Arbitration and ADR Specialist Course
Program director:
Urquiola de Palacio del Valle de Lersundi
Campus:
Madrid
Date:
February 2026
LANGUAGE:
Spanish
Conflict resolution is not an end, it is the art of building solutions.
ISDE’s Specialist Course in Arbitration and ADR is designed to educate the professionals who will lead the evolution of dispute resolution, both nationally and internationally. This program prepares you to master the most advanced techniques in arbitration, mediation, and negotiation, as well as alternative dispute resolution (ADR) mechanisms, which have become essential tools for companies, institutions, and individuals.
With a strongly hands-on approach and a faculty composed of practicing arbitrators, mediators, and lawyers from leading arbitration institutions and specialized law firms, you will acquire the skills needed to manage commercial, corporate, employment, and consumer disputes—from drafting arbitration clauses to conducting proceedings and enforcing awards. In addition, the program covers highly topical issues such as international arbitration, dispute resolution in the digital sphere, and the use of technologies such as artificial intelligence in conflict management. Are you ready to become the expert that companies, law firms, and organizations need to resolve disputes with efficiency, speed, and legal certainty?
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Introduction and objectives
The importance of arbitration and ADR should not be explained to a lawyer with experience in business law. Neither is the need to prepare for these ways of resolving conflicts, at the height of the importance of the issues that are decided with them.
Whether to exercise with due competence the functions of a commercial or litigation and arbitration department, within business law, or to perform the work of arbitrator, after a well-earned reputation in the practice of this law, it is necessary that training that allows a lawyer to defend in the best way the interests of his client or find the fairest solution, by the most efficient means.
The arbitration and ADR specialist course adds the knowledge and experience of ISDE, the Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Arbitration Court of Madrid. Taught by professionals with proven experience and with a methodology that makes it compatible with professional practice, it is the right program for anyone who wants to acquire this kind of training.
Sponsor
Structure, location and calendar
5 hours of classes in face-to-face or streaming format, on Friday afternoons (Spanish time).
On Mondays, students will be provided with videos and study material, both to prepare for Friday classes and to delve into the previously discussed subjects. Interventions by international experts, who participate in the program from outside Madrid, will also take place on Mondays.
Students will have to carry out an end-of-diploma project (TFD), in addition to the oral and written defense of a practical case.
Students who so wish may also do internships for a period of between 3 and 6 months.
Career Opportunities
Law firms:
- Lawyers practicing in Spain and Latin America (especially from Litigation or Commercial Departments).
- Practicing lawyers from Departments other than Litigation or Commercial who want to reorient their career to Commercial and Arbitration.
- Experienced lawyers who want to practice as arbitrators.
Company legal departments:
- Directors of company legal departments.
ACADEMIC PROGRAM
Block 1: Arbitration
- Introduction to arbitration.
- The arbitration agreement.
- The referees.
- The arbitration procedure.
- The decision.
- International Arbitration – International Business Law (in English).
Block 2: ADR
- Negotiation – Harvard Method.
- Mediation.
- Conciliation.
- Dispute Boards.
- Confidential binding offer.
- Collaborative law.
- Hybrid methods.
Block 3: Conflict resolution in practice
- Practical Cases: faced with the same controversy, students will have to simulate the resolution of a dispute using all the resolution methods studied in Blocks 1 and 2.
- Final work preparatory sessions
Soft skills:
- Legal research and writing
- Oratory and argumentation
- Legal English Workshop
FACULTY
- Urquiola de Palacio del Valle de Lersundi
- Palacio & Associates
- Elena Gutiérrez García de Cortázar
- MCG Arbitration
- Rodrigo Jijón (Ecuador)
- Pérez, Bustamante y Ponce
- Marta Lalaguna Holzwarth
- CAM
- Nicolás Martín de Vidales
- Avest Abogados
- María José Menéndez
- Ashurst
- Félix J. Montero
- Pérez-Llorca
- Dámaso Riaño
- General Counsel & Head of Institutional Relations
- Sixto Sánchez Lorenzo
- University of Granada
- Marianella Ventura (Peru)
- Lima Chamber of Commerce
ACCREDITED DEGREE
Once the relevant Program has concluded and ISDE has verified that the STUDENT has completed their work satisfactorily, the STUDENT will receive the corresponding Degree certificate for each PROGRAM.
In compliance with current legality and, specifically, as set forth in article 4.4 of decree 84/2004, it is noted that ISDE’s programs are professionally oriented and therefore, unless explicitly stated otherwise, they are courses that do not lead to the acquisition of a title with official value, but to that of a proprietary title from ISDE.