Most of my volunteer hours as a teenager were spent raising service dogs for families who needed them. That was my first real introduction to how nonprofits actually work: not the mission statement on the website, but the board meetings, the grant deadlines, the people trying to keep an organisation together while doing the real work. It is also, though I did not know it at the time, where I first became interested in what happens when two people who both care about an organisation disagree about how to run it.
I grew up in Toronto and the GTA. I studied business. My first accounting job was auditing nonprofits and co-operative housing organisations across the region. That kind of work puts you in the room with financial statements that do not quite add up, bylaws that have not been updated in a decade, and board members who are trying very hard to trust each other through something that is not going well. I saw a lot of disputes, and I noticed something that stayed with me: almost none of them were really about the thing being argued about. They were about a governance gap, a financial decision nobody had the authority to make, or a conversation that needed to happen three years earlier.
I moved to Newfoundland five years ago, and to Gander four years ago. Since then I have been doing the same kind of work I have always done (accounting, operations, nonprofit governance) from this side of the country. What I have noticed here is a version of the same problem I kept seeing in Toronto: the disputes people get stuck in are often the ones nobody in the room knows how to resolve. The difference is that here, there are very few people to call.
This month I am launching Breakwater Resolution, an independent dispute resolution practice based in Gander, serving Atlantic Canada in person and national clients virtually. This is the long version of why.
The gap
A search of the ADRIC directory (the national registry of credentialed dispute resolution practitioners) shows about ten mediators and arbitrators listed in Newfoundland and Labrador. The majority are in St. John’s. Outside the capital the numbers thin out quickly: one in Gander, one in Grand Falls-Windsor, one in Corner Brook.
That is a thin market for a province with the population, geography, and complexity of Newfoundland and Labrador. It means that a business owner with a partnership dispute, or a nonprofit board chair trying to navigate a governance conflict, often has a hard time figuring out who to call. Most end up with three options: drive to St. John’s, hire lawyers and hope the matter does not end up in court, or leave the conflict unresolved.
None of those are good options for most situations. The first is expensive and inconvenient. The second is slow and tends to damage relationships. The third quietly costs organisations more than any of the alternatives.
I am not claiming to be the only neutral in this province, or the only one outside St. John’s. I am saying that the people who need this kind of help deserve to be able to find it, and deserve to find someone whose background actually fits the disputes they are in.
Why an accountant starts a dispute resolution practice
Most people who end up in this field come from law or human resources. I come from neither. My background is 15 years of accounting, financial systems, and business operations, and over 20 years of nonprofit governance and community leadership work that started with those early audits in the GTA. That sounds like a detour into dispute resolution. It is not.
The disputes I see over and over again are not really disagreements about personalities or values. They are disagreements about money, authority, and decisions that were never properly made, and almost all of them have a spreadsheet, a bylaw, or a bank account somewhere underneath them. A good neutral in these cases does not just manage the conversation. They read the documents. They ask the financial questions other people miss. They can tell when the story the parties are telling themselves does not quite match what the books actually say.
That is the work I have been doing since my first audit. Just under a different title.
My background also includes nonprofit governance in a serious way. It started with those early audits of nonprofits and co-operative housing in the GTA, and it continues today: I am currently Treasurer of the North Atlantic Aviation Museum, Treasurer of Gander Grow Co., and President of the Rotary Club of Gander. I have sat through more board disputes, grant compliance arguments, and governance gaps than I could count, and I have watched the same pattern emerge on both sides of the country: most nonprofit board conflicts are not really about the thing being argued about. They are about a policy that was never written, a role that was never scoped, or a bylaw nobody has read in years. A mediation that names the gap is usually worth more than one that just tries to get people to agree.
What Breakwater Resolution does now
The practice offers four services today.
- Commissioner for Oaths. I am authorised in Newfoundland and Labrador to administer oaths and take affidavits and statutory declarations. For law firms, individuals, and small businesses in Central NL who need documents sworn.
- Negotiation advisory. I help one party prepare for and conduct a negotiation they need to have. Strategy, positioning, and real-time support during contract, partnership, or compensation conversations.
- Conciliation. A more active dispute resolution process where I meet with both parties, review the full picture, and propose terms of settlement based on a professional assessment. Well suited to commercial disputes where the parties want direction, not just a conversation.
- Mediation. The classic process. I sit in the room with both parties and help them find their own way forward. Confidential, voluntary, and designed to preserve relationships wherever possible.
Arbitration, workplace investigation, and forensic accounting advisory will follow through 2027 as the relevant credentials are completed. Everything the practice offers today is available without those designations, because negotiation, conciliation, and mediation are unregulated in Canada, and the Commissioner for Oaths role is granted by the province.
What the practice will not do
This part matters as much as the services do.
Breakwater Resolution is independent, which means it is built on hard boundaries. I will never take a case where I have a conflict of interest, regardless of how remote. I will never promise a specific outcome, because mediation is voluntary and depends on the parties. I will not take a case where my existing professional relationships create a conflict of interest, and I will not take a case that would push me outside my current scope or capability. When that happens, I will say so and refer you to someone better placed.
These are not marketing points. They are the reason the work is credible at all. A neutral without clear boundaries is not neutral.
The next step, if this sounds like your situation
If you are a business owner dealing with a partnership dispute, a board member navigating a governance issue, a lawyer looking for a local referral, or an HR professional trying to figure out whether a situation calls for mediation or something else, the first conversation is a thirty-minute no-cost suitability call.
The goal of that call is simple. We will talk through the situation, figure out whether ADR is a good fit, and check for any conflicts of interest on my end. At the end of the call I will tell you honestly whether I am the right neutral for the matter. If I am not, I will recommend someone who is.
DISPUTE RESOLUTION. BUILT TO HOLD.