Operating out of the Ted Rogers School of Management at Ryerson University, the Centre for Labour Management aims at dispute avoidance rather than just resolution.
“There’s a lot of people talking about dispute resolution,” says Buzz Hargrove, co-director of the centre along with Maurice Mazerolle, professor of labour relations at the school.
“But nobody has spent any time on saying, well how do you avoid disputes as oppose to trying to resolve them. They’re much more difficult once they’ve started.”
The CLMR will act as research centre where contentious work issues will be identified, researched, and analyzed in an attempt to assist all aspects of workplace conflict. Meanwhile Ryerson students will also reap the benefits.
“The very fact that we exist is a bonus,” says Mazerolle. “We’re hoping that through our partnering with organizations, we’ll have executives from labour and management and government on campus and available, be it speaking to a class, judging case competitions, or just providing advice on whatever students feel they need advice on.”
