Nanci Smith Email and Phone Number

Growing up on the playgrounds of Detroit, I advocated against child abuse in 4th grade when I discovered my friend’s mother would extinguish her cigarettes on her daughter’s fingers. By 6th grade, I made an amazing Minestrone for a soup kitchen, and started to feel the weight of racial and economic injustice. I was called into law. I developed a thick skin, a quick wit, and a disciplined approach to problem solving by discerning people’s interests and motives. I studied Philosophy because the Big Questions matter, and attended law school to fight bullies and injustice. As a law student, I represented a domestic violence victim through the intimidating world of family court to divorce her batterer. Divorce was foreign to me, as my parents had always been together. I then became a trial attorney under the apprenticeship of a former attorney general, who taught me the art, skill, and ethics of effective lawyering. A dream called me back to represent the underserved, and I worked at Legal Aid until opening my firm in 2005.After litigating many custody cases, it gnawed at me that I was contributing to a lifetime of bitterness and resentment for my clients. They were losing so much (time with their children, money, lifestyle, identity) through an aggressive, public and adversarial forum full of shame and blame. I then discovered Collaborative Law (CL). Clients explore their options, including CL, which is an interdisciplinary and non-adversarial process that empowers clients to make healthy decisions about their post-divorce life. Clients put their children’s needs ahead of their negative feelings toward one another and choose to act with integrity and decency, despite their pain. Lawyers choose to use collaborative negotiation skills to create a supportive environment to resolve their dispute. It’s private, educational, inspirational, and it works. This is the conflict resolution model that I most value. It recognizes our common humanity. Let's connect!