Frequently Asked Questions

1.  What is Collaborative Practice?

Collaborative Practice is an out-of-court family law process for divorcing and separating couples who work with their lawyers and other family professionals to achieve a settlement that best meets the needs of both parties and their children. Because there are no court appearances involved, a Collaborative divorce is usually less expensive than the traditional approach.

The parties must sign a contract at the beginning of the process binding each other to the process and agreeing to the three guiding principles of collaborative practice:

• A pledge not to go to court
• An honest exchange of information by both spouses
• A solution that takes into account the highest priorities of both spouses and children.

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2.  What is the difference between Collaborative Practice and traditional divorce?

The major difference between Collaborative Practice and traditional divorce is the undertaking to reach an out-of-court agreement. Conventional divorces often become adversarial causing additional distress to all the participants, most notably the children.

In a Collaborative divorce, the separating parties meet with their lawyers, and any other professionals they may choose to involve, in a series of meetings to work out an agreement. The Collaborative approach gives separating couples the opportunity to create child support and parenting agreements without having to wait months or years for a court ruling.

The cooperative nature of Collaborative Practice can relieve the emotional strain caused by the break-up of a relationship significantly. If either party decides to leave the Collaborative process and go to court, then both Collaborative lawyers are required to resign from the case. This agreement ensures that everyone works hard at achieving a settlement acceptable to both spouses.

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3.  What are the benefits of Collaborative Practice divorce?

• The separating couples, assisted by Collaborative professionals, make their own agreements rather than giving control to the court. This provides the opportunity for creative problem-solving, resulting in richer, more satisfying agreements.
• The issues are resolved sooner and often less expensively than the traditional court approach.
• The couple and their family have the opportunity to benefit from the expertise of neutral professionals, including family, child and financial specialists.
• Over the long term, the parties are more likely to comply with an agreement that is reached through mutual problem-solving.
• Spouses really craft their own solution, rather than have a stranger (a judge or arbitrator) decide for them.
• Because sessions are held in private, details are out of the public record.

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4.  How does Collaborative Practice actually work?

Each party hires a Collaboratively trained lawyer and decides if additional Collaborative experts, such as coaches, child experts or financial specialists, are needed to join the process. The spouses and their chosen professionals sign a Participation Agreement undertaking to act in good faith, disclose all relevant information, put the children's needs first, and look for mutually acceptable solutions. Negotiations take place in a series of settlement meetings where information is exchanged and an array of options considered. Mutual problem-solving by all the parties leads to the final divorce agreement.

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5.  What types of family law issues can be resolved using the collaborative process?

All family law issues can benefit from the collaborative process, including:

• parenting arrangements,
• spousal and child support,
• the valuation of a business and other assets,
• division of property and the family home
• pre- and post-marital contracts.

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6.  What other professionals might be involved besides lawyers?

Specially trained divorce coaches who work with individual parties, or neutral family, child specialists, and financial specialists are available as resources to help the spouses manage their emotions, meet the needs of any children, and develop workable property division and support arrangements.

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7.  What is the history of Collaborative Practice?

"Collaborative Family Law" was created in 1990 by Stuart Webb, a Minnesota lawyer who had many years of courtroom experience using the adversarial divorce model and who saw that traditional litigation was not always helpful to parties and their families. The collaborative approach has spread rapidly to every major city in Canada and the U.S. and to Europe and Australia.

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© Sheila Kirsh