Repair

Most organizational repair is transactional: apology issued, acknowledgment given, move on. Restorative practice suggests this usually fails because it skips the most important step. The person who was harmed has not had the chance to say what they need to say. The person who caused harm has not had to genuinely understand the impact. Repair is a conversation, not a transaction.

Howard Zehr, often considered the grandfather of restorative justice, frames the key questions this way: who has been harmed, and what are their needs? Who has obligations to address those needs? How do we engage all of those people in creating a path forward? Notice what is missing: punishment, assignment of blame, and determination of who was right. Those belong to a different framework.

This month’s move: The three restorative questions. Repair is not a daily event, so this rep is lighter-touch. Once a day, notice one piece of unfinished business you are carrying with someone, and ask yourself the three questions: what happened, what was the impact, what would make this right. Most days this is reflection. At least once this month, take one real step toward an actual repair.

Recognition cue: You feel slightly different with someone and can trace it to a specific moment that was never addressed. That is unfinished repair business.

Write one line on your log each day you run it.

The reflection rep works fully alone. For the circle practice, you cannot run a solo circle, so instead write the three questions about one real rupture and, if the other person is willing, ask them for a short conversation using the Repair Prep Sheet.

Meeting hook for this month: Use five minutes to ask: is there any unfinished repair business from the past quarter that we should name before moving on? Do not force it. Just open the space. This is the lint filter doing its deepest work.

Most organizational repair asks: what rule was broken and what is the consequence?
Restorative practice asks three different questions:

• What happened and who was affected? Not who is to blame. What occurred, and what did it cost in trust, relationship, confidence, belonging.
• What does the affected person need? Not: What should happen to the person who caused harm.
• What would make this right? Not what is the standard consequence. What repair would restore the relationship?

These questions shift the conversation from retributive to relational. The goal is not punishment. It is repair.

A structure for conversations that need more space than a normal meeting provides.

Setup: Arrange seating so everyone faces each other. Choose a talking piece, any small object that passes around the circle. Only the person holding it speaks.

Open: Name the purpose. “We are here to…”

Opening round: Each person answers one question in turn, uninterrupted. No cross-talk.

Core rounds: The talking piece passes around for each question or topic.

Closing round: Each person completes a sentence such as “I am leaving with…”

What the structure does: slows the conversation down, ensures every voice is heard, and prevents the loudest person from setting the agenda.

SCENARIO 1
A team member made a decision affecting others without consulting them. Two months later, colleagues are still carrying it. Using the three questions: who was affected? What did it cost? What would repair look like, not an apology but something specific that restores trust?

SCENARIO 2
Your team has come through a difficult period where trust eroded. Run a short circle. Opening question: what have you been carrying since that period that you have not said? Then: what do you need from this team going forward?

SCENARIO 3
You need to repair something with a specific person. A small rupture that has been sitting between you. Using the prep sheet: what happened? What do you think it cost them? What do you need to acknowledge? What are you asking for going forward?

Media for this Month
Required before the live session: Zehr’s own summary. The rest is optional.

1. WATCH Shannon Sliva: How Restorative Justice Could End Mass Incarceration The core principles and why they apply far beyond criminal contexts
2. WATCH Dan Reisel: The Neuroscience of Restorative Justice TED Talk
3. LISTEN Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris: Why We’re All Suffering from Racial Trauma (Even White People) — Resmaa Menakem Therapist and trauma specialist Resmaa Menakem on how racialized and generational trauma lives in the body, and the somatic practices that make repair cellular rather than just conversational. Free transcript.
4. ARTICLE Discipline With Dignity: Oakland Classrooms Try Healing Instead of Punishment (Fania Davis, YES! Magazine) Fania Davis, founder of Restorative Justice for Oakland Youth, shows what restorative practice looks like in an organizational setting. The circle, the talking piece, the three questions, all present in a real situation where punitive response would have caused more harm.
5. ARTICLE The Radical Work of Healing: Fania and Angela Davis on a New Kind of Civil Rights Activism (YES! Magazine) Fania Davis on moving from civil rights law to restorative practice, and the Indigenous and African roots of restorative justice that Zehr drew from.
6. REQUIRED · ARTICLE Howard Zehr's Restorative Justice Threes (restorativejustice.org) Zehr's own summary of the core framework: three assumptions, three principles, three stakeholder groups. Read this before anything else on restorative justice
7. ARTICLE The Serviceberry: An Economy of Abundance (Robin Wall Kimmerer, Emergence Magazine) Kimmerer on reciprocity, gift economies, and the relational ethic that underlies Indigenous circle practice. The essay that connects repair to a deeper frame of how relationship is maintained over time
8. OPTIONAL | BUY THE BOOK The Little Book of Restorative Justice (Howard Zehr)
9. OPTIONAL | BUY THE BOOK The Little Book of Circle Processes (Kay Pranis)

Total time for required media this month: approximately 2 hour 10 minutes. The Menakem episode is the longest item at 75 minutes and deserves unhurried listening.

Week 1: Think of a time when you were harmed by something a colleague did or said. What would genuine repair have looked like? Did it happen?

Week 2: Think of a time when you caused harm, even unintentionally. Did you repair it? If not, what got in the way?

Week 3: What is the difference between an apology and repair in your experience? When have you offered or received one that felt complete?

Week 4: Apply the 5 Whys to a piece of unfinished repair business: why has it not been addressed? And why that? Keep going.

Discussion questions for pairs or the full group:

• What did the circle practice surface that does not usually get said?
• Why does it not usually get said?
• What is the difference between “I’m sorry you felt that way” and a genuine acknowledgment of harm?
• Have you been on either end?
• Zehr argues the key questions are about needs and obligations, not blame. What would change in how your team handles mistakes if you used those questions instead?
• Is there unfinished repair business on this team right now?
• What would it take to name it?

Before the next session, check in with yourself:

• Did I take at least one step toward a piece of unfinished repair business this month?
• Did I use the restorative formula at least once?
• Can I distinguish between an apology and genuine repair?

• The circle requires careful setup.
• Establish the container explicitly: what is said in the circle stays in the circle, no one is required to share what they are not ready to, the goal is understanding rather than resolution.
• Use an anonymized situation, not a live one.
• Give each of the three questions its own round before moving on.
• After the circle, ask what surprised people.
• Debrief the experience of the process, not the content.
• Watch for people who skip to solutions before the impact is heard (return to the second question), people who minimize their own harm (“it was not a big deal” often means “I have carried it for months”), and emotion that surfaces unexpectedly (slow down, use STOP, do not rush past it).
• Month 4 sometimes surfaces things that need more than this curriculum can hold.
• Have a plan for what you will do if that happens.
• Know in advance who you would call.
• If a client flags the co-billed Davis conversation in the media list, substitute Fania Davis's book The Little Book of Race and Restorative Justice; the Oakland classrooms article in this month covers the same ground.