Find a Professional — Australian Association of Collaborative Professionals

Clarissa Rayward

Collaborative Lawyer in Brisbane, QLD

Area of Law: Family Law

Phone: 07 3862 1955

Hi…

My name is Clarissa Rayward and thank you for your interest in working with me. I guess you might want to know a little more about me? Well here goes! I am a wife, mum to two, Divorce Lawyer (don’t hold that against me!) and lover of chocolate, coffee and anything colourful! I love to write, dance and spend any free moment I have ‘crafting’ (or as I like to call it #bedazzling!)

By day I am an accredited specialist family lawyer and the Director of the Brisbane Family Law Centre, a multidisciplinary practice where my team of lawyers work alongside counsellors and financial planners to ensure that clients receive the holistic support they need through divorce.

I published my first book, Splitsville- How to separate, stay out of court and stay friends in 2015 and have since spent countless hours training family lawyers in Australia and around the world in better ways we can help our clients through divorce.

I have long been a #fangirl of anything collaborative practice. My business is built around those principles and I tend to use that good old ‘interest based negotiation’ everywhere I go (including on my kids!)

I am the current President of the Qld Association of Collaborative Professionals and over the years have also held committee roles within the IACP.

I regularly train other professionals in Australia and overseas in Collaborative Practice.

In my other life I run a business called 'Happy Lawyer Happy Life' helping lawyers around Australia to build legal businesses that have at the heart of them a happy life. I didn’t set out to be a happiness advocate in law but it seems that is just how it has all come together and in 2019 I was recognised as the 2019 Lawyers Weekly Australian Law Awards Wellness Advocate of the Year and the inaugural winner of the Minds Court Individual Wellness Advocate in Law and in 2022 was named the Agnes McWhinney Award recipient, an award that recognises a female lawyer that has forged new pathways for themselves, their peers and/or those that they serve through a commitment to excellence, equity, professionalism and service to the community.

These days I still work with families all around Australia helping them through divorce and separation and all the bits in between. But in my ‘free time’ I am working hard to change the way lawyers practise law, to reduce our overly high rates of anxiety, depression and psychological ill-health just in case one of my girls decides this crazy career might be for her too! So there you go. Me in a few paragraphs!

Back to Search →