Norman Solovay
Dispute Resolution Section
Co-Chair, Committee on Collaborative Law

Norman Solovay is a partner in McLaughlin & Stern.  Although one of New York’s oldest law firms it has a quite up-to-date separate Alternative Dispute Resolution department which he Chairs.  

After receiving his B.A. from Cornell University and serving as a Lieutenant during the Korean War, Solovay received his law degree from Columbia Law School where he was an editor of the Columbia Law Review. 

He joined the then 45 lawyer firm of Rosenman, Goldmark, Colin & Kaye directly out of law school. However, because at that time he viewed it as too large, he left after several years to acquire more direct hands on litigation experience, including serving as Law Secretary to Justice Charles D. Breitel.

He subsequently became a partner in the then 15 lawyer firm of Holtzmann, Wise & Shepard whose clients included, among others, Allen & Company and the Onassis interests and whose managing partner was Chair of the American Arbitration Association. During his almost 20 years there he founded and headed its Litigation Department which handled a broad spectrum of matters including antitrust, securities, intellectual property, libel and business and personal divorces as well as many significant domestic and international arbitrations. As a result of the latter, he was invited to author the first of his several alternative dispute resolution books, Using Arbitration to Settle Commercial Disputes, (published by Matthew Bender).

Although the Holtzmann firm had grown to 45 and Solovay’s Litigation Department to 15 lawyers during this time, it had become too small for the type of practice it was handling and dissolved. While Solovay thereafter continued for a number of years to maintain a very active trial practice first as a senior trial partner at a major firm, then as founder of a firm which grew to 25 lawyers, he also authored two more ADR books involving mediation and arbitration,  Alternate Dispute Resolution (Matthew Bender) and then The Internet and Dispute Resolution: Untangling the Web   (New York Law Journal Press) and began devoting more time to his ADR interests.

Following the acquisition of his firm by a giant law firm, Solovay came to be a strong advocate of mediation and has participated in many, both as counsel and as a mediator.  He also became trained in and an active practitioner of Collaborative Law.  While serving as Co-Chair of the Collaborative Law Committee of the Dispute Resolution Section of the New York State Bar Association when it was formed, he promoted the continued and expanding use of Collaborative Law to resolve family law disputes as well as the ongoing and growing efforts to expand the use of Collaborative Law into other civil law areas including settlement of probate and other disputes where interest based negotiations are particularly important. That has led to his recent appointment as Co-Chair of the Negotiation Committee. 

Before joining McLaughlin & Stern he also explored and became proficient in other ADR modalities, including the increasingly popular one known as “Med-Arb” which combines mediation and arbitration as well as the use of Settlement Counsel and other settlement techniques.   He is a frequent organizer, chair and presenter at CLE and other bar association programs on various topics in the field of ADR, including one entitled Collaborative Law & Med-Arb and How They Can Enhance Your Practice sponsored by the New York City Bar Association's Alternate Dispute Resolution Committee of which he is presently a member and, more recently, a program sponsored by the ABA Alternate Dispute Resolution Section entitled Collaborative Resolution of Cross Border Estate Disputes - A Process for Family Governance. 

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