are meaningful tracks. They tell us that something real has been stirred while also carrying a story about what another person did or what their actions mean.
For mediators, the challenge is to honor the experience without reinforcing the story as fact. By tracking from assumptions and storied feelings toward present feelings, underlying needs, and what remains emotionally alive, mediators can help parties move from blame and reactivity toward greater clarity, acknowledgment, and choice.
Using the metaphor of tracking, this experiential session explores how mediators can combine careful observation, informed speculation, and intuition to follow emotional cues while remaining present, curious, and neutral when the trail becomes complicated.
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Our presenter: John Ford
John Ford is a workplace mediator, negotiation educator, author, and conflict resolution specialist with nearly 30 years of experience. Originally trained as a human rights attorney in South Africa, John has mediated hundreds of workplace disputes and trained thousands of professionals in mediation, negotiation, emotional intelligence, and conflict management.
He currently teaches negotiation and mediation at UC Law San Francisco and is a past president of the Association for Dispute Resolution of Northern California. John is the author of Peace at Work and Tracking Triggers: From Reactivity to Responsiveness, and creator of The Empathy Set®, a practical tool for improving communication and understanding.
Offered by Will Work For Food, founded by Natalie Armstrong-Motin, and moderated by Kimberly Best, Felicia Harris Hoss, Jeff Kichaven, Jean Lawler, and David Shraga.
This worldwide conversation will be like nothing else. Join in! Share, learn, have fun, and raise money for food banks.