The Collaborative Process provides a safe and supportive environment where you and your ex-partner/spouse work together with your lawyers in a series of joint meetings (“team meetings”) to resolve your legal issues without court intervention.

To help you stay focused, efficient and productive in team meetings, you are assisted by an interdisciplinary professional team. Collaborative professionals are trained to keep separation negotiations on track and focused on what really matters to each of you. You negotiate your separation agreement with real-time legal advice.

The Collaborative Process avoids the adversarial nature of the litigation process by giving control to you instead of a judge.

Once you have chosen the Collaborative Process, these are the basic steps you will follow. Most of the work will happen in a series of meeting with your spouse and your professional team.

1. Choose Collaborative and Build Your Team!

You and your spouse choose and agree to use the Collaborative Process. This often starts with one or both of you discussing your process options with a collaborative professional – this could be a Collaborative Lawyer, a Collaborative Family Professional or a Collaborative Financial Professional. From there you build the rest of your team. The team members arrange a first meeting where you and your spouse will sign a contract called a “Collaborative Participation Agreement”. Now your Collaborative Process has officially started!

2. Set Goals

Couples who use the Collaborative Process are generally very satisfied as they move into the next phase of their lives. The process works because it begins with determining what really matters to you. The team helps you and your spouse uncover and articulate your underlying goals. While the law is important (and this is why lawyers are involved), most people have concerns that go beyond what the law can address. Where do you want to be in 2 years, or in 10 years? What type of relationship do you want to have with your children and / or with your ex-spouse? What are your career goals or retirement plans? What are your hopes for your family pet? Do you want to continue to live in the same community? These questions might matter deeply to you, but may not be legally “relevant”. In the Collaborative Process there is room to discuss all of these issues. Your individual and common goals will establish the values and benchmarks for planning the next chapter of your family’s journey.

3. Gather Information

You and your spouse need a solid understanding of the family’s financial realities as well as having sound legal advice before you can make decisions. The professional team will support you to put all the relevant information on the table in a transparent manner and to ensure that you and your spouse have everything you need to make informed decisions. The lawyers will explain and educate you about the legal implications for your family. You may also look at household budgets and examine other financial issues like qualifying for a new mortgage or valuing family assets. The professional team keeps the process on track by helping you determine what information you need and how you will get it, so you can move efficiently through the process.

4. Generate Options

Together, with the help of the professional team, you and your spouse brainstorm solutions to address your goals. At this stage in the process, no idea is a “bad” idea – we can be creative and think outside the box. If the legal framework doesn’t provide the best solution for your family, you can safely come up with creative or even unorthodox options. Ultimately, an agreement you both craft together will be one that will endure. The best ideas come from non-judgmental brainstorming allowing you to customize solutions to your family’s needs.

5. Evaluate and Select Best Options for Your Family

With the support of your professional team, you and your spouse will determine which options best address the goals that you each articulated at the outset of the process. Will an option support you in your goal of making a career change? Will an option allow both of you to afford a home in the children’s school area? It is much easier to agree on a solution if you first identify and understand your goals, and are not just trying to “win” or get the bigger piece of the pie. Your professional team will help you weigh the pros and cons and prompt you to think about any legal, financial or interpersonal implications you might not have thought of, to ensure that options you choose are lasting and workable.

6. Finalize Your Separation Agreement

Once you have selected the best options for resolution and have agreed on how to move forward, your lawyers will draft the Separation Agreement. Before you sign, you will have an opportunity to get all your questions answered. Chances are, however, that because you and your lawyer were in the room when the solutions were determined, there won’t be any surprises in the Separation Agreement.