by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting I am very proud of A2L Consulting's role in the creation of the job title "litigation consultant." Over the years, this position has evolved somewhat, but it remains substantially similar to the way we designed it in the mid-1990s. Back then, it was my full-time job. Today, I still get a chance to do parts of it now and then, and after 20 years, I believe it's the best job in litigation. The role of a litigation consultant is to work with trial teams and help them develop the best visual and rhetorical strategies for persuading factfinders at trial, ADR, or in any dispute. In the 1990s, no one but the attorney-consultants at A2L called themselves litigation consultants and few if any firms offered a similar service. Now, litigation consultants are generally litigators themselves often hailing from a large law firm. They spend most of their time directing the development of persuasive PowerPoint presentations, working with jury consultants in mock trials, and helping top litigators more effectively tell their stories at trial. As we've written before, this role is becoming increasingly important in the litigation industry where even top litigators make it to trial only once every few years. By contrast, a litigation consultant may see the inside of a courtroom dozens of times or more per year. If you love litigation like I do, this is the best job in the world. Here are nine reasons why I think this is so. Trial. Let's be honest, the best part of litigation is not the endless years of paper pushing in advance of trial, it's the theater of preparing for and performing at trial. A litigation consultant skips all of the pre-trial tedium and gets to engage in all the best parts of litigation. See, 11 Things Your Colleagues Pay Litigation Consultants to Do.
As someone who has participated in countless mock trials, I can attest to the fact that it can be an incredibly stressful and overwhelming experience. From preparing your arguments to presenting them in front of a panel of jurors or judges, there are a lot of moving parts to keep track of.
by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting
by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting We talk a lot about storytelling in our A2L blog articles. Our books, webinars, and articles that are focused on storytelling -- like Storytelling for Litigators 3rd Ed., Storytelling as a Persuasion Tool, and 5 Elements of Storytelling and Persuasion -- are among our most popular. We believe that effective storytelling is central to winning cases, and we've talked about the kind of results you can get when storytelling is used well in $300 Million of Litigation Consulting and Storytelling Validation and Patent Litigation Graphics + Storytelling Proven Effective: The Apple v. Samsung Jury Speaks. We've also written several times about how to structure a good story or opening statement for trial in articles like How to Structure Your Next Speech, Opening Statement or Presentation, Portray Your Client As a Hero in 17 Easy Storytelling Steps, The Top 14 TED Talks for Lawyers and Litigators 2014, and 5 Keys to Telling a Compelling Story in the Courtroom. However, there are many ways to put together an effective story, and the format matters a great deal.
by Ryan H. Flax (Former) Managing Director, Litigation Consulting & General Counsel A2L Consulting It’s always interesting to me how humans view and judge each other. We all do it almost all of the time, in every interaction with other people. We even do it when we don’t even interact with others, for example, while driving or watching TV. We develop little dramas and characters in our minds to make sense of the world around us and its characters. This is particularly important in my profession, where my goal is to help litigators frame their case or showcase their client in a compelling and engaging way for judge or jury. I’ve just watched the video below and it highlights how important it is to frame our clients’ character correctly when we want a decision maker to see things our way. That “correct” way of introducing our client is whatever way will result in a decision in our favor – Ask: what would make the judge or jury feel our client should prevail?
In my last post, 7 Bad Habits of Law Firm Litigators, I wrote about the problems caused by litigators who, even when they have an adequate budget, design their own PowerPoint slides for trial. I've seen this result in: demonstrative evidence being excluded for using inappropriate tactics; demonstrative evidence being used for outright misconduct; opportunities being missed to use persuasion tricks of the trade; lawyers getting stuck in a chronological recitation of the facts; an overall lack of anything memorable or creative being presented; the use of out-of-date techniques like bullet points that damage credibility; and many other things that, as I said a few Halloween's ago, can lead to a deMONSTERative evidence nightmare. Well, there's new problem to add to this list of challenges faced by litigators who design their own slides, and it was just revealed by a brand new study conducted by the Missouri School of Journalism and the Washington Post.
by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting
by Ryan H. Flax, Esq. (Former) Managing Director, Litigation Consulting & General Counsel A2L Consulting I’ve passed another anniversary at A2L Consulting and in my time as a litigation consultant I’ve been both surprised and reassured about the state of the litigation business and its players (I also wrote about my surprises upon beginning my career as a litigation consultant). I’ve seen both the very best and quite bad litigators in action and have consulted for both. Although some litigators don’t live up to my high standards, I’m impressed by many litigators as both professionals and people. Here are seven of my observations over these years that I think might help you in your practice. Many Lawyers Confuse Chronology With Storytelling It is almost universally accepted that storytelling is important to engaging an audience (including a jury) and that framing a client’s case as a compelling story is key to doing your best at trial, particularly in opening statements. But more often than not, when I ask a litigation team what their client's story is, rather than explain “why we’re really here” as they would to a jury and illustrate some conflict and emotionally valuable moral that is critical to juror engagement, they rattle off some chronological series of events that led to a legal injury to their client or some misconstrued relationship by the opposing party. These are not stories and presenting a case framed this way, while possibly interesting to a legal scholar, is not compelling to a juror. I’m surprised that so many smart litigators fall into the chronology trap and forsake emotional connection to engage jurors. I don’t advise pandering to a jury or excessive emoting by a litigator, but for a jury to care about you and your client and generate the stamina jurors need for a trial, litigators must tap into their emotional brains. This is not done by an information dump, a calendar, or using a lot of words. A story answers the question posed above – why are we here today, in this courtroom? A story also has all the stuff you learned in grade school: a beginning, middle, climax, and end, characters, setting, theme, and moral. Some Lawyers Focus Too Much on Too Small Things It’s easy for litigators (even more so for the associates doing the day-to-day stuff) to over-focus on every detail. The prospect of overlooking a potentially key piece of evidence or being surprised by an unknown fact exposed by opposing counsel is frightening for attorneys (it was for me), so we often wind up thinking way too much about every little thing in a case. This is called being “in the weeds,” and when you’re there it’s exceedingly difficult to escape without help. It happens with the selection of evidence, with witness prep, and even with the development of graphics, where sometimes counsel wants to very carefully think over every aspect, e.g., choosing what font style and color palette and slide aspect ratio will best work for their case. On each of these things, I urge counsel to take a step back and delegate where possible so they can focus on the BIG PICTURE. The best first-chair litigators do this naturally, and the rest of us need to do it deliberately. Attorney time and brainpower should be spent on figuring out what it will take to win. Let litigation graphics consultants decide what font works best for your opening statement presentation. It will be a relief when you do.
by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting Today is the 20th anniversary of the founding of A2L. We literally started in a closet not long after I finished law school. First, we were Animators at Law. Then almost five years ago, we became A2L Consulting to reflect the fact that litigation graphics were now less than half of our business. Jury consulting, trial technology support and litigation advisory services are now a bigger part of what we do. Twenty years later, we're a national litigation consulting firm and arguably, the very top litigation consulting firm in the country. That's not mere puffery. We're consistently voted #1 in local and national legal industry surveys. To celebrate our 20th, here are 20 new realities that litigators, in-house counsel and litigation support professionals should consider. 1. The New CLE: It is a rare CLE seminar that does not put us all to sleep. I think that modern formats of continued learning like our Litigation Consulting Report blog and other litigation blogs, including those recognized by the American Bar Association, are the best places to go for continued learning. It’s time for the legal establishment to agree. 2. The power of storytelling: The science behind the effectiveness of storytelling as a persuasion device is just now coming into view. It is critical for litigators to study this field and to understand the insights it has developed. See, Storytelling for Litigators E-Book 3rd Ed. 3. Big firm litigators rarely try cases: As a result of this new reality, litigators must get a new kind of help - help from trial tested litigation consultants. These courtroom experts may participate in 50-100 trials per year. It just stands to reason that they can help a litigator who is in court far less frequently. See, With So Few Trials, Where Do You Find Trial Experience Now? 4. Using PowerPoint incorrectly does more harm than good. Most lawyers will actually design slides for themselves that will reduce overall persuasion - but they don't have to. See, How Much Text on a PowerPoint Slide is Too Much? 5. Juror expectations are on the rise: Jurors expect litigators to wow them a bit with graphics and to keep them interested. They know what can be done in the form of graphics and at a lower price than ever before. See, Will Being Folksy and Low-Tech Help You Win a Case?
by Ken Lopez Founder/CEO A2L Consulting Well, no one ever said a trial was like a day at the beach. Except that there are a lot of similarities, if you look hard enough. I'm just back from an annual two-week family vacation at the Outer Banks of North Carolina. My wife and I have seven-year-old triplet girls. My friend says that doesn’t sound too much like a vacation, and his point is well taken in many ways. Although anyone who has done this type of trip with young kids will have some memories that seem as if they came from a Norman Rockwell painting, there are plenty of stressful or crazy moments. Fortunately, with time, the human brain can focus on the good memories. This type of vacation time is chaotic, stressful, and, yes, fulfilling. And that reminds me an awful lot of what I do every day — high-stakes litigation. Let’s consider how these two events are similar. 1) Other stuff comes up. I worked one 16-hour day at the beach. I had to. Two other managers were traveling, and one was slammed. I had to pitch in even if it was from 350 miles away. A long trial is no different. Often, you have to focus on other clients for a bit and you must plan for that possibility at trial. 2) Breakdowns happen. My clunky old Range Rover broke down at the beach. My wife was not pleased, but I’m always prepared for such an event. I have towing coverage that brought the car home, and I enjoyed driving on the beach in a four-door Jeep Wrangler instead. Things break down at trial too, often at the least opportune times. If you're not mentally prepared for that, if you haven’t planned for it, you're going to look bad at trial. See, 12 Ways to Avoid a Trial Technology Superbowl-style Courtroom Blackout. 3) Surprise is the key. My daughters are well behaved, but they need to see the unexpected from time to time, whether it’s an unusual shell on the beach or a funny kind of ketchup bottle. If they don’t have that, they become moody and distracted. Judges and jurors react similarly at trial. If you don't surprise them, they become bored and antsy. Learn the power of surprise. See, Could Surprise Be One of Your Best Visual Persuasion Tools?
by Ryan H. Flax (Former) Managing Director, Litigation Consulting & General Counsel A2L Consulting In our last post in this series, we explained why storytelling is the key to gaining and keeping the attention of any decision maker and thus the key to winning before trial. How does one develop an effective story? Here are the rules of thumb. First, the simpler the story, the better, and the simpler the language, the better. Use metaphors involving sensory descriptions. Reduce the facts to a relatable story, and use “word pictures.” The complete package of storytelling is not just an oral telling of a story; it also involves necessary visual persuasion. Studies show that at least 60 percent of people learn primarily by seeing. They are visual learners.
by Alex Brown Director, Operations A2L Consulting I hate selling. How many times do we hear this in our daily lives? Many of us have chosen our careers at least in part to avoid having to sell. I bet that many law students thought they’d never again need to be in a position to sell something. Then they became litigators. Whether you believe it or not, as a litigator your whole essence is to sell. But no: You believe that selling is manipulative, annoying, and even boring. Think of Steve Jobs. Whenever Jobs stood up at an internal meeting, interview, or software release event, he was passionate and had a story to tell. He believed that to be truly successful, you must be able to sell. Selling – one might simply call it persuasion -- is not just for salespeople and their prospects. Heck, he started the idea of selling while not selling as seen in his innovative ad from 1997, “The Crazy Ones.” Here is the rare unaired version read by him.
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