by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting I love a good trial timeline whether it's a printed large-format trial board or whether it's in PowerPoint form. This goes for my colleagues here at A2L, as well. In fact, we love timelines so much that we've even produced a book with more than 30 types of trial timelines illustrated. Timelines are used as demonstrative evidence in just about every trial. They serve an obvious purpose of orienting judge and/or jury to the order of events and how those events relate to one another. It's the one exhibit that helps make sense of it all, particularly in a complex case. As our trial timine book discusses, a timeline does not have to be limited to simple chronologies. In fact by incorporating graphs, photos, color schemes and more, a timeline can transmute from being simply informative to being quite persuasive.
Handling a CEO during litigation can be a daunting task for trial lawyers. CEOs often hold significant influence and are the public face of their companies, making their words and actions crucial in determining the outcome of a trial. It is imperative to approach this situation with careful consideration, thorough preparation, and a solid understanding of the legal process.
by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting Unfortunately, I have the memory of an elephant when it comes to life's uncomfortable moments. One of those occurred during undergraduate school at the University of Mary Washington almost 30 years ago. Like it was yesterday, I remember reviewing my professor's notes on a graded paper. Burned in my memory is the red-pen-circled-notation, "cliché." At the time I really didn't understand why using a cliché would be a problem. After all, it's just a linguistic shortcut, and having my professor deduct points for it struck me as splitting hairs. At the end of the day, a cliché is really just a culturally entrenched phrase that shortcuts language and allows us to speak more efficiently, right? Well, not exactly. Clichés are really the place where good metaphors go to die. That is, what was once a useful language shortcut becomes so overused that it is negatively labeled a cliché. So, what's all the hubbub about when it comes to using clichés in litigation for persuasion? It turns out that by taking the easy way out and using a cliché, you will significantly harm your courtroom persuasion efforts.
by Ryan H. Flax (Former) Managing Director, Litigation Consulting A2L Consulting I am not advocating that you spend more to develop top-notch demonstrative evidence. What I want you to do is make sure that the litigation graphics that you do use look like you paid a million bucks for them. Make sure you’re getting what you’re paying for. Let me explain why. Recently published and widely reported research out of the University of Cincinnati relating to treating Parkinson’s disease shows that the placebo effect is a real thing and a powerful psychological phenomenon. Interestingly, what the study also shows is that it matters greatly to those experiencing a strong placebo effect how much they believed the pseudo-pharmaceutical cost. Amazingly, seemingly-more-expensive drugs turned out to be much better “drugs” in effect (even though they were not drugs at all). The more a patient believed a drug cost (here the artificial difference was $100 vs $1,500 per dose), the more effective it was at treating their symptoms of Parkinson’s. Perception of cost was capable of influencing physical and psychological behavior and responses on a subconscious level. Wow.
by Alex Brown Director, Operations A2L Consulting How do you determine value? This weekend, while my oldest child was in Boston at a gymnastics meet, we thought this would be the perfect time to “renovate” her room back home. My youngest daughter wanted to help but also wanted to negotiate her fee to do so. I came up with many reasons for her to find value in helping: the good of the family, experience, and enjoyment, but none of these provided the proper balance of cost and value to her. Finally I told her that she will be able to destroy something that belongs to her big sister, without any concern for retaliation. This brought her on board, and in the end she not only loved it but she also had the added benefit of being able to tell her sister how much fun it was to destroy her room and how destructive the work needed to be. As litigators, you have a similar job of having to persuade your client about, say, the importance of using expert witnesses or the need to bring on a litigation support team. This is always a delicate conversation because there are so many factors in play; emotions, money constraints, and inexperience, to name a few. For years, the use of expert witnesses has been an easy sell for the most part. But the importance of litigation support (i.e. theming, visual presentations, trial technology/hot seat operators, and mock trial exercises) is not universally accepted, so it can be more of an uphill struggle to convince clients of the need for these things and even harder to persuade them of the value. But why? It’s clearly not the cost, since that normally runs anywhere between .5 percent and 5 percent of the legal fees in a big case. So the sticking point is the need for these services.
by Alex Brown Director of Operations A2L Consulting Last year, we talked about the pros and cons of business development professionals -- specifically, the good and bad traits of people in this profession. Here, I start a new series on the six principles of persuasion. I have long been a huge fan of Dr. Robert Cialdini and find myself repeatedly going back to a book he wrote called "Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion." In this book, he discusses the six principles of persuasion. I want to share with you these principles in a six-article series, starting with principle number one: Reciprocation. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, reciprocation is a noun that refers to a mutual exchange, a return in kind or of like value. Now before the emails come in about the ethics of giving the jury something in exchange for a favorable verdict, hear me out.
by Ryan H. Flax (Former) Managing Director of Litigation Consulting A2L Consulting
by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting If you can win the battle of opening statements, you'll likely win your trial. Up to eighty-percent of jurors will make up their minds about your case during opening statements. In this webinar you'll learn the top-five ways to maximize persuasiveness during opening statements. From how to tell compelling stories to visually supporting your key arguments, this one-hour will reveal the best secrets from courtroom persuasion experts. Ryan H. Flax, Esq., A2L's Managing Director of Litigation Consulting is an accomplished litigator who helps trial teams perfect their trial story and trial presentation using the latest persuasion science. Even if you can't make it to the live event, you'll receive access to the recorded version just for registering.
by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting Do I really need a local jury consultant? It's a question that I hear our clients struggle with frequently. The answer is maybe you do, maybe you don't. The gut instincts of many are that a jury consultant who regularly works in the jurisdiction will provide special insights that trial counsel, often admitted pro hoc vice for purposes of trial, could use to persuade the jury more effectively and have first-hand knowledge that will help in jury selection because of specific, local nuances. I understand the instinct, since - when going to trial - you naturally want every single advantage, and it's natural to fear that there are some things you just don't know about your potential jurors, your judge, the courthouse or the local community. While I understand the rationale, both emotional and logical, I've come to believe that such beliefs are now outdated and reflect pre-Internet thinking. Much like the need for 8-glasses of water a day, waiting an hour after eating to swim, or humans using 10% of their brains, I think these beliefs about local jury consultants are mostly stubborn old wives' tales. The reality is that human beings make decisions following the same principles, regardless of where they may live, and the psychology of persuasion, as well as individual and group decision-making does not need to be reinvented from place to place. What you need and can rely on is the best consultant with the best skills, regardless of their location. I'd like to offer seven ways of working through this challenge with a solution for you, whether you believe a local jury consultant helps or whether you believe hiring the best jury consultant is best for your case.
by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting In case you missed it, the New York Attorney General's Office dropped a bombshell this week. They have accused major retailers including Wal-Mart, Target, Walgreen's and GNC of knowingly selling supplements that contain either none of what is advertised (an incredible 80% of the time) or something else entirely. The herbal supplement industry is estimated to have close to $100 billion in annual sales. That's about five times the revenue of all AmLaw 200 law firms combined. Once I saw the New York Times piece reporting on this issue, I wanted to learn more about what this might mean for litigators. Fortunately, I knew exactly who to speak with. Below is an interview with Dr. David Schwartz, head of scientific support to counsel at Innovative Science Solutions. He describes his role as something of a scientific detective, regularly helping ISS’s clients defend and support pharmaceuticals, industrial chemicals, medical devices, foods, and dietary supplements in the courts, the regulatory arena, and the market place. In this six-minute interview, Dr. Schwartz shares his outlook for how this issue might unfold in the courts.
by Ryan H. Flax (Former) Managing Director, Litigation Consulting A2L Consulting We strongly advocate that counsel must use a visual presentation to support his or her oral argument at trial (and anywhere they need to be persuasive). This most commonly happens during opening statements and closing arguments at trial and the dominant format for such presentations is PowerPoint – a very good tool. However, like cutting your own hair or doing your own dental work, we must again caution you that you must really know what you’re doing because your case may depend on it. On January 22, 2015, the Supreme Court of the State of Washington published its opinion in State v. Walker, overturning the State Prosecutor’s conviction of an accused murderer because the attorney went too far with his demonstrative evidence in closing. A murderer has potentially been freed because, in the Court’s view, counsel was inflammatory in his presentation and “appealed to passion and prejudice” of the jury. Certainly as zealous advocates we do want to appeal to the passion of jurors on some level. We need their emotions to be in sync with the law and evidence, but what might be too much so as to prejudice the proceedings? Let’s explore the Washington Supreme Court’s opinion to see.
by Ryan H. Flax (Former) Managing Director, Litigation Consulting A2L Consulting Inter Partes Review, or IPR, has drastically changed the way we litigate patent infringement in the U.S. In big-budget patent cases, it is now almost inevitable that an IPR will be requested (and likely granted). The process is supposed to take no longer than a year to complete, but under current case law that’s a year’s delay in the district court case. Moreover, the odds are that any patent that enters IPR will not leave it unscathed. So, whether you need to win an IPR to save your client’s patent’s claims or to insure your client against infringement allegations, the bottom line is that it’s critically important. And, you need to win. Here are what I believe to be five important tips for improving your chances of victory once you get to the oral argument stage at the end of an IPR. At that point, you’ll need to convince Administrative Patent Judges that you’re the most reasonable person in the room and what you’ve said throughout the IPR “just makes sense.”
by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting We East Coasters have a love-hate relationship with snow, and the snow moving into the Northeast today may be one for the record books - particularly around Boston. It will dominate the news for days - and it probably should. An incredibly large number of people will be impacted by this particular storm. Under or next to that red line on the map where the storm is forecast to hit, you'll find roughly 20% of the U.S. population living on roughly 3% of the country's land, half of the hedge funds, one third of the headquarters of Fortune 500 firms and — in the states under the red line, about 35% of the country's and, hard as it may be to believe, about 25% of the world's lawyers! A blizzard disrupts our lives. It can feel tedious, it creates confusion, and it generates a lot of hard work — sort of like a trial. Not all trials are blizzard-like, but some surely are. Here are 21 ways some trials are like a blizzard and how to avoid white-out conditions in your courtroom.
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