Practice Tip: After the Love Is Gone

I prepare by summarizing the extent of the parties' marital assets and liabilities in a spreadsheet format. All attorneys have different ways of illustrating how they summarize the marital estate. I prefer a spreadsheet so that it is easy for everyone at the conference to review and see the bottom-line figures without having to sift through the actual financial statements themselves when discussing a particular asset.

Be Prepared to Make a Settlement Proposal, if Possible

Or at least discuss the terms of an official one to be made once full discovery is complete. In my marital estate spreadsheet, I set up a separate column for each party and designate in each party's column my proposal for how that asset should be divided. For example, if the asset is the Dodge minivan worth $5,000 and I propose that the wife should keep the van, then the $5,000 will appear in the wife's column next to the asset. If, however, the precise value of an asset is unknown because it needs to be valued or because it is being appraised, I will put a note next to the asset, indicating that the value is to be determined and a tentative date for following up on this detail.

Leave the Conference with a To-Do List

The list should be for each attorney and, if necessary, each party. Hopefully, your conference will be so successful that the to-do list for one attorney would be to draft the settlement agreement and the to-do list for the other attorney would be to process the divorce once the agreement is signed. If that is not possible, or if updated financial statements need to be exchanged or assets need to be appraised, then the four of you should each leave with a to-do list and a deadline for each task on the list. If the list is extensive, then it is probably a good idea for one of the attorneys to agree to write a confirming letter after the conference that sets forth everyone's action items and their respective deadlines.

Better Than E-mail

Why is a conference format more productive than e-mail, letter or phone call? Because the act of the conference itself is helpful to moving your case toward the finish line. The advantage of the conference versus the e-mail, letter, or telephone call is that all four of you are together to hammer out the actual settlement. Your client and his or her spouse are looking at each other across a table ' just like they did many years ago when they were in love and were out to dinner getting engaged. Your client's spouse is also meeting you, hearing the tone of your voice and your reasons behind the proposal, which will go a lot further to convince him or her that what you are saying is fair than just reading your words on a piece of paper and surmising what you must be like and why you have not allocated everything to him or her.

A settlement conference can also calm the storm between your client and his or her spouse. For example, every divorce case, whether heated or not, can have its own exchange of nasty arguments, text messages and/or e-mails between the parties about all aspects of the case. Forcing the parties to have these conversations in front of their lawyers usually makes both parties better behaved to the point of engaging in a somewhat civil conversation about an overall settlement. In most cases, having the attorneys there during the conversation about their assets and liabilities ' a touchy subject even for intact couples ' allows us to do the job we were trained to do: resolve the conflict. Clearly, talking to each other in front of counsel is a far quicker and less aggravating way to resolving issues than via a string of nasty exchanges that generally do not resolve anything and only makes matters worse.

Even in those cases where there is no possible way the parties could ever have an ounce of love for each other left, remember that the love was once there. You probably are not going to discover it for them and get these two back together again, but you can at least take advantage of the one thing these two people cannot change: They are both human and were once in love with each other, or so they thought. ' Lisa Shapson , Berner Klaw & Watson

In heated divorce cases, a four-way settlement conference can bring everyone back down to earth. The four-way conference is a great tool that can serve as a mechanism for settling your case, as long as you are organized and prepared.

The timing of the conference in the life of the case is important. Do not schedule the conference too early in the process. Make sure everyone has exchanged financial documentation and that you have had a chance to summarize ' for both your benefit and that of your client ' the extent of the marital estate. Whenever possible, the goal is to reach a settlement that day.

Be Prepared for the Conference

I prepare by summarizing the extent of the parties' marital assets and liabilities in a spreadsheet format. All attorneys have different ways of illustrating how they summarize the marital estate. I prefer a spreadsheet so that it is easy for everyone at the conference to review and see the bottom-line figures without having to sift through the actual financial statements themselves when discussing a particular asset.

Be Prepared to Make a Settlement Proposal, if Possible

Or at least discuss the terms of an official one to be made once full discovery is complete. In my marital estate spreadsheet, I set up a separate column for each party and designate in each party's column my proposal for how that asset should be divided. For example, if the asset is the Dodge minivan worth $5,000 and I propose that the wife should keep the van, then the $5,000 will appear in the wife's column next to the asset. If, however, the precise value of an asset is unknown because it needs to be valued or because it is being appraised, I will put a note next to the asset, indicating that the value is to be determined and a tentative date for following up on this detail.

Leave the Conference with a To-Do List

The list should be for each attorney and, if necessary, each party. Hopefully, your conference will be so successful that the to-do list for one attorney would be to draft the settlement agreement and the to-do list for the other attorney would be to process the divorce once the agreement is signed. If that is not possible, or if updated financial statements need to be exchanged or assets need to be appraised, then the four of you should each leave with a to-do list and a deadline for each task on the list. If the list is extensive, then it is probably a good idea for one of the attorneys to agree to write a confirming letter after the conference that sets forth everyone's action items and their respective deadlines.

Better Than E-mail

Why is a conference format more productive than e-mail, letter or phone call? Because the act of the conference itself is helpful to moving your case toward the finish line. The advantage of the conference versus the e-mail, letter, or telephone call is that all four of you are together to hammer out the actual settlement. Your client and his or her spouse are looking at each other across a table ' just like they did many years ago when they were in love and were out to dinner getting engaged. Your client's spouse is also meeting you, hearing the tone of your voice and your reasons behind the proposal, which will go a lot further to convince him or her that what you are saying is fair than just reading your words on a piece of paper and surmising what you must be like and why you have not allocated everything to him or her.

A settlement conference can also calm the storm between your client and his or her spouse. For example, every divorce case, whether heated or not, can have its own exchange of nasty arguments, text messages and/or e-mails between the parties about all aspects of the case. Forcing the parties to have these conversations in front of their lawyers usually makes both parties better behaved to the point of engaging in a somewhat civil conversation about an overall settlement. In most cases, having the attorneys there during the conversation about their assets and liabilities ' a touchy subject even for intact couples ' allows us to do the job we were trained to do: resolve the conflict. Clearly, talking to each other in front of counsel is a far quicker and less aggravating way to resolving issues than via a string of nasty exchanges that generally do not resolve anything and only makes matters worse.

Even in those cases where there is no possible way the parties could ever have an ounce of love for each other left, remember that the love was once there. You probably are not going to discover it for them and get these two back together again, but you can at least take advantage of the one thing these two people cannot change: They are both human and were once in love with each other, or so they thought. ' Lisa Shapson , Berner Klaw & Watson