Who is Just Outcomes

Just Outcomes is a team of specialists in restorative justice, conflict transformation, community-building and organizational change.  Our work is grounded in an understanding of the importance of relationships in creating growth and change.  The core team is Aaron Lyons, Catherine Bargen and Matthew Hartman, who have a combined experience of over 50 years of working in this field.  Just Outcomes also draws on a larger team specializing in related areas such as trauma-informed care, community healing, diversity/equity/inclusion, transitional justice, multi-stakeholder negotiation, strategic peacebuilding, and law.  You can learn more about us at www.justoutcomesconsulting.com

What is restorative justice?

Restorative justice is an approach to addressing harm within community which recognizes our interconnectedness within a web of relationships. This approach is rooted within core principles including:

• Inclusion: justice is participatory and collaborative, rather than adversarial and hierarchical.
• Repair: justice is about building/rebuilding right relationships; restoring dignity and voice to those harmed; healing trauma; fostering individual and collective responsibility and accountability; making amends; restoring identity and meaning.
• Transformation: addressing root causes; building individual, collective and organizational resilience.

In short, restorative justice seeks to repair harm while building a community of trust. In service of these aims, a wide range of approaches can be employed which are developed and refined collaboratively, while informed by decades of experience and research.

Why is Just Outcomes involved?

In times of crisis, having an outside party facilitate collaborative, relational, and intentional processes that move to address the emergent needs of individuals and groups within the community can often be helpful. We bring a variety of experiences which we hope and believe will be valuable to your community. We are committed to being responsive to your unique needs and circumstances. A few points about how we see our role:

• Just Outcomes’ primary role is to facilitate a process by which this community can respond to the current crisis according to its expressed values and teachings.
• The design of the project is highly collaborative, with Just Outcomes playing a facilitative, supportive and advisory role to community members who are leading the work.
• The leadership of the Compassionate Reconciliation process will come from the CRC, which will be designed to the degree possible to represent all facets of the community (see explanation above).

What will the Compassionate Reconciliation Process look like

​Unlike other large-scale processes, restorative justice and conflict transformation do not follow a prescribed or pre-determined approach. Each individual and community has different needs with respect to its healing and growth. For us, being in service of healing and growth means taking the time necessary to build strategies and approaches that are based directly on the needs we are hearing expressed within the community. A commitment to responsiveness means that when we intervene in a crisis, our work is done in deep consultation and collaboration with those involved and impacted. With the support and guidance of our team, the shape of this process will be determined by the CRC and its Advisory Teams over the coming months.