Shifting the weight of your experience: Becoming a family mediator

Legal aid may have gone for a lot of family and children legal matters, but there are still other avenues to consider to complement your family law background.

I have been involved in the family law sector since 2005. In 2010 I decided that I did not want to work only as a family solicitor; I wanted the challenge of working with separating couples, not just individuals, and to focus on the families' interests rather than having a fixed position. After looking into how this could be achieved, I decided to train as a family mediator.

Five years on, I am now doing more work as a mediator than as a solicitor.

Becoming a family mediator

It can be quite expensive at the start of the mediation journey, with the mediation foundation course fee and regular supervision meetings.

It takes time to build up a mediation caseload. Find time to plan how many clients you would like to work with and decide what action and networking needs to be done to achieve this. I find that my plan is always changing, but at least if you have a plan you have something to aim for.

Marketing can often take place outside work hours, so if you are attending breakfast events or late night networking, aim to attend events that you enjoy being at. I tend to find having a chat with one to two people works better than going round the whole room and trying to speak to everyone, but again you need to find a networking strategy that works for you.

I am now working at a fixed office for family mediation meetings. Five years ago I used to rent rooms in several offices across London: this was good initially to keep the room hire costs down, but I found that a lot of time in the day would be lost travelling from north, east, and central London, so I now aim to get clients to meet me at one location.

Make sure that you have mediation insurance in place and that you have the right level of cover, especially for financial mediation matters. Once you have started to mediate, then you can build on the foundations of your mediation knowledge. For example, a lot of the families I work with have an international element to their issue, so it is important to keep up to date in this area.

I have also been on an online mediation training course as I am getting more and more clients who are not based in London. Last month I did a Skype mediation for a client based in Ireland who had a disability and another case where a mother lives in Hong Kong to focus on financial and children matters. (As an aside, if you do Skype mediation sessions, make sure you do a test call first.)

Most of my family mediation cases work on the model of 90-minute joint sessions, but half-day and full-day mediation sessions are possible if the clients have a court case taking place very soon. The first mediation session allows separating couples to discuss strategies on how communication and trust can be worked on and improved, even before we start to discuss childcare and financial matters.

I want to be known as a specialist solicitor and mediator. A lot of clients when they come to you want to work with someone who is a specialist in their area. I think it is harder to get this message across if you work in lots of areas of law.

In family law I work within the areas of divorce, finances, children, relocation, pre-nuptial and post-nuptial agreements, domestic violence, and child abduction.

In family mediation the matters I tend to cover are: how the divorce will commence and who is the petitioner; childcare, finances, and direct consultations with children; grandparents wanting to see their grandchildren; and also LGBT families.

Training and accreditation

If you are thinking of becoming a family mediator, do your research.

Make sure that the foundation course you are signing up for will be recognised when you apply for accreditation.

The foundation training costs around £2,500. If your firm is not willing to pay, you might wish to consider self-funding and then being reimbursed when you start to see clients.

If you enjoy working with children, then you should consider doing the course on direct consultation with children.

Before you start to mediate, you will need to observe some mediations and also do some co-mediation hours. See what opportunities are available for this, as I found that I had more opportunities to observe and co-mediate by contacting mediation services outside London.

Try to find a professional practice consultant (PPC) who you are comfortable working with. When I started mediating I found that I had to ask a lot of practical questions, and when I started mediating with clients the questions I had were more about dealing with the client and the process. Make sure that the PPC has time to supervise you as sometimes you may need to speak to them urgently.

If you do not have enough cases to be accredited, then you might need to consider whether you charge mediation clients less than other local mediation practices or co-mediate on a pro bono basis with an established mediator. Once you become accredited, a lot more opportunities become available. Getting the accreditation has been my biggest challenge as a mediator - it took around two years for me to get the required cases for the portfolio.

If you are from a legal background, you may want to consider going on a level two or three counselling diploma course; I found this very helpful when writing up my reflections for the mediation portfolio.

Once you complete your accreditation, you may want to be a supervisor and undertake PPC training; I completed the training last year and am working with several supervisees aiming towards accreditation.

Out-of-court options

Clients come to mediation with a general knowledge that if they can resolve matters in mediation, it is generally a cheaper, quicker, and less adversarial process than going to court, and over the last few years clients seem to have become more informed of what mediation is and how it works.

The courts are also becoming more aware of the important role family mediators can play in helping to resolve family matters out of court.

I am involved with schemes at the Central Family Court and Barnet Family Court, where, for cases having the first hearing, the courts are trying to encourage the separating couple to try mediation if both clients are willing and the matter is appropriate for the mediation process.

If mediation does not resolve every matter, then there is the possibility for it to be referred to arbitration for a binding decision if both clients agree.

Further, I have noticed more recently that solicitors are looking at ways to regularly work with mediators, and I am part of the scheme with Dialogue First where clients choose this process. The clients have a solicitor assigned to them and the clients can then seek legal advice after each mediation session.

What are the challenges?

Not all cases are suitable for mediation. You need to ask screening questions with each client at the start of the process to try to establish which cases are not appropriate.

Recent examples of mediation matters that have not proceeded are where one client involved in the mediation process did not want to make a full financial disclosure of their assets and the other client believed that some assets were being hidden.

It can also be a challenge where one client wants to see you for a shortened mediation information assessment meeting (MIAM). If a client has attended a MIAM before with another service, then I may do a shorter MIAM, but if it is a client who is new to mediation, they should spend around 45 minutes to an hour in the meeting for it to work properly.

In some cases, clients will need some space with the mediators, without the lawyers present, and you must simply let the lawyers know this. You need to do what is right for the clients. SJ

Austin Chessell is an accredited family and child mediator at FAMIA. He is also a professional practice consultant, and a  collaborative family solicitor at Feltons