Deal or No Deal: Making commercial decisions is what businesses do best

Pressures on Business

As a small business owner the pressures are considerable.  More often than not if you are not getting your hands dirty you are not earning money.  The nature of work may different but some of the business problems are the same for us all.

Lets think about cash flow

Everyone need money to eat and live.  We can agree that keeping tabs on debts and expenses are crucial.  If you have a dispute you can lose not only the value of the product or service but also the time it takes to sort it out.  Looking rationally it may be easier to just write it off but what if you can’t afford to?  Do you really want a reputation as an easy walk over?

What to do when both sides think they are right

Making commercial decisions is what businesses do.  In order to do that you need the person or company to sort out the dispute and come to an arrangement.  One thing that you can be absolutely sure of (and there aren’t many absolute sureties) is that both sides of a dispute think that right is on their side.  They are not going to roll over and put there hands up and pay you.  Your suggestion that you can come to an arrangement has fallen on deaf ears.

When you need a quick (and cheap) solution

You want to sort it out, and cheaply; and doing it yourself hasn’t worked.  Court is a different ball game, surely it hasn’t come to that?  If both sides of the dispute can agree they have a dispute to be resolved, mediation is the answer.  The process of mediation helps both sides to get a deal.  Without having to get too involved in looking back at the cause, mediation looks forward to getting rid of the problem by coming to an arrangement that suits both sides.  Mediation saves you and your business money and the fees are usually an allowable business expense.

Share the pain and the gain

It is not a winner takes all solution and that is an advantage because it means that no one looses everything.   Quite often both sides of a small business dispute are business owners and neither can afford to loose everything.

The mediator can help each person look at all the different angles and realise the benefits of making a deal.  Sounds easy, rational and obvious but when you are engulfed in the dispute its hard to see that easy path.

Whether you involve your solicitor or start the court process, or not, think if mediation could resolve your problem faster, cheaper and easier.

If you want to see if mediation can help your business problems or if you want to talk about mediation as an option, look at www.mediateddisputesolutions.uk or call on 02085054175.