Minimum Standards—IMI Intercultural Competence Specialisation

Note that Intercultural Competence Qualifying Assessment Programs may have higher entrance standards than these, but they will never be lower. Do make sure you read through the requirements of the IC-QAP you are interested in.

A. Knowledge

1. Cultural Framework(s): Ability to apply at least one recognized cultural theory in order to identify relevant Cultural Focus Areas for facilitating inter-cultural mediations (see below). The theory and approach shall include an appreciation of similarities and differences among cultures.

Comments:

1. Any
   selected framework should provide suggestions as to how to use culture,
   and possible Cultural Focus Areas that have been identified using the
   theory (or theories) taught, while avoiding stereotyping when setting up
   and participating in mediations. Although there are many recognized and
   respected theories, the goal is not to learn comparative theories about
   culture or to master a particular theory. The goal is to be able to
   apply a selected theory or theories about culture in such a way as to
   help mediators consider appropriate issues when setting up and
   facilitating an inter-cultural mediation.
2. Understanding
   culturally shaped norms and expectations can help explain parties’
   different perspectives and think about possible impasses that these
   perspectives may create. However, it is important to avoid considering
   culture as an overly inclusive concept to try to explain all behaviors
   that individuals may manifest, which may not always be group-related but
   also can be linked to individual considerations (e.g., age, gender,
   residence, etc). Mediators should strive to apply their understanding of
   culture as a tool to understand and foresee possible patterns of
   behavior while considering mediation as a social process in
   inter-cultural cases, helping people from different cultures to
   communicate optimally with one another.
3. Any discussion of
   culture in the context of mediation needs to consider how the concepts
   of “parties”, “participants”, “conflict”, “resolution”, “mediation”,
   “conciliation” and “process” can have different meanings in different
   cultures.

2. Self-awareness. Ability to recognize one’s own cultural influences and their possible effect on the mediation.

Comments:

1. Mediators
   should be conscious of their own culturally-influenced practices
   including how culture may form lenses through which they view and
   interpret the behavior of others.
2. Mediators should consider how their culturally shaped preferences or behavior might be viewed and interpreted by participants.
3. Mediators
   should learn to recognize signs of their own surprise, discomfort, or
   cognitive dissonances when facing cultural differences, and develop
   adaptive strategies for re-establishing balance, coping with cultural
   ambiguities, and managing unfamiliar or contrary practices.

3. Multi-Cultural Perspectives: Ability to recognize each participant’s culturally-shaped perspectives of behaviors or events. Ability to understand and appreciate participants’ similar and different cultural perspectives, and possible imbalances between them. Ability to manage ambiguities and mistakes that may emerge in multi-cultural situations. Ability to use the mediator’s understandings of these possible differences and similarities to create a workable environment for all participants, including one that optimizes communication among them.

Comments:

1. Mediators
   should be sensitive to the participants’ possible perceptions of the
   behavior of the mediator, the behavior of other participants, and
   preferences in handling procedural issues or substantive topics.
2. Mediators
   should not react negatively when faced with different ways of doing
   things, unless the behavior violates the mediator’s fundamental personal
   values.
3. When working with multiple cultural perspectives,
   mediators should learn to deal with possible uncertainty, ambiguous
   information or circumstances, unintentional mistakes (e.g. cultural
   malapropisms), and possible unconscious biases or behavioral scripts of
   participants.
4. Mediators should consider the best styles and
   processes for dealing with issues related to multiple perspectives. This
   includes whether to address them in caucuses or joint sessions or
   directly or indirectly with the participants, as well as how to generate
   procedural options that all participants can work with.
5. When
   managing multiple cultural perspectives, mediators should consider how
   and whether to co-mediate with neutrals from other cultures or involve
   interpreters as cultural consultants when preparing for and
   participating in mediations.

B. Skills

4. Communication: Ability to adjust one’s own communication style to the preferred styles of participants from other cultures, and to help participants communicate optimally with each other, including establishing suitable processes to facilitate communications.

Comments:

1. Mediators
   should be able to employ suitable inter-cultural communication skills
   when interacting with participants as well as with co-mediators from
   other cultures. For example, under one theory, the communication style
   suitable for mediators may involve pinpointing a point on the
   direct-indirect communication continuum, a point that can be influenced
   by a number of other cultural parameters such as the power distance
   index and relationship orientation of the participants or co-mediators.
2. Mediators
   need to check for compatible communication styles among the
   participants and consider whether, how and when to assist participants
   in communicating in the event of possibly incompatible communication
   styles.
3. Mediators should be able to assist participants in
   understanding how information may be conveyed in different ways across
   cultures.
4. Mediators may need to help participants adjust the way
   they communicate with each other based on such parameters as the
   participants’ comfort in displaying emotion, their ability to empathize
   or understand others’ perspectives, their comfort with face-to-face
   discussion of sensitive topics, and their preference to pursue delicate
   matters through indirection (e.g., to avoid “loss of face”). Mediators
   may need to be prepared to help the participants render explicit what
   may have been implicit in their behavior, or to state less explicitly
   what a participant may prefer to learn implicitly. Mediators also might
   help the participants generate a new set of behavioral norms for the
   purposes of the mediation.
5. Mediators need to learn to assess if, when, and how to use caucuses with participants to facilitate communications.

5. Preparation: Ability to prepare for a mediation by identifying possible cultural patterns and preferences (e.g., identifying specific Cultural Focus Areas for each mediation) and designing potentially appropriate processes and possible interventions.

Comments:

1. Mediators
   should learn to prepare for inter-cultural mediations by researching
   and anticipating possible culture affects and by figuring out what
   process may work best for the participants based on any Cultural Focus
   Areas that the mediator may have identified. When preparing for a
   mediation, mediators should consider whether to hold preliminary private
   interviews with the participants, explore whether to design culturally
   appropriate procedural rules for behavior and interaction, and consider
   preparatory interventions to help the parties recognize and address any
   culturally-influenced communications, interests, or impediments.
2. The
   aim of this preparation should be to construct hypotheses for how to
   proceed initially given what a mediator may know about the participants,
   their representatives and their wider constituencies, and plan how to
   test and adapt these hypotheses as the mediation progresses. It should
   be remembered, however, that preparation only gives rise to hypotheses,
   and mediators should not assume that their hypotheses can be relied on.
3. When
   considering interests, mediators should consider the possibility that
   there may be wider interests at stake than only those of the
   participants at the table. Those interests may include the interests of
   other constituencies or stakeholders (e.g., family members, elders,
   communities, tribunals, affiliates, and regional, national or political
   groups or entities). This analysis also should consider whether there
   may be impediments due to the participants’ different sense of status or
   different needs for procedural certainty, autonomy, fairness, or
   relatedness.
4. Mediators should be flexible and open to
   re-assessing and modifying their procedural preferences and styles of
   intervention, as illustrated by the following examples:
   1. Whether to convene a pre-mediation meeting with each party, certain parties only, or their representatives.
   2. Whether to request prior written submissions and the type of submissions that may be helpful.
   3. Where
      the mediation should take place, who should attend, and what venue,
      food, dietary needs, external resources, social activities or welcoming
      rituals should be considered.
   4. Whether to work with the parties
      to design a procedure to meet any needs for mutual respect, autonomy,
      affiliation, certainty, or procedural fairness, in which statuses and
      roles are relevant (e.g. dress code, seating arrangements, and forms of
      address).Whether to help participants avoid cultural norms that may be
      deemed politically or culturally incorrect by others, as well as avoid
      being manipulated by cultural norms.
   5. How participants or their
      representatives should communicate optimally with one another prior to
      and during the mediation, including whether or not to specify the role
      of the mediator (e.g., as non-evaluative or evaluative), the need for
      co- mediators or interpreters, who may speak and write, the order of any
      initial presentations, possible deadlines, the length of mediation
      sessions, and how time should be allocated.
   6. How proposals might
      be presented (e.g., in some cultures, parties may not be comfortable
      presenting options, may not be familiar with brainstorming processes,
      may not understand what is expected of them, and may not want to present
      because may appear weak, unfocused, lose face, or lose the respect of
      other participants or stakeholders).
   7. Whether and if so, when and how to provide for evaluative feedback.

6. Managing the Process. Ability to detect whether, when and how cultural considerations (e.g. Cultural Focus Areas) may be impacting on the mediation process as the mediation progresses including abilities to adapt the process accordingly and design appropriate interventions, that also encompass any settlement and compliance phases.

Comments:

1. Although
   managing the process is important in all mediations, this
   responsibility requires special attention in intercultural mediations
   where signposts of progress and impediments may be less evident. Also,
   suitable interventions may be different.
2. Due to cultural
   considerations, mediators may need to become more or less directive or
   facilitative at times on procedural issues, depending on the mutual
   needs or requests of the participants.
3. Even though the mediator
   and the participants may feel they are advancing well, each individual
   may think they are heading in a direction whose outcome may be
   culturally influenced and different. In order to provide a check and
   elicit the range of different understandings, mediators should be able
   to assess the extent to which participants’ expectations are aligned,
   can be reconciled, or can be respected.
4. Mediators may need to
   help participants set parameters for a final work product or action
   items, so that the participants can feel they have reached satisfactory
   closure.
5. Conflicts underlying a mediation are seldom ended by
   only an oral agreement, nor are they always ended when there has been a
   signed agreement. In inter-cultural disputes, mediators should be aware
   of additional procedural or ceremonial steps that may be necessary to
   enable participants to feel that they can bring closure to the conflict.

Cultural Focus Areas

The IMI Inter-Cultural Task Force identified six Cultural Focus Areas (CFAs) that mediators may want to give attention to when mediating inter-culturally. Each of these behavioral categories includes examples that may be relevant when preparing for mediation, interacting with participants, bridging differences, and establishing common grounds between participants.

1. Relatedness and Communication Styles

• Formal-Informal
• Direct-Indirect
• Emotional: High-Low
• Emotional Expressiveness
• Physical-Non-physical
• Verbal, Para-verbal and Non-verbal
• Personal-Impersonal
• Sequential-Circular Reasoning

2. Mindset Toward Conflict

• Negotiation Attitude (how participants may prefer to negotiate)
• Attitudes to conflict: Positive-Negative
• Risk taking: High-Low
• Relationship building-Task orientation

3. Mediation Process

• Roles of Mediator and Participants
• Predictability of Process
• Need for an agenda
• Social protocols
• Separate or identifiable phases during the process
• Fairness
• Goals or Outcomes

4. Orientation Toward Exchanging Information

• Transparent-Non-transparent
• Legal or other norms or social conventions
• Broad-Narrow
• Non-specific-Contextual
• Fact related-Non-fact related

5. Time Orientation

• Polychronic-monochromic
• Long Term-Short Term orientation
• Past-Present-Future (facts, needs or interests)
• Deadlines, Deliverables, Punctuality
• Duration and Frequency (of joint and/or separate meetings)
• Expected timelines for reaching outcomes
• Time Pressure-No Time Pressure

6. Decision-making Approaches

• Norms-based-Subjective interests-based
• Mediator as norms-generator, norms-educator or norms-advocator
• Individualist, Majority-led or Collectivist
• Compromising-Non-compromising
• Problem-solving-Outcome generating
• Structured-Unstructured
• Relationship oriented-Outcome-oriented
• Participant driven-Constituency driven
• General-Specific Forms of Agreement (oral, written, behavioral)
• Inductive-Deductive Reasoning
• Measurable-Non-measurable

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