Julia Menard

There’s been a huge shift in the water cooler talk these last few months. Who hasn’t engaged in some form of conversation about the state of power-over, competitive, win-lose politics.     For those of us who still believe in collaboration, what meaning are we to bring to this changing landscape in the type of […]

A few weeks ago, I turned on the radio and heard the announcer say that Vancouver Canucks hockey teammates Pettersson & Miller: “Don’t like each other.” The announcer went on to say even though these two hockey players make millions of dollars every year: “That’s just human nature. They don’t like each other. Money can’t

According to a study by Bravely, 70% of employees avoid difficult conversations at work and fully 95% of employees struggle to speak up about a concern. That’s a lot of conversations about meaningful topics that are not happening – a whole lot of bottlenecking going on! Imagine how many conversations we are not having that

Recently, I wrote about how no real good comes from conversations where everyone’s emotions are elevated. I likened it to two people doing a dance with their amygdala, the almond-shaped part of our brains that says things like: “Your hair is on fire! The roof is falling in! This is horrible!” And, usually, it’s not.

Many people have heard about “I statements.” As someone said to me recently: “It’s counseling 101.”     Yet, I do see many people struggle with expressing I statements, or even having a common understanding of what they are.     So, let’s start with the basics: what do we really mean by I statements?

Why Bother Opening a Can of Worms? As a mediator and conflict connoisseur, a question I get asked a lot, when I am encouraging people to talk with each other, sounds something like: “Why should I even bother having the conversation?” “What’d be the benefit in me even opening that can of worms!?” Exactly! That’s

Last month, I spoke about the importance of being able to see multiple perspectives. In an era of information and misinformation, it’s become futile to convince someone of your point of view. There’s just too much data and it can be massaged in various ways to make it support a particular perspective.     If

In this day and age, trying to discern what the truth is can seem impossible. Did someone really do that egregious behaviour or not? Sheryl Sandberg, for example has come out with a new documentary on the sexual violence perpetrated on men and women in the October 7 attacks.     We know many of

Over this last month, I’ve had the privilege of working with a few high-level leadership teams. Each of these teams are made up of leaders who are responsible for leading their own teams.     Together, we’ve been digging into the 8 step difficult conversations model for navigating important conversations.     Last week, we