Inclusive Conferences
conference ombuds servicesTake Action for Your Business Today!
Schedule a call
Creating Inclusive conferences
Overview
How do you create social safety at your event? How do you ensure inclusion and effectively handle troubling interpersonal issues?
Untangled Resolutions’ Conference Ombuds service provides a supportive system that lets conference organizers offer a conference experience that empowers attendees and vendors to surface and confront difficult issues.
These issues can include:
Harassment
Bullying and heckling
Incivility
Cross cultural miscommunications
Other interpersonal and intergroup conflicts
Services for individuals who experience harm
We assure that anyone at your conference who experiences harm has access to a confidential and unbiased trained professional who will:
listen with empathy and discuss what happened so they can
- Sort through their concerns
- Identify their priorities and desired outcomes
- Understand and explore their options
- Understand any relevant rules or formal requirements
- Make an informed decision about how to move forward
Services for individuals and groups seeking resolution
As skilled mediators we can help individuals and groups to address their differences and reach a mutual agreement about how to resolve them.
Our specialized Ombuds stand as your trusted resource, offering a confidential and effective way to address challenging social issues that may arise.
What you will receive
Partnership and Consulation
We help you to evaluate your risks and consider a range of formal and informal options for addressing them.
Reassurance and Peace of Mind
For planners and attendees, knowing there is a professional confidential resource available can enhance the quality of their conference experience.
Reduced Liability
Our collaborative approach fosters genuine commitment to a collaborative agreement, reducing potential liability.
What we offer
A full-service collaborative effort to ensure your conference is truly inclusive.
BENEFITS OF THE SERVICE
For Event Organizers: Beyond resolving conflicts, our services provide a sense of reassurance, help ensure smoother event execution, enhance your organization’s and sponsors’ reputations, help to mitigate potential liability, and foster a culture of respect.
For Conference Attendees: We help create a safe and supportive conference environment, guided by the principles of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Belonging, Justice, and Accessibility (DEIBJA) that promotes a lasting positive experience for attendees.
DEIBJA Focus
We handle diversity, equity, inclusion, justice, and accessibility issues with the utmost care and respect.
Robust Staffing
At least two dedicated Ombuds practitioners on call (hours depend on agreement)
Effective Intervention
We can address concerns before they become crises.
Neutral & Confidential Space
We ensure everyone’s voice is heard in confidence and without fear of judgment or backlash.
Varied Tools
We tailor our approach to best suit each situation using a variety of tools such as mediation, facilitation, conflict coaching, and options for training.
Support Before, During & After
BEFORE EVENT
We collaborate with you to understand your goals, anticipate issues, and create a solid code of conduct.
DURING EVENT
Our team does not just standby waiting for something to happen. We circulate during the conference to ensure visibility and increase access. We are also available to online attendees.
AFTER EVENT
Our post-event analysis includes insights on noted trends and feedback, along with advice for your upcoming events.
AFTER CARE
Includes up to 6 months post-event access to ombuds services for issues related to the conference.
Your Conference Ombuds Specialists
Bathabile K.S. Mthombeni
(She/Her/Hers)
Bathabile K.S. Mthombeni, J.D, M.S.LOD, PCC is the University Ombudsman for Binghamton University. She is also a coach and mediator, and the founder of Untangled Resolutions, providing DEIB policy, process, and procedure development and implementation services to schools and other organizations. Untangled Resolutions also provides Racial Intelligence and Racial Mindset coaching, training, and dialogue facilitation services primarily to White members of leadership teams and DEIB committees. Finally, Untangled Resolutions provides external ombuds services, leadership coaching, mediation, conflict management workshops, and conflict management systems design services.
As an organizational development practitioner, Bathabile helps organizations to take their DEIB statements from aspiration to action. As a mediator and coach Bathabile is passionate about helping people to learn how to communicate better, resolve their differences, and find the highest expression of their best selves.
Bathabile earned an A.B. in Sociology, cum laude, from Princeton University, a J.D. from Columbia Law School, and a graduate coaching certificate and M.S. in Leadership and Organizational Development from the Naveen Jindal School of Management at the University of Texas at Dallas. She holds a PCC level certification from the International Coach Federation.
She is a dedicated human companion to five dogs and two cats. She is an avid yarn crafter and a singer/songwriter/guitarist who has performed on New York City’s subway platforms and once lived in a tent.
Dr. Laura P. Minero
(She/Us/Our/Ella)
Dr. Laura Minero is a Latinx, queer, gender expansive and formerly undocumented, bilingual and bicultural, immigrant licensed psychologists who specializes in working with BIPOC, 2SQT+, Spanish-speaking and immigrant youth and adults via her labor of love, Yolotl Libre Therapy, Training, and Consulting. As founder of Yolotl Libre, she serves as an anti-racist, community healing, liberation, 2SQT+ and trauma-informed, culture of health consultant and has given over 150 keynote speeches and trainings for international and national audiences.
Dr. Minero earned her Ph.D. in Counseling Psychology from University of Wisconsin-Madison in August 2020. She is a peer-reviewed scientific author and her scholarly work has included contributing to scientific consensus studies used to inform national policy as a 2019 Christine Mirzayan Science Policy and Technology Fellow with the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.
Her research with undocumented and asylum-seeking transgender immigrants and the intersections of transphobia, racism, and trauma was supported by prestigious Ford Foundation Predoctoral and Dissertation Fellowship awards. Her dissertation critiqued U.S. Detention and Asylum-seeking processes for incurring trauma and psychological sequelae on Latinx, transgender immigrants and earned APA’s Division 44’s (Society for the Psychology of Sexual Orientation and Gender Diversity) 2020 Transgender People and Gender Diversity Research Award, the National Latinx Psychological Association’s Outstanding Dissertation Award, Association for Hispanics in Higher Education 1st Place Dissertation Award, and the 2022 Outstanding Dissertation Award from the Committee for Global Psychology, American Psychological Association.
Dr. Minero has received several state and national awards in recognition of her reforming and re-imagining oppressive systems that primarily and adversely impact communities of color, immigrants, and 2SQT+/LGBTQ+ folx via community healing and love centered approaches. Dr. Minero was featured by Our Live’s Magazine as an influential leader on their Queer People of Color 2017 Pride List and received the 2017 Alix Olson Award for the Promotion of a Tolerant and Just Community and University of Wisconsin-Madison’s 2020 Outstanding Woman of Color Award in recognition of her advocacy. She has also received awards from the National Latinx Psychological Association and American Psychological Association’s Division for Counseling Psychology and the Society for the Psychological Study of Culture, Ethnicity, and Race.