When Parenting Coordination Doesn’t Work — and Why Structure Sometimes Matters More Than Coaching

High‑conflict parenting situations exist on a spectrum, and most families who enter Parenting Coordination are not at the far end of it.

Many parents arrive overwhelmed, reactive, and uncertain, but still capable of learning. With time, structure, and support, they gradually develop better communication habits, reduce conflict, and regain a sense of stability for their children. For these families, coaching‑based Parenting Coordination is often effective—and change, while imperfect, is real.

This article is not about those cases.

What follows describes what happens only after good‑faith efforts at education, structure, and coaching have already been tried and have not worked at that point in time. It reflects the later stages of a small subset of high‑conflict cases, where the usual tools are no longer sufficient and different forms of structure are required to protect children and manage process fairly.

It is important to say this plainly because a common question arises in these situations:

“Why can’t you just teach them to communicate better?”

In many cases, the answer is straightforward: we can—and we do.

My Parenting Coordination work is grounded in neuroscience, emotional regulation, and clear communication rules designed to reduce conflict and protect children from being caught in the middle. When parents are able to learn and adapt—even imperfectly—the results can be meaningful: lower conflict, reduced cost, and children who no longer feel responsible for managing adult problems.

But there is an important truth that deserves to be stated clearly and honestly:

Some Parenting Coordination cases cannot succeed in a coaching‑based or insight‑oriented model, no matter how clear the rules or how much education is provided.

This is not a moral judgment. It is a reality of human capacity under stress.

What Coaching‑Based Parenting Coordination Assumes

All coaching‑based Parenting Coordination models rely on several basic assumptions:

• That parents can follow neutral communication rules

• That feedback leads to some degree of behavioural adjustment

• That adult emotions can be managed separately from a child’s needs

• That short‑term discomfort can be tolerated in service of long‑term stability

When these assumptions hold—even inconsistently—education and coaching can work very well.

When they do not, the process itself begins to break down.

A Pattern That Appears in a Subset of High‑Conflict Cases

Over many years of practice, a small but consistent group of cases follows a predictable pattern:

• Every interaction is framed through a story of victimization

• Responsibility for conflict is consistently externalized

• Neutral communication rules are argued rather than applied

• Previously addressed issues are repeatedly re‑litigated

• Delays and procedural disputes increase cost and complexity

• Eventually, the Parenting Coordinator is reframed as biased or harmful

What matters most is this:

These patterns persist despite repeated explanation, clarification, and education.

At that point, the issue is not misunderstanding. It is non‑adaptation.

Why More Coaching Can Sometimes Make Things Worse

Modern conflict resolution emphasizes insight, emotional awareness, and understanding past experiences. For many parents, this approach is helpful.

For others, it is not.

Some parents experience neutral rules not as structure, but as threat.

Some experience neutrality not as fairness, but as betrayal.

Some rely on conflict itself to regulate overwhelming emotions.

In these situations:

• More explanation leads to more argument

• More emotional language leads to more grievance

• More time leads to more cost, without reducing harm

Continuing to coach under these conditions does not resolve conflict—it prolongs it.

Children and Conflict: An Important Distinction

It is neither realistic nor accurate to suggest that children are never aware of parental conflict.

Most children know their parents do not like each other. Divorce itself is evidence of conflict. Even generally healthy parents occasionally make a snide or frustrated remark within a child’s earshot. Most children are resilient enough to understand that parents are imperfect and that they still have permission to love both parents.

This kind of ordinary exposure does not make Parenting Coordination impossible.

The problem arises at a different point.

What undermines children’s wellbeing—and the Parenting Coordination process—is toxic enlistment, such as when a child is:

• Repeatedly used as a messenger or intermediary

• Asked to validate one parent’s grievance against the other

• Exposed to adult narratives of blame, fear, or moral judgment

• Positioned as an ally, confidant, or emotional support

• Pressured, directly or indirectly, to take sides

At this level, the child is no longer simply aware of conflict; the child has become part of the emotional system of the conflict.

When this pattern is persistent and resistant to correction, coaching‑based approaches often fail—not because a parent is “bad,” but because the conflict has become organized around the child.

Education Has Limits: Managing Process Fairly

Parenting Coordination is an educative process. Parents are taught how to understand and apply court orders, agreements, and child‑focused communication rules. In most cases, this education leads to improved behaviour over time.

In some cases, however, the same issues are raised again and again despite repeated explanation. Communications remain non‑compliant. Previously addressed topics are revisited without integration.

At this point, continuing to re‑teach the same material is no longer productive.

Parenting Coordinators do not enforce court orders. Courts have been clear that the PC role is not coercive or punitive. Instead, the PC’s responsibility is to manage the process fairly.

When one parent repeatedly requires additional time on issues that have already been addressed, it would be unreasonable for the other parent—who is following the guidance, agreements, and orders—to absorb the cost of that repetition.

For this reason, Parenting Coordinators may reapportion fees for time spent revisiting the same topic or correcting repeated non‑compliance. This is not punishment, and it is not enforcement. It is a fairness‑based response to process misuse, intended to:

• Protect the cooperative parent from unnecessary cost

• Maintain proportionality in the process

• Encourage adaptation without shaming or escalation

When the Process Shifts to Determination‑Only

In some cases, education and coaching do not lead to meaningful behavioural change. When that happens, the Parenting Coordination process must become more structured and more limited.

This often involves moving to a determination‑only model, sometimes preceded by recommendations that explain why a particular parental position is not in the child’s best interests.

For many parents, these explanations are helpful—even when the outcome is disappointing.

For others, they are not.

What Often Happens Next: Allegations of Bias and Defunding

A further pattern appears with striking consistency in a subset of cases.

When determinations or recommendations do not align with a parent’s preferred narrative, particularly when the reasoning is child‑focused rather than grievance‑focused, allegations of bias often emerge.

This reaction is not necessarily about the quality of the reasoning provided. Rather, it reflects difficulty tolerating outcomes that do not confirm a fixed sense of victimhood.

As structure increases and options narrow, the Parenting Coordinator is no longer experienced as neutral, but as aligned with the other parent or with the system itself.

At this point, a predictable financial consequence often follows: the parent withdraws funding from the Parenting Coordination process.

The BC Parenting Coordinator's Roster Society's  current participation agreement allows one parent to carry the cost and have fees reapportioned. While this may be permissible, it is rarely a sustainable solution. Continuing without a clear funding framework simply adds an extra procedural step, increases cost, and delays resolution.

The issue at this stage is no longer the substantive parenting disagreement. It is process viability.

Why a Return to Court Is Sometimes Unavoidable

When a Parenting Coordination process is defunded following allegations of bias, a return to court is often necessary. Courts are best positioned to:

• Address funding and cost‑sharing models

• Clarify the scope and limits of the PC role

• Determine whether Parenting Coordination remains appropriate

• Re‑establish a workable structure going forward

While this outcome is frustrating for parents, it reflects an important reality:

No out‑of‑court process can function if one party rejects both the outcomes and the mechanism itself.

Attempting to continue Parenting Coordination without court involvement in these circumstances does not reduce conflict. It simply prolongs it.

A Final Word

Most parents want to do better—and many can, with the right structure and support.

But Parenting Coordination also requires honesty about its limits.

When cooperation is not possible, clarity, structure, and proportionality are not failures.

They are protective tools.

The most important question in any high‑conflict parenting situation is not who is right, but:

What process best protects the children and treats both parents fairly right now?

Even when Parenting Coordination must become more limited or return to court, something important has still occurred: the parents were given a real opportunity to try. Skills were explained. Structure was offered. Time was allowed. People can only work with the capacity they have right now, and capacity can change with time, maturity, treatment, or changing circumstances. Children, however, grow up on schedule. When an intervention is wrong for the moment, it should be postponed rather than forced—but it is never too late to do better. The goal is not perfection. It is to choose the right level of structure at the right time, while keeping open the possibility of growth in the future.

Written by Cori McGuire, a Parenting Coordinator since 2008 and a family law lawyer since 1998 in British Columbia. 

© 2026 Cori McGuire. All Rights Reserved. Proprietary Workflow.