COLLABORATIVE FAMILY PRACTICE
NEUTRAL COACH ROLES AND FUNCTIONS
4/15/09

Because the Neutral Coach role differs in significant ways from the 2-Coach Model, the following is offered as a summary of the multifaceted functions available to the Collaborative clients and Team who selects a Neutral Coach to participate in their process.

GOAL OF NEUTRAL COACH: To facilitate a client-centered divorce process toward positive resolutions, working to minimize negative impact of the process on the participants, while helping to keep the process moving forward with a focus on the future.

SUMMARY ROLES

FACILITATOR: Facilitates movement by helping the couple develop and focus on their post-divorce goals and interests, providing an anchor for discussions and decision-making. Facilitates meetings by reviewing goals/interests, recording developments and decisions, offering tips for better communication around difficult topics, monitoring the pace of meetings and requesting breaks as needed, assigning homework to participants, setting agendas and coordinating meeting dates/times.
COMMUNICATOR: Facilitate communication between clients and Team members by providing 3-6 way meeting summaries and updates to the Team relative to issues affecting the collaborative process and/or its outcomes.

MANAGER: Works to manage the emotional content of the couple’s communication, providing tools and strategies for effective communication. Monitors communication and relationship at 5 levels:
Neutral’s relationship with the husband and wife, independently
Maintaining a neutral relationship with the couple
Neutral’s relationship with the attorneys
Relationship between attorneys (e.g., Have they worked together before? Comfort with each other?)
Wife’s relationship with her attorney and his attorney; Husband’s relationship with his and her attorney.

TRANSITIONER: Available to the couple, and their family on a limited basis, throughout the divorce process, as well as post-divorce, should previously agreed upon goals and/or co-parenting roles change and thus require re-negotiation.

RESOURCE: Able to offer information related to the divorce process, normalizing feelings, child development, how to talk to kids about divorce, parenting plans, communication and problem-solving skills, as well as provide referrals for outside resources and adjunct services.

CHILD SPECIALIST: Can, if appropriately trained, meet with the couple’s children to assess the impact of the divorce on their well-being and adjustment, and to convey questions and concerns they may have which have not yet been addressed.

For more detailed information about how the process unfolds with a Neutral Coach involved see additional blog, The Road to Solutions: How the Neutral Coach Works in 3- to 6-Way Meetings



KEY ELEMENTS:
Collaborative practice offers a Win-Win approach to divorce, as opposed to the Winner-Loser feelings frequently engendered by traditional litigation.

Remain hopeful for positive outcomes. Nothing is necessarily impossible given a future orientation, empathy, effective communication and creative problem solving.

If one spouse begins to resist or shut down in response to what the other spouse is presenting, remember that all ideas are important to consider; that what is being presented by one person is "an" option not necessarily "the" option.

Offering tools to help the couple arrive at mutually acceptable solutions is key.

Being involved with the case from the beginning is also important.

For more information on Collaborative Divorce go to www.collaborativedivorcekansascity.net.