Mediation
Safe and open communication to help you sort through your options
In mediation, the participants work with a mediator who guides the conversation to the matters at issue. Through mediation, the participants make decisions together—guided by their personal viewpoints, a mutual understanding of each other's view, and the reality that they now face together. The mediator provides objective, unbiased support to help you make the best possible decisions. The mediator guides and facilitates discussions in the following ways:
- Provides an informal setting to discuss problems
- Elicits discussion about the participant's needs and concerns
- Generates options for the parties to choose from
- Tests the options against the interests of all members involved to narrow down the alternatives
The more relaxed atmosphere and voluntary nature of mediation nurtures the generation of ideas and helps find creative solutions that often elude participants in an adversarial environment. Mediation is a private, voluntary process that allows people to actively participate and negotiate for the items that matter most. Mediation lets you personalize the decision-making process and tailor the outcome to your circumstances. Mediation is highly versatile, and can be used to resolve the following types of disputes:
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The advantages of mediation
Mediation enables clear communication about relevant issues. Through mediation, people work through their concerns to develop solutions custom-fit to meet their needs. Benefits of mediation include:
- Clear and competent communication: Avoid misunderstandings with the help of an objective third party.
- Control over outcome: Make decisions for yourself rather than submitting to the decision of a judge.
- Cooperative atmosphere: Work together to develop the right solutions for you, your family, or your business.
- Facilitated discussion: Objective mediator guides the conversation to the points at issue.
- Quicker resolution: Schedule mediation on your own timeline, not the court's timeline.
- Privacy: Mediation is a private matter. There are no public records.
Usually, mediation is a more cost-effective alternative to courtroom litigation. You can still hire your own attorneys to represent you in mediation, but you eliminate the cost of formal discovery.
What makes mediation different from Collaborative Practice?
The dynamic in mediation is quite different from Collaborative Practice. Mediation provides one person—the mediator—whose job it is to facilitate discussion between the parties to a dispute and their attorneys, if they are present. Often, in family matters, the parties choose not to have their attorneys present during negotiation sessions. In Collaborative Practice, the attorneys work together to facilitate the discussion.
>> Learn more about Collaborative Practice
What types of family law matters can be mediated?
Mediation affords you and your family the opportunity to control the outcome of your case, not a judge. Almost any family matter that you can take to court can be mediated. Some examples of family law matters that can be mediated include:
- Marital issues, including prenups, marriage contracts, divorce, separation, property division, and alimony
- Cohabitation issues, including cohabitation agreements, accumulated property, and ending cohabitation
- Children's matters, including contested custody, support, visitation, adoption, guardianships, parental rights, and college planning
- Elder law, and issues related to aging, disability, competency, medical care, living arrangements, and power of attorney assignations
What types of will, estate, or trust matters can be mediated?
Contentious family conflicts often arise from disputes over rights of inheritance. Because mediation allows each party to voice their concerns, mediation can be highly useful and productive in resolving estate planning and estate administration disputes. Mediation may be useful for many types of contests that arise regarding the legitimacy of a will, estate, or trust instrument:
- Beneficiary rights, and matters relating to the absence of a legal will, spousal contests, will contests, trust contests, or estate contests
- Probate and rights of inheritance disputes related to accounting contests, fraudulent asset transfers, and fiduciary misconduct
- Businesses and succession planning contests, partnership disputes, taxable assets, and related matters
What types of business disputes can be mediated?
Mediation offers businesses the benefit of achieving practical solutions to disputes with shareholders, customers, suppliers, vendors, and manufacturers. A wide range of business disputes may be mediated, including:
- Shareholder disputes involving minority stockholders and partners, professional liability, conflict of interest and related matters
- Professional negligence claims involving medical professionals, accountants, architects, engineers, lawyers, and other state-licensed professionals
- Personal injury claims relating to cost of medical bills, pain and suffering, loss of earning capacity, and loss of future earnings
- Real estate issues involving landlord-tenant relationships, buyer-seller relationships, financing issues, boundary issues, and property defects
- Business or partnership dissolution topics including consulting arrangements, valuation issues, financing concerns, and issues related to business succession
Contact us
We offer mediation services for—
When you believe that your case can be settled without the need of a judge, contact the offices of Katherine Eisold Miller to learn more about our mediation services.
