Catherine Schatzel

Catherine’s colleagues & clients describe her as compassionate, insightful, empowering, and supportive. Her 30 year volunteer and work history includes working in Human Resources recruitment, staffing, & training; providing Vocational/Career counseling for Collaborative and litigation divorce cases, and conducting public and private sector family, eldercare, and workplace mediations.

Catherine works with her vocational/career clients to identify their passions & skills, and supports them with compassion, empowerment, and sensitivity in analyzing their work history in order to determine their skills and competencies to plan their desired career direction. She helps her clients understand the true value and earning potential of their professional qualifications and supports her clients to determine additional education/training needs and associated costs, support in the job search process including resume design, interviewing & salary negotiation strategies, support through a divorce or separation, and re-entering the workforce at mid-life.

In addition, Catherine is an experienced mediator/facilitator & mentor mediator/coach of complex, diverse, cases including family, divorce, and domestic partner disputes, eldercare & workplace issues, often involving difficult parenting, financial, communication, and cultural issues. She is certified by the Washington Mediation Association (WMA) to mediate conflicts in Consumer, Community, Employment/Personnel, Family, Intercultural Relations/Diversity, Labor Relations, and Landlord/Tenant issues.

Catherine has conducted a variety of mediation, conflict resolution, communication, and personnel related training presentations to a variety of audiences including attorneys and allied professionals newly involved with the King County Collaborative Law group trainings to Collaborative professionals (parts of the Communications and Negotiations required training, Power Dynamics in Collaborative cases, & Body Language and Non-verbal Communication skills), and to new mediators in the Snohomish and King County Dispute Resolution Centers 'Basic & Family Mediation Training' classes.

The empathy and understanding that clients experience from Catherine is equally important in developing their trust as is her competence and professionalism.

Her heartfelt listening puts her clients at ease, knowing they have an ally to help them work through the professional challenges they face. Clients report a renewed sense of self-confidence as Catherine coaches them in creating and carrying out a plan for employment that ensures that the plan is congruent with their inner values, resulting in a consistently high level of client satisfaction & success with the outcome.

Catherine provides a unique perspective, awareness, and passion relating to diversity and multi-cultural issues as she is originally from Argentina, obtaining her U.S. citizenship in 1976.