“Alone we can do so little; together we can
do so much.”

- Helen Keller

Benefits of Collaborative Family Law

Collaborative Family Law focuses on all involved parties reaching a mutually acceptable resolution of their issues. The process results in valuable benefits for the clients and for their children, friends and extended families.

When you choose collaborative lawyers to help you through a separation or divorce, we focus on you reaching a mutually acceptable resolution of all of the issues. The Collaborative process creates a cooperative environment where communication opens, where both spouses can envision the results of “good divorce” between them. If you are parents, we first focus on parenting philosophies and the kind of young adults you would like your children to grow up to be. With a positive restructuring of your family in mind, the next step taken is to gather all of the information both spouses need to make good and informed decisions. The collaborative professionals provide a setting where you can work with one another to create the best possible life for your children and for yourselves.
The Collaborative process builds what feels like a team advocating for a positive future instead of two opposing sides arming for an adversarial battle. Your lawyer supports you; your spouse's lawyer supports your spouse. With everyone working toward that shared goal of a “good divorce”, you keep control of the creatively tailored outcome your family deserves.
If an expert opinion is needed or if a coach, child specialist or financial specialist would help, you can jointly hire one independent professional, shortening the time needed to have information necessary to reach a decision and reducing the overall expense.
Once both of you have all of the information you need to made sound and reasoned decisions, the collaborative attorneys work with you to shape the agreements together. If the decisions have to do with parenting issues, working together reduces the parental conflict the adversarial system can generate and helps protect children from having their loyalties divided.
In the Collaborative process, you can schedule meetings without waiting for court dates. You generally spend less time and, as a result, less money to reach closure.
The family’s issues stay within the Collaborative setting, giving everyone more privacy, greater confidentiality and less stress during an already stressful time.
Because both of you are represented by attorneys, the separation agreement and the judgment roll documents can be prepared by the same attorneys involved in the settlement process.