VOCATIONAL FOCUS:
To offer support and training to individuals, organizations, and communities in their efforts to both live and work in a more efficient and harmonious manner and to utilize their time and resources more effectively.

KEY QUALIFICATIONS:
Over the past six years I have over 2500 hours of contact time with clients as a trainer, facilitator, and mediator. I am an adjunct faculty member in the conflict management program at Woodbury College in Montpelier, VT and am a contracted mediator with the Vermont Family Court Mediation Project. I am also a Masters candidate in Organizational Development at American University in Washington DC.

KEY AREAS OF PRACTICE:

• Facilitation of Difficult Conversations
• Board Development
• Facilitation of Multi-Party Public Disputes
• Team Building
• Strategic Planning
• Coalition Building
• Retreat and Meeting Facilitation
• Training Design and Delivery
  

WORK EXPERIENCE:

Director, Cheshire Mediation: I have over 1500 hours of actual mediation experience in divorce, post divorce, business, small claims court, public disputes, and organizational conflicts. I am also responsible for grant writing, supervising 10 employees, and managing a $175,000 annual budget. Keene, NH. (1/98- present)

Meeting Facilitation and Group Interventions including multi-party public disputes: Provided mediation and facilitation services for organizations dealing with conflict and processes of change, including the work of: facilitating large scale public disputes, meeting facilitation, consensus decision making, collaborative problem-solving and facilitated negotiation. I have done this work with social service agencies, non-profit boards, international human rights groups, international corporations and state agencies. (1997– Present)

Training and adjunct faculty: Provided conflict resolution, communications, mediation, and facilitation training services to organizations and groups including: adjunct faculty in Woodbury College’s Conflict Management Program; MacMillin Corporation, (Keene, NH); Franciscan Mission Association of North America, (Washington DC); Cheshire Medical Center, (Keene, NH); Millipore Corporation, (Jaffrey, NH); Vermont Department of Corrections; VT Americorps; and VT Department of Education. (1997 – present).

Meeting Facilitation and Group Interventions including multi-party public disputes: Provided mediation and facilitation services for organizations dealing with conflict and processes of change, including the work of: facilitating large scale public disputes, meeting facilitation, consensus decision making, collaborative problem-solving and facilitated negotiation. I have done this work with social service agencies, non-profit boards, international human rights groups, international corporations and state agencies. (1985 – present)

Organizational Development Consultant: Provided team-building, strategic planning, board development and other participatory problem-solving interventions to non-profits and for profit organizations. (1999 – present)

EDUCATION AND TRAINING:
St. John's University, Collegeville, MN: BS in Psychology, Cumulative GPA 3.7, 1983.
Woodbury College, Montpelier, VT: Certification in mediation, 1998.
American University, Washington D.C.: Candidate for MS in Organizational Development.

INTERNATIONAL EXPERIENCE:
Witness for Peace in Nicaragua & Honduras: Member of the long-term team in Nicaragua and Honduras, living in conflict zones in order to document the effects of the war, and to provide accompaniment to endangered Nicaraguans (1987 & 1988). While in Nicaragua I was a part of a team that negotiated the release of a kidnapped member of the Italian clergy.

Plum Village, France: Lived and worked in the Buddhist Community of Vietnamese Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh for four month, learning meditation and deep listening. (1993)

International Peace Pilgrimage Organizer: Led peace pilgrimages of 12 to 80 internationalist through Central America and Mexico (1992) and Bosnia and Eastern Europe (1995) as ways of commemorating the Quincentennial of Columbus and the 50th anniversary of the end of World War II.

PUBLICATIONS: “The Cost and Management of Organizational Conflict, “NH Business Review, (Manchester, NH, July 11 – 24, 2003)
“Listening in Prayer and Peacemaking,” Lay Mission Handbook Series, (Catholic
Network of Volunteer Service, Washington, DC, Volume 3 Number 7)
“Truth and the Contras,” in Ways Out, ed. Gene Knudson-Hoffman. (John Daniel &
Company, Santa Barbara, CA, 1989) pp. 124 -- 126.
“Making Peace with Pain,” Fellowship, (Nyack, NY, July\August 1995)

SKILLS:
Group process and facilitation, mediation, organizational process consultation, cross-cultural experience, community organizing, Spanish, public speaking, negotiation skills, and writing.