The Benefits of Both Mediation and Collaborative Divorce
- Allows the parties to take charge of their lives and design a plan for their future that would be good for themselves and for their children
- Facilitates, promotes and improves communication between the parties
- Hard bargaining tactics are avoided
- Helps the parties to exchange views and information
- Helps to reduce conflict and hostility between the parties
- Encourages co-operation and trust
- Allows the parties the opportunity to express their feelings associated with ending the marriage
- The parties are assisted in articulating their goals and interests rather than taking positions
- The parties have more control over the outcome
- Increases potential for solutions that may go beyond remedies which can be ordered by the court
- Settlements generally work better because of the fact that the parties worked cooperatively to arrive at the agreement, rather than having it negotiated back and forth between their lawyers
- Empowers the parties to solve their own dispute and find a compromise that works for both of them
- A mutually acceptable solution lets both parties be winners and respect each other
What are the benefits for children?
- Focuses attention on the children and in doing what is best for the children
- Minimizes the harmful effects of divorce and separation on children
- Agreements can take into account the personal needs of children in much more detail than other kinds of agreements
- Child specialists provide a constructive way for the children to have a voice in the process without triangulating them between the parents or over empowering them in the decision making process
- Children adjust better to their parent’s divorce than do children of parents who simply go through the litigation process; the children are happier, more secure, more reassured and less distressed
- Presents a cooperative model for addressing future changes in the lives of the children
- Establishes a sound foundation for post-separation parenting arrangements
