The IACP recently made changes to their Ethical Standards. The most critical changes were made to Section Three, The Collaborative Process. The first four parts of Section Three are the general standards for disclosure of information, advocacy, good faith negotiations and professional teamwork. Today I will discuss the first two parts on disclosure and advocacy.
The section on disclosure is short and succinct and says that full and affirmative disclosure must be made whether requested or not and disclosure is the responsibility of the clients and professionals. The one subjective part is that it requires the full and affirmative disclosure of all Material information. So that leaves open the question of what is material? In accounting, material is usually thought of as a percentage of the total. If we are dealing with a $1 million issue is a couple of thousand dollars material? I would suggest that to the spouse who hasn’t worked during the marriage and is worried about their future, a couple of thousand dollars may SEEM very material.
Section 3.2 deals with advocacy in the Collaborative Process. This standard has five concepts. The first deals with the professional’s responsibility to respect each client’s self-determination and that ultimately the client’s must make the final decisions. The second deals with the requirement that the professionals assist the clients in establishing reasonable expectations. The third requires the professionals to encourage the client to consider the impact of their decisions on any dependents.
Those first three are client centered. Professional standards require us to put the client, and their dependents, first and foremost.
The fourth and fifth standards under advocacy requires each professional to consider how their experiences, values, opinions, beliefs and behaviors will impact the matter and each professional has a duty to no contribute to interpersonal conflict of the clients.
I find the first three to be pretty standard stuff for well-trained Collaborative professionals. Those standards are really the cornerstone of the Collaborative Process.
It is the last two standards of advocacy that I implore all professionals to think about carefully. These two standards place a very high bar on each professional to self-monitor their behavior in the Process.
If you are a Collaborative Professional I urge you to read the entire Ethical Standards. They are available on the IACP website at www.collaborativepractice.com.
And join Ed Sachs and My Collaborative Team on Saturday, October 27th at 9 a.m., at the IACP Forum for even more discussion on these important issues.
