What is a Collaborative Practice Agreement?
In a Collaborative Practice agreement, the desires of the parties participating in the negotiations are ascertained prior to the first combined meeting with their lawyers and with each other at the time of the early stages of the joint negotiation meetings.
It is quite common for parties to have the same wishes and goals, which are usually recorded on a whiteboard and which are visible throughout the negotiating process. James Noble Law is an expert firm in Australia that can help to prepare your Legitimate Collaborative Practise Agreement.
The wishes and goals for the Collaborative Practice Agreement normally are:
- A wish to reach a fair agreement with the other party;
- A wish to agree to a settlement that will provide financial security for not only the party but for the family;
- Not to involve the children in their conflict;
- A desire to do what is best for the children and the family;
- A wish to maintain as best as possible a friendship with the former partner, which will assist them to effectively co-parent the children in the future, and to be involved in the future lives of their children, such as attending on family occasions, weddings and to maintain a strong relationship with the grandchildren;
- A desire for both parties to maintain an association with their mutual friends and extended families;
- A wish to maintain the privacy of their affairs and the details of the problems they are facing from being aired publicly or becoming the subject of a public court record;
- A wish not to have some other people such as a judge make a decision for them and to manage and restructure their financial affairs or to determine future arrangements they will have with their children.
Consult Collaborative professionals
Collaborative professionals and family lawyers have extensive training and continuous training to work together and with their clients to reach an agreement that is fair and reasonable to all concerned.
Collaborative professionals are trained to listen deeply to the clients’ entire story on their first meeting with the client prior to any negotiations taking place to gain a clear understanding of the wishes, goals, and emotional issues that are involved in the client’s life.
The client in the first meeting will receive an education about the negotiating process involved in collaborative practice, which will empower the client to participate actively and effectively in the negotiation that will take place in the later joint meeting.
Collaborative professionals assist their clients to achieve their highest intentions for themselves and their children in the post-divorce restricted family environment. Collaborative lawyers have an effective working relationship with each other.
They work on a common basis to achieve the best results for their clients. Collaborative practice provides creative problem-solving that is not available or exists in mediation or litigation. The collaborative lawyers work together to assist the clients to reach a resolution that best meets the needs of the clients.
All discussions, information sharing, option development, and negotiation take place in face-to-face meetings with the clients. The role of the collaborative professionals is to act as guardians for these negotiations and in the management of conflict.
Collaborative professionals work effectively with their clients to offer the best possible circumstances in which to carry out negotiations in good faith in an interest-based respectful manner, mutually beneficial, and accepted the outcome.
Family consultants and financial consultants can be involved in collaborative negotiation.
The family consultants maintain a highly focused communication process during the negotiation process. They endeavor to reduce the stress levels during the meetings and assist the parties to clarify the issues involved.
The family consultants have been trained in anger management skills which help the parties move as effectively as possible through the process. They provide balanced, non-judgemental, non-evaluative information about the children’s needs, with the aim of developing parenting plans for the children.
They have a very comprehensive role in assisting the parties in reaching a resolution. The financial consultant assists the parties to clearly identify their property and financial issues, incomes, and expenses, and effectively document such matters for the collaborative lawyers to use in the negotiation process.
They can assist the parties with any budgeting concerns. They assist in identifying the financial issues that need to be addressed. They assist in the settlement process by analyzing taxation issues and in projecting long term financial consequences of various settlement options, which may be put forward during the negotiation process.
Here you can Download A-Z Collaborative Law Ebook.
The team approach of lawyers and consultants significantly reduces the costs of conducting the negotiations. The team approach streamlines negotiations and provides long-lasting ‘value-added’ resolutions. It enables the parties to negotiate educated resolutions of the issues involved.
The team approach enables the parties to reach respectful, efficient, lasting, mutually workable solutions to financial and parenting issues. It assists the parties as parents to provide effective co-parenting of their children in the future.
Article Source: https://www.jamesnoblelaw.com.au/collaborative-practice-agreement-australia/
