We made every effort to stay “in the middle” and to act as an intermediate space between the parties: this required that each of us not collude, not take sides and acknowledge our own processes of identification and projection; that we not take on and blur the role of expert with that of facilitator; and that we accept, especially in the initial stage, the parties’ partial and inflexible views helping them to explore the complexity of the problem and of hypotheses of interpretation and action. Moreover, it was necessary to guide the stakeholders toward tolerating, accepting and understanding the other's difference. The underlying hypothesis is that, if others exist, it is crucial to recognize the existence of differences, of possible conflict (without experiencing it as destructive or wrong) and of different powers in play. This recognition – when it happened – constituted progress, and the PAR functioned here to re‐equilibrate power. Giving different stakeholders a voice, legitimating and understanding each one's perspective in turn worked to improve service and promote patients’ well‐being. For example, the development of a more complex view of the organizational problem, the elaboration of new professional practices and new organizational dispositions were possible thanks to various elements and PAR outcomes. First, the management gradually made it legitimate for practitioners to express their suffering and therefore succeed in considering it. Second, the practitioners made it legitimate for caregivers to participate in the care process, even seeing their suffering and feelings of guilt. Finally, the informal caregivers’ viewpoint was gradually and increasingly considered in planning care. Here, the action researchers’ function was also to analyze the representations of power asymmetries and to facilitate their acknowledgment always keeping the patient's care as the circumscribed and shared work‐object.