Divorce court here in Florida is a terrible way to resolve disputes. Divorce litigation is an adversarial proceeding where husband is pitted against wife, mother is pitted against father.
And it is the children who end up suffering the most.
But don’t take my word for it. Tampa psychologist Stephanie Moulton Sarkis writes about the consequences of high conflict divorce on children:
Tampa attorney Adam B. Cordover lead a workshop at the 17th Annual Educational and Networking Forum of the International Academy of Collaborative Professionals (“IACP”). The Forum took place in Lake Las Vegas, Nevada, and was attended by hundreds of attorneys, mental health professionals, financial professionals, mediators, and other supportive of helping families resolve disputes respectfully and privately via the collaborative process.
Cordover lead the workshop alongside Barrie, Ontario lawyer Brian Galbraith and Seattle, Washington attorney Kevin Scudder. The program was called “Collaborative Multiverse,” and the idea was to lead a townhall-style debate and discussion among experienced collaborative practitioners on issues affecting collaborative practice.
Brian Galbraith, Adam B. Cordover, and Kevin Scudder at the 17th Annual IACP Forum (2016)
One topic that was discussed was determining the best collaborative model to use for each particular family. Different parts of the world predominantly use different arrangements of professionals to resolve divorce and other issues. In Florida, the main model that is used is known as the Neutral Facilitator model, where each party has an attorney, a neutral facilitator with a mental health licensure helps with parenting issues and ensures discussions are future-focused, and a neutral financial professional aids in creating family budgets and ensures financial transparency and disclosure.
One of the great things about collaborative law is that families are not handcuffed by the over-scheduled dockets of judges, nor are they bound by the confines of the overcrowded courthouse. This provides families and professionals with a lot of freedom on how, when, and where they make long-lasting decisions and resolve disputes.
Still, it can sometimes be daunting to organize meetings around the busy lives of spouses and practitioners. Here are four tools to help communication in collaborative cases, and the best part is that do not cost a dime.
One of the toughest initial tasks of any collaborative divorce case is to find a time that works for all of the professionals to plan out how to best help out the family. Similarly, carving a time that also works for both spouses for the first full team meeting adds two more calendars to consider.
Fortunately, Doodle provides an easy and free way to help coordinate schedules. Simply go to their website, provide some basic information such as title for the event, location, description, your name, and your e-mail address, and then fill out a grid for all of the proposed dates and times of your meeting. Next, provide the e-mail addresses of the people with whom you need to schedule, and Doodle will send out a message inviting everyone to fill out the grid. Every time someone responds, you will get a notification, and Doodle will indicate the date(s) and time(s) that works best for everyone. If no time and date works for everyone, simply create another Doodle.
I have found that in person meetings are generally the best way to communicate in collaborative cases. However, in person meetings are not always possible, and sometimes they are not desirable.
In May 2016, Tampa hosted the 4th Annual Conference of the Florida Academy of Collaborative Professionals. The conference ended up being the largest gathering of collaboratively-trained attorneys, mental health professionals, and financial professionals in the organization’s history.
You can find a video of highlights of the conference after the jump.
The World of Collaborative Practice Magazine is an online forum for collaborative professionals to write about news as well as the latest trends in collaborative practice. On September 15, 2016, the Magazine published the transcript of an iHeart radio interview from here in Tampa of a father discussing his collaborative divorce. The father, “Claire,” appeared with his collaborative attorney Julia Best Chase, along with Family Diplomacy managing attorney Adam B. Cordover, who represented Clair’s wife.
You can find a portion of the article reproduced after the jump.
Collaborative family law is a process that can be tailored to your family’s specific needs. In all collaborative cases, issues related to divorce are discussed peacefully and respectfully in private conference rooms rather than confrontationally in public courtrooms. Each spouse has their own attorney – who focuses exclusively on helping his or her client reach an out-of-court agreement – on whom the spouse can rely to provide advice and guide them throughout.
Oftentimes, experts are brought into the collaborative process so that the clients can reach a comprehensive agreement that deals not only with legal issues, but also emotional and financial resolutions. Experts end up making the process much more efficient by being able to handle issues far more quickly than attorneys are able to.
One option that families may want to consider is whether to bring in a child specialist. The short video after the jump, produced by Cypress Collaborative Divorce, discusses the role of the child specialist.
On August 24, 2016, Family Diplomacy managing attorney Adam B. Cordover spoke in Jacksonville, Florida, on the topic of “Collaborative Divorce for the Middle Class.” The workshop was organized by the Collaborative Family Law Group of Northeast Florida.
Collaborative divorce is a process that is available to help families privately and respectfully reach agreements no matter their income level or size of their estate. Though it has been thought of as alternative dispute resolution for the rich (and it certainly is an effective method for handling complicated cases), more middle class families are learning that it is accessible for them, as well.
If both spouses can hire attorneys, then the question becomes not whether they can afford collaborative practice, but whether they can afford any billable hours being spent on anything other than trying to reach an out-of-court agreement.
More and more people are deciding that they want to avoid the traditional adversarial divorce court system and instead handle their family law matter privately and respectfully via the collaborative process. In collaborative divorce, each spouse receives independent legal advice from his or her own attorney, and the attorneys are retained solely for the purpose of reaching an out-of-court agreement. Oftentimes, experts will be brought in to help with parenting or financial issues.
As collaborative divorce is becoming more popular and since Florida Governor Rick Scott signed the Collaborative Law Process Act in March 2016, more attorneys who are steeped in the old system of divorce court are now advertising that they offer collaborative services. The issue is that the skillset needed to successfully help clients reach dignified agreements in collaborative practice is very different than the skillset needed to be an aggressive trial lawyer.
Below are four questions you should ask any attorney you are interviewing to possibly represent you in the collaborative divorce process.
Tampa real estate agent Rande Friedman was recently interviewed on the topic of collaborative divorce. Rande, of White Glove House, has lived in the Tampa Bay area for the past 30 years, and he has been in the real estate industry for around ten years.
Rande is also a member of Next Generation Divorce, one of the nation’s largest interdisciplinary collaborative practice groups with professionals helping families in Hillsborough, Pinellas, Pasco, Sarasota, and Manatee Counties. Rande became involved in Next Generation Divorce after he helped a family who used the collaborative process in their divorce. Rande found them in a better state of mind to agree upon their real estate needs and move on with their lives compared to clients who had litigated their divorce.
You can find a video and partial transcript of Rande Friedman discussing his experience with families transitioning via collaborative divorce after the jump:
Divorce is not just a legal challenge. It is also usually a financial challenge.
Unlike the traditional courtroom divorce, interdisciplinary collaborative divorce prepares clients to budget for the future and anticipate post-divorce life so that the challenges can be met.
Brian Pope of Divorce Financial Solutions is one of the premiere neutral financial professionals in the 12th Circuit of Florida (DeSoto, Manatee, and Sarasota Counties). Brian has an MBA and is designated as a Certified Divorce Financial Analyst. In fact, several years ago Brian and I worked together to bring Next Generation Divorce – Florida’s largest practice group of independent collaborative attorneys, mental health professionals, and financial professionals – into Manatee and Sarasota Counties.
You can find a brief interview of Brian and a discussion of his work in the collaborative process in the following video (after the jump):
