Many times in a typical year, A2L is voted #1 in one of our service areas (jury consulting, litigation graphics consulting, and hot-seat/trial technology consulting) in reader-driven polls. Often these polls are conducted by major legal industry publications and sometimes by bar association publications. We don't announce all of our wins as honestly, I feel a little guilty writing about it. Yes, that sounds a bit like a #humblebrag, but I mean it. I, like all the other authors here at A2L’s Litigation Consulting Report Blog, work hard to create reader-focused articles -- not A2L-focused articles. We publish to engage with the world’s top trial lawyers in a way unlike anyone else. We publish to elevate the overall state of the industry. We publish because we authentically love what we do. Today, we're very proud to announce that the Massachusetts litigation community voted in the annual Massachusetts Lawyer Weekly reader survey and concluded that A2L was a top firm in both courtroom presentations and jury consulting. We are honored and grateful. With that announcement and explanation out of the way, let's make this article about you -- our 10,000 or so readers whom we value so much. Let's even do it in my favorite way possible -- using a list. The ABA said of our blog articles, “It’s hard to resist the infectious numbered-list headlines that keep us reading their chatty, first-person posts answering questions we hadn't yet thought to ask.” So here are the top five reasons why A2L being voted number one matters to you that are in no way about us: These votes are helpful for your client relationship. It’s easier for you if a company is vetted already. As they say, nobody gets fired for hiring IBM, and the same is true when it comes to your litigation clients. Because A2L is regularly voted a top litigation consulting firm, you can make a recommendation to your client with total peace of mind. There is so much to worry about at trial. It’s nice to take one worry off the table by hiring a trial consultant that has this level of approval. This saves your client money. Taking the time to find the litigation consulting firm that’s right for your case is expensive to do well. This effort could easily cost the client thousands of dollars. Instead, you can present these options to your client: we can interview all the regular players or we can believe in the wisdom of the legal community. This saves you time in vetting. Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly issued a helpful guide of top-rated firms like ours. It's a nice peer-reviewed guide that gives you insight into who the best people are. You can download that by clicking here. You know that your peers trust us. At the end of the day, most of us trust our peers to give us good recommendations for everything from doctors to lawyers to handymen. The same is true for litigation consultants. Other free articles and resources related to A2L's jury consulting and demonstrative evidence consulting practices: Three Top Trial Lawyers Tell Us Why Storytelling Is So Important A2L Voted Best Jury Consultants & Best Trial Graphics Firm 3 Types of Litigation Graphics Consultants 11 Ways to Start Right With Your Litigation Graphics Team 21 Reasons a Litigator Is Your Best Litigation Graphics Consultant 5 Settlement Scenarios Where Litigation Graphics Create Leverage 6 Triggers That Prompt a Call to Your Litigation Consultant VIDEO: Working with A2L Consulting - Customers Talk About A2L's Litigation Consulting Services 17 Reasons Why Litigation Consultants Are Better at Graphics Than Law Firms 10 Types of Value Added by Litigation Graphics Consultants The Real Value of Jury Consulting, Litigation Graphics & Trial Tech How Does a Trial Presentation Consulting Firm Do What It Does? With So Few Trials, Where Do You Find Trial Experience Now? 12 Ways in Which We Make a Boutique Litigation Firm Feel Like a Big Firm 16 PowerPoint Litigation Graphics You Won't Believe Are PowerPoint 10 Things Litigation Consultants Do That WOW Litigators 6 Studies That Support Litigation Graphics in Courtroom Presentations FREE Webinar: Persuading with PowerPoint Litigation Graphics FREE Webinar: Storytelling as a Persuasion Tool 10 Things Litigators Can Learn From Newscasters The 12 Worst PowerPoint Mistakes Litigators Make 6 Trial Presentation Errors Lawyers Can Easily Avoid Explaining the Value of Litigation Consulting to In-House Counsel The 14 Most Preventable Trial Preparation Mistakes Trial Graphics Dilemma: Why Can't I Make My Own Slides? (Says Lawyer) Law360 Interviews A2L Consulting's Founder/CEO Ken Lopez
As you might expect, I think about the litigation graphics industry a good deal. It’s a fairly new industry, and it is undergoing constant change. The way I think about it, the industry is actually fairly small. There are perhaps three other serious national players that I would be mildly comfortable recommending when A2L is conflicted out of a case. Still, though, these firms are quite different from A2L, so a trial lawyer should expect an entirely different experience as a customer than with A2L. Most of our competition now uses the term “litigation consultant” that we first started using in the mid-1990s. In fact, we may have been the first to use it the term. However, this term means vastly different things from firm to firm. At A2L, we use the term litigation consultant primarily to refer to attorneys on our staff with a creative expertise, trial experience, and an understanding of persuasion science who interface with trial teams to help: develop the visual presentation develop themes, narratives, and strategies for the opening statement work with our jury consultants to help test cases As one can readily discern, these people are truly trusted advisors. They add value as opposed to taking orders.
by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting Every month, 1,000-2,000 free e-books and webinars are downloaded and viewed on A2L Consulting's web site. These free resources are likely the single best place on the Internet to learn how the best trial lawyers prepare for and win at trial. It's an exchange of litigation's best practices like no other. Judging by the topics searched for and read during the 100,000+ visits to A2L's website and industry-leading litigation blog so far in 2017, the legal industry is especially eager to learn more about voir dire, storytelling for persuasion (including visual persuasion), and jury consulting generally. Below are the top 10 free litigation best practice resources that have been downloaded and viewed so far in 2017. Choose your favorite(s) now, share this list with friends, and improve your results. Really, everything below is complimentary. 10. The Opening Statement Toolkit: In this 219-page book, you will find 66 articles curated from A2L's massive collection of posts related to litigation and persuasion. Each article relates to opening statements in some way. 9. Why Work with A2L: This free guide details how we think as litigation consultants and the value that litigation consultants provide generally. It's a useful tool to hand to in-house counsel to explain how jury, graphics, and technology consultants can contribute to winning a case. 8. Top 75 Articles of All Time: Our litigation consultants have compiled 75 expert articles on topics related to litigation support and litigation generally. This free book compiled the top 75 articles written in the first five years of our litigation and persuasion blog. 7. The Voir Dire Handbook: This one-of-a-kind and brand-new book will be helpful to junior and veteran courtroom practitioners alike. Because the composition of a jury can dramatically affect the outcome of the case, it is vitally important to get voir dire right and use whatever tools are available for doing so. 6. Using Litigation Graphics at Trial: In our most comprehensive e-book about litigation graphics and courtroom persuasion, A2L's jury and graphics consultants have compiled 74 expert articles in what is a first-of-its-kind book. 5. Tactics for Complex Civil Litigation: Whether you are a veteran trial lawyer or support trial teams, you will find this book valuable. This guidebook includes 74 articles about how to best to prepare and try a complex civil case for bench and jury trials. 4. How to Use Storytelling in Litigation E-Book: In our biggest e-book yet on courtroom storytelling, our litigation consultants have compiled 75 expert articles on topics related to litigation support and litigation generally. 3. How to Design and Use a Great Trial Timeline: This book is a must-have for anyone who prepares informative or persuasive timelines designed to influence and change what people think. 2. Using Storytelling as a Persuasion Tool at Trial Webinar: Whether you are in-house counsel, outside counsel, or litigation support, this 60-minute webinar plus 20-minute Q&A will improve your understanding and use of storytelling techniques during litigation. Led by seasoned litigator, Tony Klapper. 1. The Litigation Consulting Report Blog: Every month, 200 or more people subscribe to our blog. Six years into its existence, there are nearly 10,000 subscribers. You or a friend can subscribe free here, and you can control how often you hear about new articles (published 1x-3x/week) here.
Law360 is a top legal industry publisher owned by Lexis-Nexis. Its daily newsletters are a must-read for trial lawyers involved in big-ticket litigation. This interview, Trial Consultants Q&A: A2L Consulting's Ken Lopez, was originally published on April 28, 2017, and is reprinted here with permission. Links to A2L articles and resources have been added by A2L in this reprint. Q: What aspect of trial consulting do you and your firm specialize in? What is unique about your firm, compared to other trial consulting firms? A: Founded in 1995, our firm is a leading national litigation consulting firm that helps trial lawyers and other advocates more reliably win complex and high-dollar disputes. We are typically in trial year-round and deliver world-class client-pleasing results in three key service areas: jury research and consulting, litigation graphics consulting, and trial technology consulting. We have recently been voted #1 in each of these categories by major legal publications. The composition of our leadership distinguishes it from other trial consulting and litigation consultant firms. Unlike firms whose origins are rooted in the trial technology business, the engineering business or the marketing/public relations fields, our team is composed of experts in the persuasion sciences. These include former litigators from top law firms, attorney-artists and social science Ph.Ds with decades of experience working with judges and juries. We primarily serve AmLaw 100 law firms and their clients. However, the firm regularly works with boutique law firms and in-house departments. It counts amongst its clients nearly all top law firms and a large portion of the Fortune 500. Most people find A2L through its litigation and persuasion-focused blog, The Litigation Consulting Report. It has nearly 10,000 subscribers and was named one of the top ten blogs in litigation by the American Bar Association. Q: What was the most interesting or memorable case that you worked on? A: The average case at A2L Consulting is a business dispute between global companies with $100 million at stake where we provide jury consulting, a mock trial, litigation graphics, and courtroom hot-seat trial technology support. One of our most memorable cases was entirely — not average. Through a top trial lawyer, we were hired to work on behalf of a surviving family member of the 1996 crash of ValuJet Flight 592 in the Everglades. This was not a plane that exploded or quickly crashed. Instead, oxygen containers in the cargo area helped fuel a fire that caused smoke to fill the plane. Then, the oxygen-fueled fire burned through the passenger cabin floor from below. After some time, controls on the plane were destroyed by the fire. Then, the plane flipped and dove into the Everglades below. No one survived. It took a long time for the tragedy to unfold and the passengers had awareness of what was happened. We know this because the plane was equipped with recording devices in both the cockpit and the passenger cabin. The recording is confidential, but none of us who worked on this case will ever forget what we heard on that recording. To help the jury visualize the experience the passengers had, we could have created a 3-D animation to show what the experience inside of the cabin was like. Instead, we synced that chilling audio with an animation we created that helped tell the tragic story. Once the animation was admitted into evidence, the case quickly settled. Q: Which stage of the trial process is the most challenging, and why? A: While we support all phases of litigation from prefiling to appeal, our firm most often focuses its consulting efforts on the opening statement. Indeed, we speak and write about opening statements often. Perhaps second only to jury selection, the opening statement can make or break an entire case. It provides the framework and narrative upon which the judge or jury will hear the evidence. For many, consciously or subconsciously, the decision about the outcome of the case will be made during opening statement. Because the opening statement is so critical, the best trial lawyers expend enormous amounts of effort preparing for openings. I’ve seen some trial lawyers practice their opening more than 100 times over the course of a year. Not surprisingly, these trial lawyers tend to win their cases. In every type of litigation consulting we provide, the opening statement is a central focus. When we conduct a mock trial, the attorneys present their openings to mock jurors or mock judges. When our senior litigation consultants work with top trial lawyers to refine their trial presentation, we ask them to present their openings as part of that process. When we design a PowerPoint presentation for opening, we ask our clients to do run-throughs of openings. When we introduce one of our trial technicians/hot-seat operators to a trial team, we ask the first chair to practice opening statements so they develop a rapport with the trial tech. Indeed, sometimes, we are asked to draft an opening statement as part of our litigation consulting effort. Opening statements are the most challenging part of the trial process because they should be. Cases are regularly won and lost because of them. Q: How has trial consulting evolved over time? What major differences are there between the industry when you started and the industry now? A: Our firm, now a national litigation consulting firm with jury consulting, litigation graphics consulting and trial technology consulting practices all voted #1 by the legal industry, was started as Animators at Law, an animation and litigation graphics firm for trial lawyers focused on persuasion. Back in the mid-1990s when we started our firm, the idea of using demonstrative evidence/litigation graphics during a trial was new. Today, no serious trial lawyer would go to trial in big-ticket litigation without litigation graphics and nearly all would hire a litigation graphics consulting firm like ours. When we started our firm, PowerPoint did not exist. Most litigation graphics were printed trial boards. Today, trial boards are used as unique emphasis tools that supplement a PowerPoint trial presentation. The practice of jury research has changed too. It has evolved from a guru-dominated practice where gut instinct drove many decisions. Today, there is more scientific rigor among top jury research firms. They let the data speak for itself and supplement that data with advice based on experience. Of course, the trial technology practice has radically changed. In the 1990s, it barely existed. Now, the complexity of cases demands that an experienced trial technician/hot-seat operator run the technology, show the trial presentation and be ready to pull up evidence on a moment’s notice. Q: What are some of the biggest challenges when working with attorneys and their clients? A: One of my colleagues likes to say, “they call it the practice of law, but nobody is practicing.” I agree wholeheartedly. If I could change one thing about the way trial lawyers prepare for trial, it would be the way they practice. The correlation between open practice in front of peers and winning cases is unmistakable. Half of the time, trial lawyers practice extensively and seek feedback from litigation consultants and colleagues. These lawyers tend to win their cases. When we see a trial lawyer who wants to privately prepare their trial presentation on the eve of trial, we worry. It’s not that this approach can’t work. It often does. Instead, we simply recognize that the more a trial team openly practices, the more often that trial team wins.
by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting Imagine a world in which the best trial lawyers work in small boutique litigation firms and charge clients half of current rates. Many people have imagined such a world for a long time, and even though we're not there yet, we're closer than we used to be. Today, a few of these smaller firms do exist. They are being run by some of the world's best trial lawyers, and these lawyers do in fact charge a lot less than they used to. However, this does not represent a new type of law firm; this type of firm has always existed. After a while, these firms either become large law firms with a refreshed culture of entrepreneurialism (e.g. Boies Schiller) or they get absorbed into a big law firm (e.g. Bancroft LLP into Kirkland & Ellis). Only a small handful of firms have found something of a middle ground and are able to deliver large law firm results without a lawyer headcount in the thousands (e.g. Bartlit Beck and Williams & Connolly). Working closely with boutique law firms as we do, I see that large companies are getting much of what they hoped for. They get exceptional lawyering, better rates, and that big-firm swagger that unmistakably contributes to winning cases. There are some gaps, however, and the best of these firms acknowledge it and fill it with litigation consultants. It turns out that sometimes the resources and scale of a large law firm are precisely what is needed to overwhelm and overrun an opponent. A large enough army can always overrun even the most elite small special forces team. However, this is only true if the elite group does not have a means of bringing in more support on a moment's notice. The best in-house departments see this nimbleness as a strength. Our litigation consulting firm is often called upon to serve in this role. So here are 12 ways that we can make a litigation boutique as powerful as a very large law firm. We help keep prices down. If you're a big law firm, built into every hour billed is a cost for marketing, all those offices, and all that support staff. That is not true for a small firm. The small firm does not need to keep full-time staff on hand for services that are more efficiently outsourced (e.g. litigation graphics, trial technician services, and other trial consulting services). See 17 Reasons Why Litigation Consultants Are Better at Graphics Than Law Firms. We amplify the skills of the best members of the trial team. Part of our role for many of the top trial lawyers is to help them hone their skill set. See Your Coach Is Not Better Than You – in the Courtroom or Elsewhere. We amplify the skills of other members of the trial team. In the new litigation boutiques, there are often a handful of superstars, but there are always some lawyers who can benefit from learning the best practices of the best trial lawyers. Firms like A2L are in a unique position to transfer skills from one top trial team to another. See How to Get Great Results From a Good Lawyer. We free up the busiest trial lawyers to do what they do best. When you're one of the elite, management of your time is essential. Saying "no" and letting go becomes the new "yes." See How Valuable is Your Time vs. Litigation Support's Time?
by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting Our clients at A2L tend to be the best of the best trial lawyers. It's a privilege to work with the people that we work with. We learn from them, and they learn from us. It's that last point, though, that can be a sticking point for trial lawyers who are not used to working with litigation consultants. They wonder . . . Why would I need a litigation consultant or coach if I'm already recognized as one of the best at what I do? I know I'm one of the best, and I know this litigation consultant is not better than me, so how are they helpful? What if I'm perceived to not be as good as my reputation? All these responses are very normal reactions to someone accepting coaching for the first time or for the first time in a long time. However, they can all be answered with some combination of the following three answers: Most of us have had a coach at some time in our lives. If we were very young, they were probably better than us, and they could show us the right things to do to be better at our craft. If we were adolescent or older, our coaches were often not better than us at the thing being coached. Instead, in adulthood, our coaches are usually not there to model the behavior that makes us better. Rather, they are there to help us be our best. Whether it is observing our golf swing and using cameras and computers to compare it with the ideal golf swing; whether it is telling us whether our piano concerto is being played with emotion and passion as opposed to being too mechanical; or whether it is suggesting a rearrangement of the order of an opening statement; the idea is the same. The goal of a great coach is to bring out the best. See, The Real Value of Jury Consulting, Litigation Graphics & Trial Tech. At the risk of quoting a litigator colleague too often in my writings, I will note again that they call it the practice of law but nobody is practicing! It’s only a minority of trial lawyers who routinely practice their trial presentations. I think they are doing themselves a tremendous disservice when they don't practice, and I don't believe the clients should tolerate this. A litigation consultant will make sure they practice and will help them practice. See, 25 Things In-House Counsel Should Insist Outside Litigation Counsel Do Even Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, Katy Perry, and Joel Osteen have had coaches. All of these people were better than their coaches. You may be the best at what you do, but ask yourself, why do people who are the best at what they do still use coaches? To make it really hit home, ask yourself why many of your colleagues from other firms use litigation consultants to improve their results at trial? The answers will help you become a better trial lawyer. See, Accepting Litigation Consulting is the New Hurdle for Litigators Other FREE A2L Consulting resources about practicing for trial, using litigation consultants, the value of a litigation coach, and how to best practice your trial presentation: 7 Things In-House Misses When Litigation Consultants are Underutilized Lawyers: It’s Time to Make Time for Trial Preparation 12 Reasons Using Trial Consultants (Like Us) Is Possibly Not Fair The Magic of a 30:1 Presentation Preparation Ratio [Free Download] Trial Lawyer’s Guide to Jury Consulting & Mock Trials The Very Best Use of Coaches in Trial Preparation 21 Reasons a Litigator Is Your Best Litigation Graphics Consultant Practice, Say Jury Consultants, is Why Movie Lawyers Perform So Well 6 Ways to Use a Mock Trial to Develop Your Opening Statement With So Few Trials, Where Do You Find Trial Experience Now? Litigator & Litigation Consultant Value Added: A "Simple" Final Product Litigation Consultant: Embrace a Two-Track Strategy & Win the War 3 Ways to Force Yourself to Practice Your Trial Presentation 6 Good Reasons to Conduct a Mock Trial 25 Things In-House Counsel Should Insist Outside Litigation Counsel Do The 5 Very Best Reasons to Conduct a Mock Trial FREE E-BOOK: Making Great Speeches and Connecting with Your Audience Accepting Litigation Consulting is the New Hurdle for Litigators 16 Trial Presentation Tips You Can Learn from Hollywood Practice is a Crucial Piece of the Storytelling Puzzle Mock trial services lead by a jury consultant with 400+ mock trials 50 Characteristics of Top Trial Teams The 14 Most Preventable Trial Preparation Mistakes 7 Habits of Great Trial Teams 10 Criteria that Define Great Trial Teams Free Guidebook: Why Should I Work with A2L Consulting?
by Tony Klapper (former) Managing Director, Litigation Consulting A2L Consulting At A2L, we tend to work with the top litigators at some of the nation’s best-known firms. These men and women are obviously excellent lawyers, very good at what they do. They are also very busy. They always have another complaint to respond to, another discovery dispute to resolve, another brief to write or edit, another partners meeting to attend, another associate to evaluate, and another set of bills to review before a client sees them. So when it comes time to thinking about what trial presentation works best, some of these lawyers procrastinate and delay developing the story. This is a strategic error. As early as possible, you should be crafting your narrative and deciding what kind of jury research exercise you might want to do or what kind of graphics to show. These things can be the difference between winning and losing the case – and they deserve high priority. It’s not a matter of self-promotion for A2L; rather, it’s an understanding, which we hope all our team members share, that these aspects of trial are crucial and should not be deferred without a very good reason. That email to a client is important, and so is that meet and confer letter – but the essence of a trial presentation is even more important. And it has a time element that many lawyers may not be aware of. If they allow for a mock jury exercise months before the real trial, they can easily take what they have learned and apply it to their case. The sooner it is done, the better, because the lessons learned in a mock can help guide not only your ultimate trial narrative but also the evidence needed to support that narrative. If you wait too long, the admissible evidence may already be locked in because the discovery doors have closed. But working backwards to get the timing right requires careful planning and strategic thought — something that the over-stretched, busy partner might not make time for. But making time for the building blocks of your narrative is one of the most critical things you can do as a litigator—particularly when there is a very real risk of (or opportunity for) going to trial. If you are too busy, try to divide your team into those who handle the day-to-day “litigation” tasks and those who can allocate sufficient time to the big-picture trial thoughts. These, of course, cannot be completely placed in separate buckets, but if you start structuring your trial and litigation teams along these lines (with open and frequent communication between the two), you will end up making the time necessary to both properly litigate and properly try your case. One way of handling this that worked very well in matters that I was involved in during my 20 years of practice was to have the trial lead do the things that only he or she could (or should) do, and have his or her top lieutenant make sure that the day-to-day things get done. The lead trial attorney can review this work but need not be hands-on. That frees time to accomplish the essential task of trial preparation, well in advance. After all, a law firm is about client service, and that is certainly what the client in a high-stakes case would want. Other A2L Consulting articles discussing trial preparation, the timing of trial preparation, and best practices of leading trial teams include: 10 Criteria that Define Great Trial Teams The 14 Most Preventable Trial Preparation Mistakes The 13 Biggest Reasons to Avoid Last-Minute Trial Preparation 7 Habits of Great Trial Teams FREE DOWNLOAD: Storytelling for Litigators E-Book 3rd Ed. 16 Trial Presentation Tips You Can Learn from Hollywood Three Top Trial Lawyers Tell Us Why Storytelling Is So Important 3 Trial Preparation Red Flags That Suggest a Loss is Imminent How Long Before Trial Should I Begin Preparing My Trial Graphics? Top 7 Things I've Observed as a Litigation Consultant Sample One-Year Trial Prep Calendar for High Stakes Cases 7 Ways to Prepare Trial Graphics Early & Manage Your Budget Practice is a Crucial Piece of the Storytelling Puzzle 6 Triggers That Prompt a Call to Your Litigation Consultant Planning For Courtroom Persuasion? Use a Two-Track Trial Strategy 7 Reasons It's Okay to Procrastinate on Your Trial Preparation
by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting
by Tony Klapper Managing Director, Litigation Consulting A2L Consulting
by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting I don't want this post to be purely self-congratulatory, but I do have some good news to share. I think it's relevant and useful news for litigators and litigation professionals. A2L was just voted number one in the legal industry again. This time, it's in the category of trial consultants, in a poll conducted by the prestigious Legal Times newspaper. This accolade comes on the heels of being voted the number one jury consultant and number one litigation graphics provider in a variety of other national polls. Here's why I think this information is helpful for our readers. Twenty years after founding A2L, when I look at our industry I see three or four firms capable of delivering truly top-class results in high-profile litigation. However, the view from the law firms seems entirely different. If you Google any of our services like jury consulting, litigation graphics, or trial technician providers, we may very well come up first in many of these searches (for good reason), but there will be dozens if not hundreds of other providers listed for these services. How is one expected to sort the wheat from the chaff? You can't tell from a Google search because it's obviously not a reliable indicator of who is a top services provider. You can't always tell from your colleagues either. Have they had have many excellent experiences with a provider, or just a one off -- or do they have a longstanding relationship with a provider without a reliable track record? Well, it's exactly surveys like this one in Legal Times that provide an objective source from thousands of lawyers surveyed. And I'm proud to say that over the last five years, A2L has been consistently highly ranked in just about everywhere we've been nominated. So if you're in the market for a litigation consulting firm like ours or if you're in the market for another service like discovery, court reporting, or even law firm and litigation financing, a guide like this one is a good source of information. These guides prepared by objective organizations like Legal Times provide a directory of high-quality providers and can save a stressed litigator or litigation paralegal considerable time identifying the very best jury consultants, the very best litigation graphics providers, the very best trial technicians, the very best trial consultants or any one of dozens of categories relevant to litigation. Click here to download your copy of this 2016 guidebook. I hope it's helpful to you.
by Katie Bagwill A2L Consulting Watching a mock jury deliberate is a lot like watching Dr. Phil; there is a lot of arguing, and most of the “facts” end up skewed. Nevertheless, a mock jury’s conclusions and how they reach them are essential to any lawyer who wants to understand the weaknesses of his or her case. Here are some of my takeaways from observing this fascinating exercise recently. Be clear. If a point or idea you want to instill in the jury isn’t clarified enough, you will see it warped and interpreted wildly during the deliberations. During each mock presentation that I saw, the amount of attention paid and the volume of notes taken varied, but one constant seemed to be apparent: jurors want to feel as if they have all the information. Even if they don’t, once they have a firm opinion, they will use any of the “facts” they have to defend it. Naturally you want these facts to be in your favor, but for the sake of this exercise it is actually more beneficial to you for the stacks to be weighted against you. In order to improve, you need to know how you could lose. Be passionate but humble. It is important for the jury to feel empathetic toward your client, and for that to happen they need to connect with you. While presenting your case, you want to appear confident and informed without coming off as arrogant. Persuasion is all about presentation. One of the most important notes that our mock jurors made about one of our presenters was that he seemed “smug,” which made him seem sneaky, and it spiraled from there.
by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting We at A2L are launching a new e-book this month. This time, we are publishing the book jointly with IMS ExpertServices, one of the nation’s premier providers of experts and consultants for top law firms and Fortune 500 corporations. The title of the new book is Expert Trial Testimony: Direct and Cross-Examination. The book answers every question you might have thought of in connection with expert testimony at trial in U.S. courts, and it does so in a clear, conversational manner. Plus, it’s a free download. As more and more money is at stake in civil trials, and as the subject matter grows more and more complex and difficult for many jurors to understand without assistance, the value and importance of expert witnesses has grown dramatically. The difference between an effective, well-prepared, convincing expert witness and one who does not come across well to a jury can often be the difference between winning and losing a trial where hundreds of millions, or billions, of dollars are at stake. The book is directed at experts themselves and gives dozens of do’s and don’ts that will make any expert’s testimony effective and convincing at a trial. It’s not only experts who will benefit from reading this book but also trial attorneys, trial technicians, in-house counsel, and anyone who wants to understand the best ways to put on expert testimony. The book addresses the typical expert witness as follows:
by Tony Klapper Managing Director, Litigation Consulting A2L Consulting We have always emphasized how important it is for a trial lawyer to organize his or her case so as to tell a consistent and convincing story to the jury or judge. In making that recommendation, we draw on experience and common sense, as well as on science that indicates that human beings are wired to follow intriguing stories and to look forward to their ultimate resolution. “Storytelling is essential to winning trials – and that goes for mediations, arbitrations, and hearings, literally anywhere you must connect with an audience,” we have written. “Whether it’s your story or not, a story will inevitably emerge during a trial. Mock trials and focus groups have repeatedly shown that when a jury has two camps representing the two sides of the case, each camp will have a fairly consistent story that it endorses and clings to. Consistently, we find that those stories are short, that they fit with common sense, that they borrow some of the salient facts from the trial, and that they are complete tales, with a beginning, a middle and an end – including what happened and what should have happened.” A story removes a case from the realm of the strictly legal and makes it personal. It humanizes one’s client and helps a jury identify with the client. But can storytelling go too far as a technique of persuasion?
by Tony Klapper Managing Director, Litigation Consulting A2L Consulting When I was a practicing lawyer, trying high-stakes cases in the major law firm world, many of my colleagues would often cast doubt on the need for jury consultants and mock trials. They would say that as experienced trial lawyers, they already had a good feel for a jury and for the art of persuasion. In addition, lawyers would argue that very few reliable conclusions could be drawn from the attitudes and outlooks of a small number of mock jurors. Actually, this is a rather short-sighted way to approach the topic. A jury consultant can add immeasurable value to a trial team’s efforts in any number of ways. Here are five of them: Theme development. Working with a mock jury provides invaluable research into what themes will work with the actual jury and what themes will not work. The mock jury will get a chance to hear several proposed themes for your side, as well as the way in which the opposition can be expected to rebut those themes. Interviewing the mock jurors will shed considerable light on what works for them, emotionally, and what does not. Message clarity. Many lawyers on a trial team get lost in the weeds and develop countless lines of information without any concern for whether they contribute to their side’s main narrative. It is very easy to review documents for their own sake without any consideration of why they should care about the documents. A mock trial will force all those attorneys to focus on the facts that really matter to their case and will provide the needed discipline.
Share: