Meet Hans Kohler | Conflict Resolution Specialist

We had the good fortune of connecting with Hans Kohler and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Hans, we’d love for you to start things off by telling us something about your industry that we and others not in the industry might be unaware of?
My industry is very unknown, and many have no idea what Conflict Resolution is, even though they know in some ways they need it. Something others usually are not aware of is that Conflict Resolution is also a predictive behavior, in which there are ways that I learned how to predict if a conflict will happen and how to prevent it. Understanding about conflict resolution is not a skill that many of us have learnt growing up, and many times when I am working with clients they feel “weird or uncomfortable” with some strategies that we discuss, which is completely normal because it is not something they probably have done before. Furthermore, conflict is part of our lives and many get very unwilling to accept it, and they usually want me to help them “not to have conflicts in their lives anymore”, which is impossible. I help them to learn how to deal with conflicts constructively, thus conflict resolution not conflict elimination.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
A great challenge that I faced was not being aware of how to structure my finances when I went from being a W2 into a company owner. It is something that I need a lot of help from my CPA to make my finances more conducive to my business, how to structure taxes and all. Many of us are not financially educated, which makes our finances “messy” or makes us lose so much money when we do not necessarily need it to.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
Los Angeles is a great city, and I would bring them to the incredible restaurants that we have. I would say that my itinerary would be around restaurants to visit. Some of the places I would being them would be Elephant, Republique, Bestia, and Urth Cafe in West Hollywood.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
I do have to say thanks for my program director at Columbia University Dr. Beth Fisher-Yoshida. She was an incredible force to teach me how to better focus on Conflict Resolution as a life changing integration. Further, someone else that has encouraged me was my former colleague from the United Nations Lara Khalife-Dagher, which was an incredible supporter of my skills, and a great mentor.

Website: http://www.hanskohler.org/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hanskohlerr/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hans-kohler/