Endeavour

"endeavour"-a purposeful or industrious undertaking (especially one that requires effort or boldness) (www.thefreedictionary.com)

Last night at a meeting, our lead pastor used the word "endeavour" in a way that I found intrigueing, so this morning I decided to check out the word and I came across this definition which I love-probably because it has the word "boldness" in it. I am less of a fan of the word "effort". Haha...JK-that's pre-teen BBM speak for "Just Kidding", by the way...hope my 11 year old daughter doesn't catch me using her abbreviations...she would not be impressed and that would not be ideal.

Anyway, back to "endeavour". Building a practice in Alternative Dispute Resolution ("ADR") has been an exciting endeavour ie an exciting purposeful, industrious undertaking, requiring effort and boldness indeed.

My experience has been of having had to be single-mindedly intentional about building ADR. And it has been fruitful. A great number of lawyers and other professionals are drawn to ADR, believing in the innate goodness of settling disputes outside of court and are drawn to the fact that there is a potential livable income wrapped up securely within something that has so many altruistic facets. "Altruism"...um...just give me a second...ah "unselfish concern for the welfare of others" (www.thefreedictionary.com) Yes, that is what I was trying to get at in using the word "altruistic".

But altruism alone is not going to sustain single-minded intentionality in building an ADR practice. There are economic considerations. Yes, I did say "Livable income wrapped up securely in something that has many altruistic facets"

"Livable income?" I hear you ask. "Yes indeed", I say. Well then why do so many professionals with a passion for mediation abandon ship soon after become formally skilled up in the ways of mediation? The answer is, in my view, that professionals have an expectation of qualifying in mediation and then automatically getting work in mediation. Simple, you qualify, you get work. Get it? Well, the truth is many don't. For many with a burning passion for ADR, for a better way, it is a massive anti-climax.

Having just said all I have, may I just say that there are significant opportunities in ADR, and that there are significant amounts of work. So what's up then, what's missing?

May I suggest it is "endeavour"-wrapped up in that we find purposefulness, industriousness (is that a word? if not consider this whole blog a poem-JK-ooops!), effort and boldness. I love "boldness". Um...just give me a second...ah yes, "fearless and daring; courageous". Yes, that hits the spot.

Having "endeavoured" around my ADR practice for the past six years, just over a year ago I founded ADR Network South Africa to formally cope with referrals we were receiving nationally and internationally, and also as a platform to train lawyers and other interested professionals in ADR. It has grown to a platform where we also assist others in establishing, nurturing and growing their own ADR practices. We have established a dynamic, young board of directors. When I say young, I include myself in that, so think of "young" as a spectrum, if you will.

From 2012, I am largely concentrating my endeavours on getting work for the Network and training up enough capacity to do the work. It is an exciting endeavour and puts me in the position of helping professionals with an interest or passion in ADR to connect with their dreams and aspirations.

Tomorrow morning I have a meeting with a lawyer from Papua New Guinea (if the spelling is wrong on that, this is a poem). I am excited to hear her aspirations and assess how we can help in connecting her with those.

More about ADR Network South Africa to come...watch this space.

As always, yours in BIG peace, huge!
Sheena Jonker

Ps. If you have a dispute you wish to keep out of court drop us an email at adr@mediatorsa.co.za
And is you have aspirations in ADR (mediation or arbitration), email me on sheena@mediatorsa.co.za
www.mediatorsa.co.za