Maryland Mediator, Sarah Malik, in an article “Doing Your Homework Before Mediation: Increasing the Likelihood of Success” recently outlined how people can effectively prepare for family law mediation sessions. Her tips are short but sweet and likely will be helpful to many mediating parties.

Prepare emotionally: Held-in emotions often emerge during mediation sessions and can stymie progress.  If people are prepared for emotions surfacing and request breaks during the mediation process to regain composure, the welling up of those emotions don’t have to sidetrack progress.  Mediators anticipate their presence and know their presence is normal.

Prepare the numbers: When negotiating financial topics, come with your calculations of values and how you got them.  People are more willing to negotiate when they have confidence in the numbers.

Prepare to listen: Truly listening enhances the likelihood of mediation’s success.

Prepare for the spectrum of outcomes: It helps when you know what your ideal outcome is, what you think the other party(ies) desired outcomes are and what you can live with. This will help you be ready for a range of workable outcomes that can make  mediation more successful.

Advance preparation by mediating parties leads to success!

Follow this link to the article: https://www.mediate.com/articles/MalikS1.cfm