It looked as if the day had been wasted. But the mediator asked the would-be payer to keep his final offer open until the end of the week. Late on Friday afternoon, the potential payee backed down and accepted the deal — as I had guessed he would. The alternative would have been costly and time-consuming litigation. Both sides simply wanted to move on.

Although anybody — even a journalist — can set up shop as a mediator, the process depends hugely on the skills of the person conveying offers from one side to the other. It helps if the mediator is familiar with the area of business in dispute, if only so that he or she can follow the jargon and predict what a court might do. 

Sometimes, what's needed is the skill of a diplomat. And that is why nine former British ambassadors have recently trained as mediators with the ADR Group, one of the bodies that specialise in dispute resolution. I trained alongside them, and very good they were at playing the roles of awkward trading partner and emollient mediator.

Sir Stephen Brown, a former High Commissioner in Singapore and co-chairman of ADRg Ambassadors, tells me that the ability to negotiate settlements is one of the principal skills that one acquires in a diplomatic career of 30 years or more. British diplomats are often called in to resolve disputes between the host government and a UK-based business.

"One of the definitions of a diplomat is that he builds ladders for other people to climb down," Sir Stephen says. He recalls a problem that arose in China when the central government unexpectedly changed its tax laws, rendering a newly-constructed British factory unviable. "We influenced the Chinese into thinking that it was in their long-term interest to find a solution."

Having resolved the dispute in a way that allowed both sides to feel they had emerged victorious, he now relishes the prospect of using his newly-honed skills to find common ground in unfamiliar places.