Mr. Neil Bodine; President and a co-founder and Mr. Ed Miller founding member of The Workplace Institute who have conducted many seminars and workshops in various aspects of labour relations are in Sri Lanka on the invitation of The Technology Initiative for the Private Sector (TIPS). Their purpose in Sri Lanka is to create an awareness of the importance of fostering Labour Management.

The Merchant Bank of Sri Lanka Limited (MBSL) was privileged to host an EFC Asia Foundation workshop on "Enterprise Labour/Management Training’ on 07 and 08 September 2000. Its objective was to train both managers & union members to resolve disputes and specifically in-house disputes as part of HRM strategy of the MBSL.

The Interest Based Problem Solving (IBPS) technique, which is now widely used in mediation, is adopted for dispute resolution aimed at fostering Labour Management cooperation to improve productivity. The IBPS technique is one where both parties win through a solution based on each party’s interests rather than a ‘position based’ negotiation resulting in a compromise.

MBSL hopes to use this technique in their future negotiations with the union.