Season 2 - The Art of Mediation and Resolving Conflict with Louise Penberthy - Episode 018

Louise Penberthy is a mediator, Scrum Master, facilitator, and writer. She's also been a programmer, interface designer, and project manager for software-development teams. Underlying all of Louise's activities is her passionate curiosity about people. Over her 15 years of experience as a mediator, she's observed a wide range of human behavior, and worked with people of different nationalities, cultures, countries of origin, religions, and ethnicities. She writes and speaks on the patterns she sees in what people do, and how they can change their behavior to resolve disputes, avoid conflict, and work joyously and effectively with each other. Some topics she talks and writes on are, "How to Survive and Thrive on Self-Organizing Teams," "Personal Barriers to Resolution," and "Six Signs That You're Being Unwisely Generous with Your Clients – And What to Do about It." As a programmer and project manager, Louise has worked on projects at large accounting firms, medium-sized consulting firms, and a dot-com startup that didn't survive the startup phase. Now as a Scrum Master, Louise is excited about coaching self-organizing teams to achieve team coherence and to regularly deliver value for the client. Louise has been a member of Toastmasters for 2 1/2 years. In June 2017, she finished a year-long term as president of her Toastmasters club, Chamber Club 540. She blogs about her experience as a white woman in an interracial marriage, and enjoys swimming, hiking, camping, and flat-water kayaking. Louise grew up in West Seattle, and lived in Tacoma, Chicago, Atlanta, and Baltimore, before returning to West Seattle not long after 9/11. She now lives in the First Hill neighborhood of Seattle with her husband Kyle, and their large black cat Kastagir.