Part 4 of the Persuasion Occasion podcast series with Perkins Coie (see parts 1, 2, 3, and the full podcast on Spotify) Trial consultants love stories. Unfortunately, facts occasionally insist on participating. One of my favorite persuasion lessons comes from an antitrust matter involving the proposed merger of two of the largest airlines at the time. The case never produced quite the courtroom drama we imagined. The matter settled a couple of weeks before trial, and like many high-stakes cases, the final resolution came before every argument could be fully tested in court. Yet one demonstrative from that matter taught me more about persuasion than many cases that actually went to verdict. The exhibit was almost embarrassingly simple. It wasn't a 3D animation. It wasn't a sophisticated economic model. It wasn't a dazzling piece of trial graphics. It was a slowly scrolling list of airline bankruptcies. Just a list. One name after another. Many of them familiar. Eastern. Pan Am. TWA. Braniff. People of a certain age recognize these names immediately. They were once household brands. Today, they're gone. And as the list continues to scroll, something interesting happens. You start to see the airline industry differently. Here's my explanation below:
Most people, when they think of trial graphics, focus on exhibits to be used at trial. But graphics can also be used in motions and briefs presented to judges, even if jurors will never see them. After all, if you are using graphics to make your argument or tell your story at trial, why not use them at an earlier stage to make your argument convincingly in your brief?
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