In this personal narrative, Doug Noll explains his shift from a 22‑year career as a trial lawyer to a full‑time professional peacemaker. He recounts a pivotal moment on a river trip when he realized that, despite decades of legal work, he had helped only a handful of people truly improve their lives. Seeking greater impact, he enrolled in a two‑to‑two‑and‑a‑half‑year master’s program run by a Mennonite peace church, which equipped him with tools for civil, respectful conflict resolution. After completing the program, he left his senior partnership at a major law firm to launch his own peacemaking practice, now assisting more individuals each month than he did in his entire legal career. Noll also emphasizes his passion for teaching peacemaking principles, offering workshops and speaking engagements to help others become ethical leaders and resolve conflicts gracefully. He concludes by inviting listeners to consider his services for individuals, clients, or organizations.
Chapters
I'm Doug Noll and my passion is peacemaking. I love to help people gently and gracefully respond to their conflicts in a civil, respectful way and come out with peace at the other end. It's not easy work. People come into these conflicts with hate, with frustration, with low self-esteem, with deep senses of betrayal. Sometimes they're so angry they can't even stand to be in the room with each other. Sometimes they're so angry that there's been violence. And yet what I found over the years is an ability to bring forth a lot of tools to help people come together to figure out exactly what it is they want in their own personal lives and how they want to relate to the people they're in conflict with. And then from there help them negotiate solutions that are lasting and beneficial for everyone concerned. It's wonderful work. Didn't used to be that way. I used to be a trial lawyer. In fact, I was a trial lawyer for 22 years. And then after a trial one time, I went on a river trip and spent the week thinking about how many people I had served. You know, at the end of the week, I could only count 6, 7, 8, maybe 9 people at the most that I felt had come into the system better than going out. And I said, you know, I don't want to do this because after 30 years, I don't want to have only helped 20 people. 20 people. So when I got home, I heard about a new master's degree program being offered at a local college which happened to be run by the Mennonites, a local peace church. I didn't know anything about the Mennonites. I was not a Mennonite myself. I walked in, talked to them. They knew about me. Quite surprised to see an aggressive trial lawyer like myself talking about peacemaking, but they were willing to take me on. And they trained me for 2 years, 2 and a half years. At the end of that time, I left a successful practice where I was a senior partner in a major firm. And I opened my own professional peacemaking practice. And since that time, each month I help more people— each month— than I helped totally in 22 years as a trial lawyer. So it's incredible work. My other passion is teaching and talking about peacemaking. And I love to get up in front of groups and share the stories of transformation that I've witnessed both in myself and with the people that I've worked with. And also give people the tools that they can take home with them to become better leaders, to become more ethical, and to resolve conflicts in a transformative, graceful, gentle way. I love service, and if I can be of service to you, your clients, or your organization, I hope you'll consider giving me a call and let's talk about it.
