Your membership in Collaborative Divorce Texas is important. It is important to you. It is important to your clients. It is important to the greater legal community. And it takes pioneers like you to renew your membership each year and increase the benefit of this growing movement to all of us.
Why It’s Important to You
Not to sound self-aggrandizing, but Collaborative Divorce Texas has become a leader in our nation and around the world for the promotion of Collaborative Divorce when couples have no other choice but to divorce. By being a member of this organization, you are helping to lead the way in the creation of a legal system that was never previously available to divorcing families. But on a more tangible level, as a member, you directly benefit from the informational campaign being funded by Collaborative Divorce Texas. The organization is now engaging in a statewide social media campaign to push information about the process and the organization’s members to potential clients in all of our major marketing areas. Potential clients find information about the process, this organization, and ultimately you as a collaborative divorce attorney. Your dues also allow the organization to create and update forms and other practice resources so that you can practice your trade without having to reinvent the wheel each time. And this organization provides a central “place” where all of us like-minded thinkers can get together to share, learn from one another, and pool our individual resources so that we can make Collaborative Divorce the preferred method of divorce in Texas.
Why It’s Important to Your Clients
With your membership dues, Collaborative Divorce Texas operates an educational website to spread information to as many as people as possible regarding the positive benefits of a Collaborative Divorce to families. If clients have never heard of a collaborative divorce, they can’t choose it for themselves when that time comes. In other words, they don’t know what they don’t know. The statewide information campaign funded by your membership dollars helps to provide that information to your clients. The Credentialing process of Collaborative Divorce Texas is also a great benefit enjoyed by your clients. The first of its kind in the Collaborative legal world, the Credentialed and Master Credentialed designations let clients know that our members are serious in their commitment to the Collaborative Divorce process. Your membership in this organization lets clients know that they have a choice beyond a courtroom war.
Why It’s Important to the Greater Legal Community
Whether you are an attorney, a mental health professional, or a financial professional in a collaborative case, you are all part of a legal process and therefore part of the greater legal community. Our Texas Family Code offers the Collaborative Divorce process as an option for divorcing couples to end their marriage. It is, therefore, an ethical obligation on the part of attorneys to ensure that each potential client is aware of this dispute resolution method, whether that attorney is trained in the Collaborative Divorce method or not. Collaborative Divorce Texas offers both basic and advanced trainings on an annual basis to ensure its members are the most qualified collaborative professionals, prepared to represent and assist all potential clients effectively in a Collaborative Divorce. The credibility and reliability of the organization serves as a beacon to other professionals in the legal community who are still attempting to measure the Collaborative Divorce movement.
The Small Cost of Membership
We are likely all members of numerous organizations. And of course, most of those organizations require membership dues. As of this writing, dues are $285 a year – or less than $24 per month. Less than $24 a month is a small price to pay for the management of so many benefits – mass educational campaigns, website presence, practice forms, Credentialing program, trainings and seminars. And if each of you can enlighten one colleague to join with you next time you renew your membership, think of the expanded reach this organization can have.
Rhonda Cleaves is a Trustee of the Board of Directors of Collaborative Divorce Texas and Chair of the organization’s Membership Committee.
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