Litigation and mediation end in the same place: a resolved dispute. The price to get there can be as different as night and day. Litigation Who you pay: your attorney, who bills by the hour, plus court costs What drives the cost: every motion, hearing, and round of discovery Typical cost: attorney fees and court costs that often reach tens of thousands of dollars, and sometimes much more Timeline: months or years, set by the court's calendar; this requires you to take time of

Mediation isn't something only lawyers or judges can do well. In almost every case, the mediator's role is not to provide legal advice or predict how a court would rule, which means the work isn't built on legal credentials. It is built on communication skill: helping people talk to one another, de-escalate conflict, and stay focused on what they actually need. You might be wondering: if a mediator isn't there to give legal advice, how can mediation help with a dispute that h

Mediation often gets confused with therapy because both involve sitting down and having a hard conversation (or sometimes several) with a third party present. Both usually involve situations that are emotionally charged and distressing. So you might be wondering: if mediation is all about having hard conversations about difficult circumstances, how is it different from therapy? The key difference is that mediation isn't about understanding how you got here. It's about figurin

Mediation is not a legal proceeding, and it can be a useful tool in a wide range of situations where people have differing views. Many of these situations, such as adult siblings who can't agree on the best way to care for aging parents, or coworkers trying to work through a disagreement, would never end up in court, but mediation can help. At its core, mediation is about helping people communicate clearly enough to find their own way forward — something courts, by design, ar

Ask anyone to define mediation (not meditation with an extra t), and you'll likely hear some version of the same answer: "Isn't that the thing you do before a trial?" It's a fair guess, as mediation tends to be introduced to people for the first time by a judge, an attorney, or a court order, often as a required step on the way to litigation. Unfortunately, that framing sells mediation short, and it's the reason so many people never consider it until they're already mired in