CDTT Inc. COLLABORATIVE PRACTICE
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What is Collaborative Practice?
  • General Overview
  • Training Opportunities
  • Collaborative Practice & Mediation
  • New Roles of Professionals
  • Steps in Collaborative Practice
  • Advantages of Collaborative Practice
    •     - Two Approaches to Decision Making
        - Collaborative Practice and Litigation
  • Development of Collaborative Practice
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    Advantages of Collaborative Practice for Clients

    For Clients and Their Families

    Prior to the development of Collaborative Practice:
    • Clients saw family lawyers as more adversarial in their thinking and behavior than the clients needed or wanted. Family lawyers were seen as over-litigators who exacerbate family stress rather than calming it, resulting in a high emotional and financial cost to the clients. 1

    • Clients believed that family lawyers ignore, and often do irreparable harm to, the non-quantifiable human concerns in their lives. These concerns have far greater impact on the quality of clients' lives long after the legal divorce is over. 2

    • Fee disputes and malpractice suits commonly arose, as family law clients tended to be unhappy with the results their lawyers achieved in the court process. 3

    However, since the development of Collaborative Practice:
    • Clients engaged in effective Interest-Based dialogue can reach settlement at a much earlier stage in the Collaborative Practice Process. The Process positively manages conflict and elicits creative solutions from the clients. Thus, it results in more of the client's needs being met and increased satisfaction with the outcome and quite often with their lawyer's role in the process as well.

    • Any imbalances in negotiating abilities between the clients can be balanced by the direct participation of the lawyers involved, as the lawyers are attentive to the needs and issues of both clients. This keeps the clients connected to the process.
    • Clients have a more respectful divorce and develop more effective communication skills with their former spouse by actively participating in determining the ultimate outcome of the Process.
    1. Pauline H. Tesler, "Collaborative Practice: What It Is and Why Family Practice Attorneys Need to Know About It," 13 American Journal of Family Practice 215 at 216 [hereinafter Tesler].
    2. Ibid. at 217.
    3. Ibid. at 219.
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