Here’s a great opportunity to be “Nice” – be hard on problems and soft on people!

Hope to see you at this program –

Monday, February 20, 2017  3 – 4:30 pm / Campus Cinema Witherspoon Student Center

The NC State Faculty Ombuds Office is relatively new after opening its physical office space in late February 2015,  The office was the fruition of many years of effort by the Faculty Senate working closely with leadership across the university. Thus, the office is pleased to report that it recently published its First Annual Report covering office opening and its first full academic year of operations. The report also provides a comprehensive review of the office operations along with an historical perspective.

As the NC State Faculty Ombuds, It has been a privilege to serve the university to date and I look forward to continuing efforts to develop and grow the office.

Here’s a link –  Faculty Ombuds 1st Annual Report

In November I added a short video explaining the role of ombuds (check out the home page link Video Explanation) that discussed the idea of developing “options” as an important role of the ombuds.  This concept also fits well with noted dispute resolution author Bernie Mayer (and others like William Ury) who explain that conflict intervention roles can be thought of as the “third side” of an issue.  Don’t limit your thinking to one way or the other; instead, what’s the third side? At the same time, Mayer also cautions those in such roles to not focus on the “dualistic” thinking of resolution or impasse. This can surface in the ombuds role if one is singularly focused on resolving issues.

As ombuds, while part of my thinking is absolutely to help you resolve a situation, I must also keep this goal at bay because you may come to the office with a different route in mind. Thus, instead of a singular focus on resolution or even a dualistic approach – resolve it or impasse – the focus is on options.  What are the full range of choices/options available?  Perhaps a situation is not yet ready for resolution and instead more information is needed or a referral or purposely avoiding the situation might make sense. With consideration and a focus on option generation there are generally multiple possibilities.

Thus, my primary goal will be to help you generate multiple options based on your goals and then you determine how to proceed.

Hope you have a Happy New Year and Happy New Options to resolve any issues you face!