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Too often, being impartial is confused with being non-judgmental. I can remember thinking that being impartial was about not being biased, and that if I was biased I had to learn how not to be. But there is a huge difference between providing a service that is seen to be unbiased, and being a human being who does not make judgments.

When you deal with the public on a regular basis, you encounter a wide variety of people, races, attitudes, ages, professions, pets (I handled my first snake at a mediation visit) and, of course, smells. As children, we may have embarrassed our parents when visiting a relative by openly declaring how smelly the house was but, as we get older, we learn not to say such things. But we don't learn not to think them.

We all have prejudices, and we all make judgments about people. But if we are to appear not to have them – so that people have more faith in our service or trust us to work fairly on their behalf – we must learn how to put our judgments to one side before we then act with impartiality.

The smallest reaction from us can severely affect the way we are perceived. In mediation, our biggest danger occurs when we are asked, and we often are, if we could live next door to someone who made that much noise. If we are being perfectly honest, and perhaps mistakenly thinking that an honest answer will help build rapport, we might easily agree or disagree. But it is not unheard of for the client to then tell their neighbour that "even the mediator said he couldn't live next door to you" and bang, your impartiality bubble bursts. So, what should you say?

If we are to act impartially with clients, we must understand our own prejudices. To do this, we must have a safe and supportive environment in which these can be voiced

If we are to act impartially when dealing with clients, we must first understand our own prejudices. In order to do this, we must have a safe and supportive environment in which these can be voiced and explored. It is only after this that we can begin to put these judgments to one side and act impartially.

In many of the organisations I visit, I carry out a conflict audit. This explores experiences and attitudes towards disputes in the workplace and analyses where the worst problems lie. One of the questions on this is about how aware people are of their prejudices – their answer could range from being completely aware to being aware that you can always learn more about them.

One exercise I do is to ask people to list the types of people that they can find either unpleasant or difficult to deal with. The answers given are the sort that you might expect – loud people, angry people, rude or smelly people. But at one session in a local authority earlier this year, I started to prompt people to give answers that they might be fearful to admit to. For example, people rarely admit that they find it difficult dealing with people whose first language is not the same as theirs, because the language barrier can lead to misunderstandings and such interactions can take much longer than usual. Admitting that does not make you a bigot – but failing to understand, accept and deal with it might.

One woman admitted that she found it difficult to deal with dwarves. The reason she gave certainly was not malicious, but was honest, simple and understood by everyone there. But did I agree or disagree with her?