Mediation
Serious disputes require more than the exchange of offers.
Mediation is HMI’s core practice.
We mediate complex civil and commercial disputes, including matters involving professional negligence, medical malpractice and healthcare, class actions, institutional abuse, aviation, insurance and other serious or sensitive claims.
Our approach is active, pragmatic and grounded in the understanding that the stated legal dispute is not always the only thing preventing resolution.
Parties may have different understandings of the evidence, risk or value of a claim. They may also be making assumptions about the people in the other room. Trust may have deteriorated. A message may not be landing as intended. Professional or personal identity may be implicated. Previous negotiations may have created expectations or hardened positions.
Understanding those dynamics is part of the work.
Our Approach
We prepare carefully and work to understand the case before the mediation begins: the legal and factual issues, the history of negotiations, the people involved and the dynamics that may affect movement.
During the mediation, we do more than carry offers between rooms.
We test positions and assumptions, explore how proposals are being understood, identify issues that may be making movement difficult and help the parties assess the choices available to them.
Sometimes that requires candid conversations about risk. Sometimes it requires correcting an assumption about the other side. Sometimes the timing or delivery of a message matters as much as the message itself.
The mediator’s role is not to impose a resolution. It is to create a process in which the parties can exchange information, assess risk, consider alternatives and make informed decisions about whether and how to resolve their dispute.
Mediation as a Process
We do not necessarily view mediation as a single scheduled event.
Where appropriate, the process may include conversations before the mediation day, work with counsel during the mediation and follow-up afterwards when there remains a productive path toward resolution.
Some disputes resolve on the scheduled mediation day. Others require time, further information or another conversation.
Our role is to remain attentive to what the dispute requires while respecting that the decision to resolve it belongs to the parties.
Areas of Practice
HMI mediates a broad range of complex civil and commercial disputes, with particular experience in:
Medical malpractice and healthcare disputes
Professional negligence
Hospital, nursing and long-term care claims
Institutional abuse
Class actions and mass claims
Aviation
Insurance disputes
Serious personal injury claims
Complex commercial disputes
Other high-stakes or sensitive matters
Our Mediators
HMI mediators bring extensive experience in litigation, negotiation and dispute resolution to their work.
Our styles are individual, but our approach is shared: careful preparation, independent judgment, candid communication and respect for the people making the decisions.