Video: What is Collaborative Divorce? by Cypress Collaborative
Collaborative divorce starts out with a pledge by both spouses: We will not fight one another in court. Each spouse hires his and her own attorney, and the two attorneys and two clients sign a participation agreement formalizing the pledge not to fight one another. The attorneys are then barred from filing any contested legal pleadings or appearing in any contested hearings on behalf of the clients.
In the most common collaborative divorce model that we use in Tampa Bay, a neutral facilitator, who generally has a mental health background, is retained to help the clients focus on the future and the issues (such as parenting) that are most important to them rather than the arguments of the past. Additionally, a financial professional is retained to cost-effectively ensure that each has retained sufficient financial disclosure (i.e., trust but verify) and to help them development financial options that are tailored to their family.
Cypress collaborative, a group of experienced collaborative professionals in Washington State, have put together a fantastic video that further explains the collaborative process. You can see the video after the jump.