Professionals dealing with challenging behavior frequently operate detached from the other relationships in the child's life. This narrow approach has been called the unilateral strategy based on the belief that the child's outside world can be ignored and behavior can be changed by administering specific corrective interventions. In contrast, ecological treatment focuses on strengthening relationships in the life space of a child's family, school, peers, and community. No force is more powerful than parents who are the life span experts on their offspring. But in a climate that blames problems on so-called dysfunctional families, parents are often the missing team members. Parents are the best source of data on their children but are seldom enlisted as full team members in the search for solutions. Too often, schools have an uneasy relationship with parents, and residential programs try to keep them at bay. This article provides practical guidelines for building partnerships with families. (Contains 3 endnotes.)