TBW Law Newport Beach Persistence with Passion Law Firm of the Month California Case Summaries Monty A. McIntyre Effective Cross-Examination of Experts During Deposition Esquire DepositionSolutions 4 Disciplines of a Leader Jeff Wolf Being a True Giver When Networking Steve Fretzin How to Double Your Productivity in 30 Days Dave Lorenzo Don’t Rob Your Prospects of Their Scarcest Resource Tom Trush 14 Law Firm Email Newsletter Ideas to Try Noreen Fishman Volume 198, 2022 $6.95 ORANGE COUNTY
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Editorial material appears in Attorney Journals as an informational service for readers. Article contents are the opinions of the authors and not necessarily those of Attorney Journals. Attorney Journals makes every effort to publish credible, responsible advertisements. Inclusion of product advertisements or announcements does not imply endorsement. Attorney Journals is a trademark of Sticky Media. Not affiliated with any other trade publication or association. Copyright 2022 by Sticky Media. All rights reserved. Contents may not be reproduced without written permission from Sticky Media. Printed in the USA EXECUTIVE PUBLISHER Brian AddressRanchoEditorial@AttorneyJournals.comCONTRIBUTINGCREATIVEWendyEDITORToporPriceSERVICESPennCreativeCIRCULATIONAngelaWatsonPHOTOGRAPHYChrisGriffithsSTAFFWRITERSDanBaldwinJenniferHadleyEDITORIALISTSEsquireDepositionSolutionsNoreenFishmanSteveFretzinDaveLorenzoMontyA.McIntyreTomTrushJeffWolfADVERTISINGINQUIRIESInfo@AttorneyJournals.comSUBMITANARTICLEOFFICE30213AvenidaDeLasBanderasSuite200SantaMargarita,CA92688www.AttorneyJournals.comADDRESSCHANGEScorrectionscanbemadeviaemailorpostalmail. TABLE OF CONTENTS 2022 EDITION—NO.198 6 Being a True Giver When Networking by Steve Fretzin 8 Effective Cross-Examination of Experts During Deposition by Esquire Deposition Solutions 10 California Case Summaries by Monty A. McIntyre 14 Don’t Rob Your Prospects of Their Scarcest Resource by Tom Trush LAW FIRM OF THE MONTH 16 TBW Law, Newport Beach Persistence with Passion by Dan Baldwin 22 How to Double Your Productivity in Thirty Days by Dave Lorenzo 26 Fourteen Law Firm Email Newsletter Ideas to Try by Noreen Fishman 28 Four Disciplines of a Leader by Jeff Wolf 26 6 16
NEVADA REFERRA L& C O- COUNSE L RELATIONSHIPS NEVADA’S LARGES T & HIGHES T RATE D INJURY LAW FIRM 801 SOUT H4T H STREE T | LA S VEGA S , N V 89101 6900SOUTHMCCARRANBLVD.,#1010 | RENO, N V 89509 “Rickisoneofthebestlawyersinthecountry.Icallhim everytimeIhaveanyissueinNevadaandwouldnothesitate toreferhimanytypeofcaseofanysize.” ~C.MichaelAlder,Esq.,AlderLaw,LosAngeles,California, CAALAPastPresidentandFormerTrialLawyeroftheYear OVER$1BILLIONWONFORCLIENTS PASTRESULTSDONOTGUARANTEEFUTURESUCCESS
Attorney Journals Orange County | Volume 198, 20226
by Steve Fretzin
Over the past 10–15 years there has been a dramatic increase in the number of people actively focusing on networking.
As we’ve established, simply “getting out there” isn’t enough in the contemporary networking scene. It’s more critical now than ever before to employ a thoughtful approach to networking in order to find success. Many attorneys I work with express discomfort at the notion of networking due to fruitless past attempts, which makes the whole endeavor seem a waste of valuable time. However, applying an efficient and effective process to networking will ensure you get optimal results from your time investment. I’ve categorized business networkers into three groups. In addition to identifying which group you might belong to, it’s important to quickly identify which group others fit into as well. Identifying which group the person you’re speaking with falls into can make or break your results.
Being a True Giver When Networking
Whatever the case, identifying and avoiding a Taker at an event or by phone before committing to a coffee meeting can save you time and emotional energy. Feel free to thank the person for his or her time and express appreciation for the invitation, but tell the “wannabe” contact directly that you’re not available and/ or not interested in his or her product or service. It’s perfectly acceptable to say you’re happy with your current vendor. The most important thing to remember when dealing with a Taker is to use whichever response best fits your situation, get it said, and move on as quickly as possible. Your ability to identify a Taker and then to remove yourself and focus on more promising prospects is a critical component of effective networking.
Networker Type 1: The Taker
Increasing competition, along with more widespread attention on building a strong network, is encouraging businesspeople to flock to networking functions in droves. This is as true for the legal profession as for any other. However, it can be an especially difficult challenge for an attorney to simultaneously balance a clogged office inbox with a devotion to developing a book of business.
That being said, if you can detect a Taker early on at an event, try to avoid the next step: the one-on-one meeting. This important meeting is where you schedule a time to meet for coffee or lunch after the initial networking event where you met with a potential business connection. If you find yourself inadvertently ensnared in a meeting with a Taker, this meeting can make for a rough few hours consisting of a sales pitch for the Taker’s product or service, whether you have a need for it or not. It could also turn into a “name grab” by the new acquaintance for the names of your contacts so that he or she can make a sales pitch to them.
A “Taker” is an individual who attends numerous events and racks up an imposing collection of names and business cards as a way to push appointments and close sales. Unfortunately, these sometimes-aggressive creatures can burn enough people that word “gets around” and ultimately helps to dissolve their reputations. You may even start to observe people physically positioning themselves away from a Taker at consecutive events. Although avoidance seems an appropriate strategy, the Taker should not be dismissed outright. For some people, simply obtaining new sales (however generated) is and always will be their focus. Perhaps a compassionate view toward seemingly aggressive Takers is the best way to view them. After all, many entrepreneurs require sales quotas of their employees to retain their jobs as a strategy to keep the business viable. Some Takers simply haven’t been taught the art of networking, or are confused on how best to utilize networking in order to achieve long-term results.
Networker Type 2: The Apparent Giver
The Apparent Giver is the most common networker type. Apparent Givers are those people who, sometime during their careers, have heard and taken very much to heart the concept that “givers gain” or “give to get” as a mantra relating to networking. They believe they understand how to network and think of themselves as major players in the networking game, but often they miss the boat on the important component of follow-through.WhereApparent Givers stumble is in failing to execute the promises they’ve made to new contacts in an effort to gain their trust. While an Apparent Giver may actually have altruistic intentions in the beginning, promises are worthless if the networker doesn’t follow up and carry out the pledge made to the new contact. Some Apparent Givers become too distracted by other commitments and simply forget to act on their earlier promises. Some with less philanthropic motives may drop the ball when they realize the new contact may not be able to immediately reciprocate. For most people in this age of information overload, if something isn’t scheduled and written down, it probably won’t happen.
When I meet an Apparent Giver, I always perform a small test. I ask this potential Apparent Giver to make an introduction for me to a third party to observe the person’s follow-through. If the Apparent Giver seems to stumble on the action portion of the equation, I may step in and try to help the person out with a reminder e-mail or phone call to discuss progress on the referral that was offered. After that, if my prompts don’t bear fruit, I begin to seriously question my new contact’s ability to become a referral source for me. This low-commitment testing process provides me with an opportunity to gauge the new contact’s mettle in terms of living up to promises before spending time on someone who’s unable to be an active part of my network due to inertia. The same approach can work for you.
Networker Type 3: The True Giver
The ultimate networking aspiration is to become a True Giver and to seek to interact with others of this type. True Givers understand the “big picture” when it comes to networking. This networker’s mantra is, “I’ll give selflessly, regardless of what’s in it for me personally.”
As a True Giver, I can tell you that giving selflessly to everyone you meet is a fulfilling way of life in and of itself. The amount of good karma I’ve stockpiled over the years of true giving is impressive, if I do say so myself. I’ve built a mega network 15,000 people deep with a stellar reputation as a dependable person. The downside of being a True Giver comes down to a math problem. When I started networking many years ago, I attended three or four networking events each week. Depending on the type of event, I’d meet from three to 20 new people at each event. Early on, I filled up my calendar with anyone, including C-classified contacts, who’d meet with me. There were days I’d go to five coffee meetings back-to-back.
As a newbie True Giver, I felt that in order to succeed at networking on a high level, I had to help each and every person I met for a cup of joe. However, even if I met for only three coffees each day, in a month of 20 working days, that would have amounted to 60 individuals that I was trying to assist with referrals—and I was making as many as three connections for each person I met for coffee. When I make a referral, it’s typically a call on the contact’s behalf for optimal results, which could take three minutes, minimum. All this adds up to 540 minutes of referral time, give or take, each month. That’s nine hours each month just making phone calls, in addition to the time spent meeting with the contacts in the first place—which is untenable, even for the most committed True Giver.
Finally, while of course the Golden Rule tells us we should be nice to everyone, you should focus your networking energy on helping those people you identify as True Givers and those who appear to have the ability to be a strategic partner over the long haul. One major key to successful networking is to qualify people as you go. This is critical because, from a temporal standpoint, you should be following up as close in time to the networking event as possible. Because all networkers are not created equal, you should make sure they’re tested and then tested again. You’ll learn more about your new contact with each interaction. For example, after meeting someone for coffee and rating her as an A, I may try to make one or two introductions for her. Along the way, I watch her reaction and reciprocation. While I don’t necessarily expect “tit for tat,” if there isn’t some level of reciprocity, I know I’ve met someone who’s probably not a True Giver, which informs my interactions surrounding this person goingWhileforward.other networking resources might suggest that being a True Giver requires never asking the “return on investment” question, I posit that effective networking requires informed, judicious giving of your time and connections to the right people for the right reasons. After all, there just aren’t enough hours in the day to run around doing good deeds for every person who crosses our paths. On another note, I may meet a contact I rate as a C and try to make one small connection for him or her or provide some sound advice if asked. I don’t necessarily expect much from a C in return, but this is where the “networking karma” kicks in. My father always said, “If you can’t make a sale, make a friend.”
Steve Fretzin is the Chicago area’s premiere business development coach and marketing trainer for attorneys.
Fretzin is driven, focused and undeniably passionate in his pursuit to help attorneys reach their full potential. He has redefined the business development experience, transforming hundreds of attorneys into top performers. His clients are thrilled because of the growth that happens after completing his program. A typical client should expect to double or triple their book of business within 12-16 months of working with him. Learn more at Fretzin.com.
The most obvious downside to turning into an Apparent Giver is that failure to follow through will tarnish your reputation if you come to be viewed as someone who doesn’t act on a pledge to a new contact. On the receiving end of the networking exchange, Apparent Givers present a distraction from your ultimate goal of disqualifying this contact type as a potential strategic partner due to empty promises.
As a busy attorney, you’re probably reading this and shaking your head in disbelief due to not just the sheer number of meetings, but the astonishing amount of time I’d spend introducing contacts to each other. Even if you had only five short coffee meetings in a month, it might be problematic to then make one quality introduction for each. That’s why being a True Giver has to be balanced with a deliberate process.
First and foremost, remember that you don’t have to meet with everyone you encounter at a networking event, as we’ve already established. By using the system outlined in Chapter 5 to qualify the best people for you to endeavor to meet and possibly refer to another connection, you’ll focus in on quality connections.
Second, don’t feel obligated to promise referrals for every person you meet. Not everyone is worthy of your “endorsement” by way of an introduction to another one of the contacts you’ve nurtured. It’s fairly easy to disqualify Takers and industry nonexperts as people not to make pledges to or introduce to others.
This is a surefire way to build up a following of people who like you and might think about referring you down the road. n
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3. Set up predicates for dispositive motions. Cross-ex amination can be used to obtain facts or admissions that provide the basis for a dispositive pretrial motion. If the litigator obtains favorable testimony from the expert, stop asking questions. “The skill here is learning when to stop talking,” Curtis says. “Once you get your answer, do not give that witness a chance to explain or walk it back.”
1. Learn the basis of the expert’s opinion. Force the expert to explain the reasoning behind their opinion. Which alternative determinations were ruled out? Which facts were critical to the expert’s opinion? Don’t fail to ask
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The way Michael Levine, partner with Stewart Tilghman Fox Bianchi & Cain P.A. in Miami, sees it, litigators face two dangers in cross-examining the other side’s expert witness. The first is over-confidence. Many litigators believe in their case so much they go into depositions with the objective of bringing the opposing expert around to their view of the case. The second danger is having an unreasonable expectation of “winning” the expert deposition. “You’re not going to win every deposition,” Levine says. “The other side is not going to give up the farm.”
Although it’s undoubtedly true that patent litigators have deep expertise in their corner of the scientific world and Texas oil attorneys could teach a college geology class, the fact remains that most litigators do not share the same level of expertise as the expert witnesses they depose in contested, complex cases. This disparity in subject-matter expertise can leave litigators feeling over-matched during cross-examination and not up to what they believe is the task at hand: exposing the flaws in the expert’s methodology or level of expertise or extracting admissions that deprive the other side of the full benefit of the expert’s conclusions. But the strategy of fighting toe-to-toe with the expert on subject-matter expertise is a steep uphill climb. The other side’s expert will be a knowledgeable, thoughtful, seasoned witness. The expert will not easily abandon positions taken in the expert’s written report.
A better strategy is to use cross-examination to extract from the expert witness any information that can be useful to the cross-examiner’s litigation position, Levine says. “Think about what your goals are. Don’t get stuck in the weeds. Keep the bigpictureExpertsfocus.”almost always know more than the litigator about the subject of their expertise, Levine says. However, they may not know as much as the litigator does about the facts of the case or the prior testimony of other witnesses. This can be used to the cross-examiner’sCross-examinationadvantage.isthe litigator’s opportunity to establish the relevant set of facts, Levine says.
Levine suggests that lawyers approaching the task of cross-examining the other side’s expert should focus on four key objectives.
Marianne Curtis, a partner with Berger Singerman L.L.P. in Miami, cautions fellow litigators against the dangers of “just winging it” when cross-examining the other side’s expert witness. Instead, she says, litigators should keep in mind three overarching objectives during the deposition.
1. Preserve deposition testimony for trial. Litigators should take steps to ensure that expert witness testimony obtained during deposition can be used at trial. During the deposi tion, the cross-examining attorney should make sure that questions are posed with proper predicates and that they are otherwise asked in a manner that elicits testimony that can survive legal challenges if offered into evidence at trial. (A well-conducted discovery deposition can also provide an appellate record in cases in which the trial court prevents the expert from testifying on topics that would have been helpful to the cross-examining lawyer’s case.)
Effective byDuringExaminationCross-ofExpertsDepositionEsquireDepositionSolutions
Three Objectives During Expert Depositions
2. Discover facts and lock in testimony. Expert deposi tions can be used for pure “discovery” purposes. When cross-examining the expert, litigators should ask questions about the existence and location of documents. They can also attempt to seek admissions or lock the opposing side into a particular position. If favorable testimony is ob tained during the deposition, that should be nailed down so that the expert can’t “remember” damaging informa tion or submit a conflicting affidavit.
Focus on Small Victories
Paul D. PARTNERWoodard
Corey F. PARTNERSchechter
Levine says that Google can be used productively to uncover facts useful for collateral attacks on expert witnesses. For example, if the opposing attorney and the expert witness both spoke at the same professional conference, the expert could be productively cross-examined on whether he or she has a personal relationship with opposing counsel. Have you ever had dinner with opposing counsel? Do you have his or her cell phone number?
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3. Seek agreement on uncontested matters. Relatedly, use cross-examination to simplify the case. Reduce complex ity, and zero in on facts that jurors will naturally latch onto. “As lawyers, one of our biggest challenges is simplic ity,” Levine says. “We as lawyers tend to be way too wordy, way too complicated.” Levine says he often brings a list of critical facts (from his client’s perspective) to expert depo sitions and seeks to obtain the expert’s agreement with as many of them as possible.
questions simply because the answer may not be helpful to your case. “If you do nothing else, after the deposition you should walk out of there confident that you know everything that the expert is going to say—good, bad, or indifferent,” Levine says.
2. Narrow the range of contested facts. Attempt to obtain facts that are not necessary to the expert’s opinion. Eliminate distractions and narrow the facts to relevant ones only. Very often the opposition will cling to factual assertions that appear harmful to your case but are, in fact, not relevant. For example, if the victim in a wrongful death case suffered from heart disease but that condition did not contribute to her death, the expert can be asked to admit that information.
Learn
Butterfieldmschechter@bsllp.comSchechterLLPis
Finally, it’s important to note that Curtis’ and Levine’s advice applies not only to formally designated expert witnesses but also to any witness who testifies about subject matter that is beyond the cross-examining attorney’s range of expertise. Even though counsel may not be able to dislodge the witness from his or her views, there is much that can be done—with preparation, in every deposition—to extract valuable information and strategic advantages for the client.
4. Uncover grounds for collateral attacks on the expert. If the expert has a longstanding relationship with the oppos ing party or their law firm, then that relationship should be explored during the deposition. How many times has the opposition retained the expert? How much money has he or she earned giving substantially similar testimony?
This article provided by Esquire Deposition Solutions more at www.esquiresolutions.com.
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Plaintiff nurse then sued defendant hospital, based on the same alleged violations. The trial court rejected defendant’s Monty A. McIntyre, Esq. is the publisher of California Case Summaries™, which provides monthly, quarterly and annual summaries, organized by legal topic, of every new published CA civil case—helping lawyers save time, win more, and make more money. Monty has been a California civil trial lawyer since 1980, a member of ABOTA since 1995, and is a mediator, arbitrator and referee at ADR Services, Inc., conducing Zoom hearings throughout California. To schedule a matter, contact Monty’s case manager Haward Cho, haward@adrservices.com or hawardSDteam@adrservices.com, (213) 683-1600. California Case Summaries™ (https://cacasesummaries.com).
Attorney Journals Orange County | Volume 198, 202210
California Case Summaries New California Civil Cases by Monty A. McIntyre, Esq.
Partnerships Siry Investment, L.P. v. Farkhondehpour (2022) __ Cal.5th __ , 2022 WL 2840312: The California Supreme Court affirmed in part, and reversed in part, the Court of Appeal’s decision in plaintiff’s action alleging fraudulent diversion of partnership profits. After a prior appeal, the case was remanded to the trial court. Defendants failed to respond to discovery responses, even after being ordered to do so. The trial court issued an order granting terminating sanctions striking defendants’ answers and entering their default. The trial court later issued a default judgment against defendants in the total sum of $12,023,067.10 (compensatory damages, with interest, of $956,487; treble damages of $2,869,461 pursuant to Penal Code section 496(c); punitive damages of $4 million (plus $1 only against defendant 416 South Wall Street); attorney fees totaling $4,010,008.97; and costs of $187,109.13). The California Supreme Court, addressing conflicts in the Courts of Appeal, ruled that (1) a party in default has standing to file a motion for a “new trial” asserting legal error relating to calculation of damages and (2) a trial court may award treble damages and attorney fees under Penal Code section 496, subdivision (c) in a case involving, not trafficking of stolen goods, but instead, fraudulent diversion of a partnership’s cash distributions.
The Court of Appeal, applying Code of Civil Procedure section 657(7), properly determined that defendants’ challenges to the damages awarded in the original and amended default judgment raised, and constituted, errors in law that were properly brought to the court’s attention via defendants’ motion to vacate the trial court’s decision and to grant a new trial/judgment hearing. Treble damages and attorney fees are available under Penal Code section 496(c) when property has been obtained in any manner constituting theft, and the Supreme Court concluded that the statute’s unambiguous words apply to fraudulent diversion of partnership case distributions. (July 21, 2022.)
SUPREMECALIFORNIACOURT
Settlement Grande v. Eisenhower Medical Center (2022) __ Cal.5th __ , 2022 WL 2349762: The California Supreme Court affirmed the Court of Appeal’s decision that had affirmed the trial court’s ruling, following a bench trial, concluding that the language in a settlement and release agreement whereby plaintiff had settled an earlier class action wage and hour action against a staffing company (FlexCare LLC) did not bar the claims the plaintiff had against defendant hospital (Eisenhower Medical Center) in this class action wage and hour case. Staffing company FlexCare LLC arranged for a nurse, plaintiff Lynn Grande, to work at defendant hospital. The staffing company agreed to indemnify defendant hospital for certain obligations relating to the staffing arrangement. Plaintiff nurse sued the staffing company for violating the Labor Code and the Unfair Competition Law. That case settled and the trial court entered judgment upon the settlement. The hospital was not a named party in that action.
argument that because of the first judgment, claim preclusion foreclosed plaintiff’s second suit. The California Supreme Court agreed. Claim preclusion can be asserted only by a party in the first action or someone in privity with a party in the first action. In this case, a nonparty (defendant hospital) argued that it was in privity with a party (the staffing agency) to benefit from the claim-preclusive effect of a judgment that undoubtedly bound an opposing party (the plaintiff nurse). Privity requires the sharing of an identity or community of interest, with adequate representation of that interest in the first suit, and circumstances such that the nonparty should reasonably have expected to be bound by the first suit. (DKN Holdings LLC v. Faerber (2015) 61 Cal.4th 813, 826.) There was no such privity in this case because of the hospital and staffing agency’s different legal interests. Moreover, preclusion could not be based on a claimed indemnification or agency relationship between the hospital and the staffing company.
Arbitration
COURTSCALIFORNIAOFAPPEAL
Evenskaas v. California Transit, Inc. (2022) _ Cal.App.5th _ , 2022 WL 2763374: The Court of Appeal reversed the trial court’s order denying defendant’s motion to compel arbitration of plaintiff’s wage and hour class action. The trial court denied the motion on the grounds that California law, rather than the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA; 9 U.S.C. § 1 et seq.), applied to the arbitration agreement because the agreement did not involve interstate commerce, and under the California Supreme Court’s decision in Gentry v. Superior Court (2007) 42 Cal.4th 443 (Gentry) plaintiff’s waiver of his right to bring class action claims was unenforceable. The Court of Appeal disagreed. Because defendant California Transit was hired to provide paratransit services (required to be provided by the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (42 U.S.C. § 12101 et seq.), and plaintiff was hired to provide those services, the arbitration agreement involved interstate commerce for purposes of the FAA, the FAA applied to the arbitration agreement, and the FAA preempted the Gentry rule that certain class action waivers in employment arbitration agreements are unenforceable. (C.A. 2nd, July 15, 2022.)
Elder Abuse Royals v. Lu (2022) _ Cal.App.5th _ , 2022 WL 2800956: The Court of Appeal reversed the trial court’s order granting plaintiff’s request for a pretrial right to attach order (RTAO) in the sum of $3,440,000 against defendant under section 15657.01 of the Elder Abuse and Dependent Adult Civil Protection Act (the Elder Abuse Act; Welfare & Institutions Code, section 15600 et. seq.). After plaintiff filed her petition, defendant filed a cross-petition. Both made competing claims of Elder Abuse against the other. A financial elder abuse claimant may obtain an attachment for potential compensatory damages and an award of attorney fees and costs associated with those damages, but only if the request for it complies with all applicable provisions of the statutory scheme governing pretrial attachments (the Attachment Law; Code of Civil Procedure, section 481.010 et. seq.). The Court of Appeal reversed the trial court, concluding that defendant’s Attorney
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The California Supreme Court disapproved of Castillo v. Glenair, Inc. (2018) 23 Cal.App.5th 262, 278–281 to the extent it was inconsistent with this decision. (June 30, 2022.)
Corporations Fowler v. Golden Pacific Bancorp. (2022) _ Cal.App.5th _ , 2022 WL 2253851: In an action to compel an inspection of books and records pursuant to Corporations Code section 1600 et seq., the Court of Appeal determined the primary issue in the appeal was moot because plaintiff was no longer a member of defendant’s board of directors after it was acquired by Social Finance, Inc. Nevertheless, it elected to exercise its discretion to reach the merits because it was presented with an issue of substantial and continuing public interest: whether a director’s “absolute” right of inspection under section 1602 may be curtailed because the director and corporation are involved in litigation and there is a possibility the documents could be used to harm the corporation. The Court of Appeal held the mere possibility that information could be used adversely to the corporation is not by itself sufficient to defeat a director’s inspection rights. Rather, any exception to the general rule favoring unfettered access must be limited to extreme cases, where enforcing an “absolute” right of inspection would produce an absurd result, such as when the evidence establishes the director’s clear intent to use the information to breach fiduciary duties or otherwise commit a tort against the corporation. (C.A. 3rd, June 23, 2022.)
Attorney Fees City of L.A. Dept. of Airports v. U.S. Specialty Ins. Co. (2022) _ Cal.App.5th _ , 2022 WL 2156119: The Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court’s decision denying defendant’s motion to attorney fees after the jury returned a verdict in favor of plaintiff awarding it $1. Defendant bonding company argued that, despite losing on contract liability, it was entitled to fees as the prevailing party because the jury awarded plaintiff only nominal damages rather than the $3.4 million that plaintiff sought. The Court of Appeal concluded the trial court had discretion to find that neither party prevailed. (C.A. 1st, June 15, 2022.)
Employment California Business & Industrial Alliance v. Becerra (2022) _ Cal.App.5th _ , 2022 WL 2353367: The Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court’s order sustaining defendant’s demurrer, without leave to amend, to a complaint filed by plaintiff, a lobbying group for small and midsized businesses in California, seeking a judicial declaration that the Labor Code Private Attorneys General Act of 2004 (PAGA; Labor Code, section 2698 et seq.), is unconstitutional under various theories and an injunction forbidding defendant from implementing or enforcing PAGA. On appeal, plaintiff argued that PAGA violates California’s separation of powers doctrine by allowing private citizens to seek civil penalties on the state’s behalf without the executive branch exercising sufficient prosecutorial discretion. The Court of Appeal rejected this argument for two reasons.
The Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court’s ruling that plaintiff’s declaration, asserting that numerous reporters had informed him of defendants’ accusations against him, was inadmissible hearsay. The Court of Appeal also affirmed the trial court’s order granting of defendants’ anti-SLAPP motion to strike (Code of Civil Procedure, section 425.16) and entry of judgment in favor of defendants, and its post-judgment order awarding attorney fees in the sum of $218,385 and costs in the sum of $36,019.26. Plaintiff’s action alleged defamation and intentional infliction of emotional distress. Plaintiff’s declaration in opposition to the anti-SLAPP motion recounted not what he himself had witnessed, but what reporters told him they had witnessed. The reporters’ statements were offered for the truth of the matter asserted, namely that the reporters heard defendants make defamatory comments about plaintiff. The reporters’ statements therefore were hearsay. The reporters’ statements recounted in plaintiff’s declaration were not made under oath or penalty of perjury, and the trial court properly declined to consider them and properly granted the anti-SLAPP motion and awarded fees and costs. (C.A. 2nd, June 30, 2022.)
First, the California Supreme Court held in Iskanian v. CLS Transportation Los Angeles, LLC (2014) 59 Cal.4th 348 (Iskanian), that “PAGA does not violate the principle of separation of powers under the California Constitution,” and Iskanian was directly on point and controlling. Second, even if Iskanian did not require the result, the Court of Appeal would have reached it anyway through application of California’s preexisting separation of powers doctrine. PAGA is not meaningfully distinguishable from comparable qui tam statutes outside the employment context, including the California False Claims Act (Government Code, section 12650 et seq.), the Insurance Frauds Prevention Act (Insurance Code, section 1871 et seq.), the Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986, colloquially known as Proposition 65 (Health & Safety Code section 25249.5 et seq.) and many others. Plaintiff and its supporting amici failed to produce one single case in which any of these many statutes has been held to violate California’s separation of powers doctrine. Nor do they identify any sufficiently significant distinctions between those statutes and PAGA, or any other compelling reason for the Court of Appeal to break new ground. (C.A. 4th, June 30, 2022.)
Evidence Sanchez v. Bezos (2022) _ Cal.App.5th _ , 2022 WL 2352784:
Insurance Marina Pacific Hotel and Suites, LLC v. Fireman’s Fund Ins. Co. (2022) _ Cal.App.5th _ , 2022 WL 2711886: The Court of Appeal reversed the trial court’s order sustaining defendant’s demurrer, without leave to amend, to plaintiffs’ complaint alleging causes of action for breach of contract, tortious breach of contract, elder abuse and unfair competition based upon defendant’s denial of coverage and refusal to pay (or to advance) commercial property insurance policy benefits for losses caused by the COVID pandemic. Plaintiffs alleged the COVID-19 virus was present on, and had physically transformed, portions of the insured properties—“direct physical loss or damage” within the meaning of defendant’s first party commercial property insurance policy. The trial court sustained the demurrer concluding that the COVID-19 virus could not cause direct physical loss or damage to property for purposes of insurance coverage. The trial court also found there was a virus exclusion in the policy. The Court of Appeal disagreed, concluding that by alleging that COVID-19 not only lives on surfaces but also bonds to surfaces through physicochemical reactions involving cells and surface proteins, which transformed the physical condition of the property and forced plaintiffs to close their business on the property, plaintiffs adequately alleged direct physical loss or damage caused by the COVID-19 virus and a cause of action for breach of contract. (C.A. 2nd, July 13, 2022.)
attachment application did not comply with four provisions of the Attachment Law. It was not (i) supported by competent evidence (id., section 482.040), (ii) did not on an attachable “amount” (id., section 484.020(b)), (iii) was not based on a claim upon which an attachment may be issued (id., section 484.020(a)), and (iv) was not measured by the defendant’s claimed “indebtedness” to the plaintiff (id., section 483.015(a) (1)).
Ruling on an issue of first impression, the Court of Appeal held that potential punitive damages and statutory penalties in a financial elder abuse claim may not be secured by the extraordinary remedy of a pretrial attachment. (C.A. 1st, July 18, 2022.)
n Attorney Journals Orange County | Volume 198, 202212
Don’t Rob Your Prospects of Their Scarcest Resource by Tom Trush
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Remember, marketing is just an extension of a one-onone discussion. The only difference is—depending on the medium you use—you’re sharing an identical message with multiple people. Look at your last written marketing piece. Would you use the same words while speaking with a prospect?Ifyou wouldn’t say something in a one-on-one conversation with a prospect, don’t say it in your marketing materials. Far too many entrepreneurs and executives use marketing to talk about themselves. So, you may see lists of accomplishments... heavily branded content... exaggerated claims... and language that needs a permanent home inside a thesaurus. Can you imagine a real estate agent greeting you and then rattling off a series of awards? Or what if you just met an accountant who explained how she’s “a leading provider of integrated information services and scalable workflow tools that create value-added alliances, while leveraging the evolving requirements of today’s business professionals”? If you’re a robot marketing to aliens, these approaches might work—but not with real people. So use your marketing to casually talk to prospects and deliver value. Your prospects will reward you with attention. n
While recently critiquing a few marketing pieces for a client, I was startled by a strange language style. It wasn’t that the words were vulgar. Or even that they were wrong. The problem was that I couldn’t imagine the client using the language in a conversation.
Remember, the most effective marketing often doesn’t look like marketing. So, with this concept in mind, let me give you a challenge... When you write your next marketing piece, honor your prospects’ time by presenting information as if they were already your clients/customers. Ignore your desires. Forget about selling. Disregard your competitors. Snub the internal voice that screams, “You’re giving away too much!” Take this exercise seriously and I guarantee your marketing grabs more eyeballs and gains greaterNeedinterest.anexample to help you get started? Watch this nearly 12-minute video (with over 13 million views) from Dr. Robert Cialdini: http://youtu.be/cFdCzN7RYbw. He gives you six costless ways to persuade prospects and, at the same time, introduces you to his resources for improving organizational and personal performance.
ver notice how many people want to steal your scarcest resource? They crave a piece of your time— often for their own benefit. But this theft isn’t only limited to people … each day hundreds of marketing messages attempt to rob you of your time, too. So how do you decide where to direct your attention?
What Not to Say When Marketing
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Good thing you have instinct—that gut feeling that tells you (in a split second) when something isn’t worth your time. When marketing to prospects, you must overcome this intuition if you have any chance at getting your message seen or heard. Just like you, your prospects recognize promotional fluff. Your gut knows advertisements. Your gut knows when someone is selling. Your gut knows when something serves someone else’s interests. Am I right?
Tom Trush is a Phoenix, Arizona-based directresponse copywriter who helps entrepreneurs and executives craft lead-generating marketing materials. Pick up his latest book, Escape the Expected: The Secret Psychology of Selling to Today’s Skeptical Consumers at writewaysolutions.com.
Well, fortunately, this decision mostly happens on an unconscious level. If you were consciously aware of every marketing message competing for your interest, you couldn’t function.
402 WEST BROADWAY, SUITE 1950, SAN DIEGO, CA 92101 • (619) 831-6969 WWW.CALIFORNIAELDERABUSELAWYER.COM PRACTICE AREAS Nursing Home Neglect & Wrongful Death Financial Elder Abuse Will & Trust Litigation Inheritance Disputes San AttorneysLitigationLeadingDiego’sElder Partners: Joel Bryant, Rob Dieringer, and Jessica Wilson Referral Fees Paid We litigate elder abuse claims in both civil and probate court. We focus on three main areas: nursing home neglect and wrongful death; financial elder abuse cases; and will and trust litigation cases—including inheritance disputes. Our breadth and depth of litigation experience—combined with specialized subject-matter knowledge in elder law—gives us a competitive edge and a unique perspective that translates into excellent results for our clients.
He is licensed to practice by the State Bar of California and the United States District Court for the Central and Southern Districts of California. He is a member of the American Bar Association (ABA), American Association of Justice (AAJ), and the prestigious American Board of Trial Advocates (ABOTA). He participates as an active member of the Consumer Attorneys’ of California (CAOC), Consumer Attorneys’ of Los Angeles (CAALA), Orange County Bar Association (OCBA) and has been a member of the Orange County Trial Lawyers’ Association (OCTLA) for the past 18 years including service on the Executive Committee, Board of Directors, and President in 2015. Additionally, he was named to the Federal Multi-District Litigation (MDL) Science and Expert Committee for Rezulin,
TBW Law Combines Persistent Effort with a Passion for Justice in Personal Injury
withPersistencePassion by Dan Baldwin
30 YEARS OF EXPERIENCE
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A recent product liability case exemplifies how the firm combines “Persistence with Passion” to achieve often startling success for their clients. The victim was a young man, a lawyer who had recently married and who had a love of golf. He was also a concerned citizen who had volunteered in his younger years to do work in Nicaragua. When he saw an online ad for Adirondack chairs manufactured in a village in that country, he decided to help out by making a purchase. Unfortunately, the manufacturer did not test his product for safety defects. When the young attorney first sat in the chair it collapsed and cut off his fingers. “That’s a typical case for us,” Wacker says. To evaluate the case, Wacker had to determine the personal impact on the client and his young family and the value of such a loss. Combining the client’s personal story and future damages, he was able to obtain the largest settlement for a finger amputation case in the country at $1.35 million.
The firm has been in business for eight years and we have managed to expand our reputation, our client list, and the number of people on our staff even during the pandemic slowdown. I attribute that success to our persistent effort toward excellence in all we do and in our total passion for justice,” says Ted B. Wacker, founder. Wacker began his firm with no employees and only four cases. Today, the Law Offices of Ted B. Wacker (TBW Law) now employs a firm of five attorneys, including: Vince Howard (past President of OCTLA, 2016), Sara Bedirian, Douglas Wacker, and Pegah Withjack, with offices in Newport Beach, California and Bellevue, Washington, serving clients in a wide variety of areas, including transportation, premises liability, general personal injury, and product liability.
Vincent
D. Howard (Partner), Ted B. Wacker (Founder & Partner), and Sara Bedirian (Partner). 2021 2022 LAW FIRM OF THE MONTH
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Standing Left to Right: Jenni Teran (Legal Assistant), Isabella De La Isla (Receptionist), Sara Bedirian (Partner), Doug Wacker (Attorney), Ted B. Wacker (Partner & Founder), Pegah A. Withjack (Attorney), Vincent Howard (Partner), Samar Hellar (Law Clerk), Liz Medina (Legal Assistant), Yesenia Madrigal (Legal Assistant), Jayna Bosse (Medical Records). Sitting Left to Right: Sonia Saba (Legal Assistant), Melina Arroyo (Accounting/Bookkeeper), Sandra West (Discovery), and Marylou Gilsleider (Paralegal).
He graduated from San Diego State University in 1988 earning a Bachelor of Science with honors and was a four-year scholarship recipient and was named Captain of the Men’s Soccer Team. He earned his Juris Doctor at the University of San Diego School of Law in 1991. In the firm’s most recent settlement, his younger brother played an integral part. Wacker assigned his younger brother, Douglas, to evaluate the economic damages in a motorcycle collision that resulted in severe orthopedic injuries to the client. His younger brother had only joined the firm a month earlier to continue in the family’s legacy of litigation advocacy.
The value of the case was not so much on the physical injuries as it was on the impact it had on this client’s ability to work and provide for his family presently and in the future. The client was only in the first year of a five-year apprenticeship program and whether it was more likely than not that the client would complete the apprenticeship to become a journeyman electrician which would significantly impact his future earnings was hotly contested by the defense. His younger brother found a discrepancy in the data relied upon by the defense’s expert witness on the topic and undermined the defense’s argument that the client wouldn’t have completed the
FAMILY VALUES
Other family influencers imbued in Wacker a sense of empathy and compassion for others. Wacker’s passion to help those in need stems from an early age. He related a childhood story in which his grandparents helped a man “riding the rails” from Missouri to Seattle to be with his dying sister. When he got off the train, he was directed to Wacker’s grandparents’ home. They not only fed the man, but allowed him to clean up in their guest room, and even donated some clean clothes to the traveler. “They believed that even if you didn’t have a lot, you could still give something,” Wacker says. Going his grandparents one better, Wacker gave the man $5, which was his entire allowance for the week—a sizeable sacrifice for a seven-year-old kid. When his grandparents found out, they asked him why. “I said, it was just the right thing to do.”
Inc.Photography,Figge Attorney Journals Orange County | Volume 198, 202218
as well as both State and Federal MDL Science and Expert Committees for Baycol and Zyprexa. The Baycol and Zyprexa cases resolved with multi-million dollar settlements.
His honors and awards include: American Jurisprudence Awards in Products Liability and Creditors’ Remedies; 12 years as Partner at nationally recognized plaintiffs’ firm Robinson, Calcagnie; voted California Super Lawyer for 2013-2022; President of the Orange County Trial Lawyers Association in 2015.
Wacker grew up in Seattle, Washington but made Orange County, California his home after completing his education in Southern California. Wacker’s father was a major influence in his life and he learned the value of persistence through his father’s example. “There were so many times in my life where I thought, ‘I can’t do this’ or ‘I’m not going to make it.’ My dad just taught me that persistence was the name of the game.”
Wacker attributes much of how he runs the firm to his experiences from his youth through college and beyond playing team sports. Establishing a team mentality is an essential part of his firm’s success. “We do a lot of team building, whether it’s meetings, or having lunch together, there’s a lot of opportunities to bond together. I think the closer you are and the more you are there to support one another, the better everybody does. I may be the leader, but I could never meet all of my clients’ needs without the tremendous support and attention to detail that my staff provide. I am a member of the team who leads by example.”
A 23-year-old man and collegiate soccer player had been hit by a big-rig truck on the freeway. The man’s life was ruined. He was on life support for three months and his injuries were such that the family was told the only thing left to do was to donate his organs. He survived, but with a significant brain injury. The defense disputed liability in addition to the significant damages that young man required to get his second-best life to move forward. To demonstrate the impact on this young man and his family required every available tool in a plaintiff’s attorney’s toolkit: expert witnesses including medical experts, economists, vocational rehabilitation specialists, and life care planners, as well as a videographer to be able to document the client’s impacted life in visuals and testimonials from family. Wacker utilized his staff and built a team to manage all of the moving parts. Wacker says the man will need a caregiver for the rest of his life, “But, man, he’s come back. He’s got two kids and he’s walking with a cane. We got him the largest settlement that our firm’s ever had on a very difficult liability case.” The settlement for that case was $12.65 million.
TEAM LEADERSHIP
CONNECTION WITH CLIENTS
In one case, Wacker was presented with a client who was parked eating a burrito on the side of a residential street, There were so many times in my life where I thought, ‘I can’t do this’ or ‘I’m not going to make it.’ My dad just taught me that persistence was the name of the game.”
apprenticeship regardless of the injury. The discovery of that critical information presented by Wacker to defense counsel two weeks before trial allowed for a policy limits settlement for the client of $3 million. “Sometimes a fresh set of eyes can show you something that everyone else missed. It was going to be a hard fought trial, so to get the defense to finally accept a reasonable value in settlement for the client and to avoid the risks and anxiety of trial for the client is something that may be in the client’s best interest.”
The approach pays off for TBW Law’s personal injury clients. For example, a recent case was one of those touch-andgo situations in which the life of the client was in the balance.
An important element in such success is the firm’s willingness to reach and maintain close and personal contact with each client. For example, in one challenging case the attorneys face enormous hurdles. They invested significant hours and days in the family’s home and attending doctor visits to understand their clients’ struggles on a personal and emotional level. They even sorted through thousands of family photographs and videotaped their day-to-day struggles to boldly illustrate how their injuries had affected their lives.
In some cases the medical prognosis for the client never appears to resolve. Wacker discussed a case in which the client had been involved in a motorcycle injury accident where he was allegedly speeding. His injuries included a shattered leg and knee cap. His medical team had performed 11 separate surgeries to save the leg, however, it was possible if not likely the client would need future surgeries or potentially an amputation of his leg. Wacker found the top amputation expert in the country in his hometown of Seattle. An orthopedic surgeon who had been integral in working with Veterans from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Based on his medical opinion testimony, Wacker was able to obtain an $8 million settlement for the client.
Wacker says, “I believe that I am a people person. I really love working with individuals rather than huge corporations or insurance companies where sometimes the human element is lost in the shuffle. I believe that I am perceived as a reputable and respected adversary, but I am also fiercely competitive, which probably comes from playing Division 1 sports in college.”
—TED B. WACKER Attorney Journals Orange County | Volume 198, 2022 19
Another case, a motorcycle injury, at first seemed nearly impossible to win. The police report concluded the accident was their client’s fault. Another attorney had told the client, who had a below the knee amputation, that the most he could hope to possibly obtain was $1 million. When the client approached TBW Law alleging that the police report was in error, Wacker’s passion to advocate for this client and prove the truth of the case was a necessity. Lawyers for the firm located a dash cam video from another big rig that showed that much of what the police concluded was wrong. They further determined that the defendant driver of the big rig had lied to the police and the police relied upon this false information for their conclusion. They discovered other errors in the police report regarding witnesses’ observations. “Once we changed the dynamic of the liability picture, we focused on the damages. Our client had a below the knee amputation, so we brought in the top orthopedic expert in the world to have him evaluated. The settlement was for $8 million.
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Wacker counsels young people considering a career in law, and young lawyers seeking genuine commitment to a specific practice area to work with passion in a field that they truly love. Success will follow. He also encourages people to become involved and to stay involved in the legal community and to develop long-term, positive relationships both for themselves and the communities they serve.
SERVING THE LEGAL COMMUNITY AND THE COMMUNITY AT LARGE
The attorneys at the Law Offices of Ted B. Wacker invest in the community at large as well as in the care of their clients. The firm is very active with Miracles for Kids, which is a local charity based in Tustin, California. In addition, the firm participated in the Adopt-A-Family program where they adopted a family for Christmas whose young daughter was diagnosed with cancer and had lost her arm as a result. They are active supporters of the Veterans Legal Institute having two military veterans (Vince Howard, U.S. Army Veteran and Douglas Wacker, U.S. Marine Corps Veteran) as attorneys in the firm.
waiting to head into work, when he was struck by the defendant’s speeding vehicle (70-80 MPH in a 45 MPH zone) that had lifted from a bump in the road eventually flying off the ground and colliding with five separate vehicles. The client suffered significant head and spine injuries resulting in multiple surgeries. Wacker’s team was able to locate video from a neighbor’s security camera. “The video was so low quality that the speed of the defendant’s vehicle appeared to jump frames like an old cartoon,” Wacker says, “however, because we were able to find that video, we were able to show the recklessness of the defendant.” The case settled for $8.5 million and with the help of Wacker’s firm, the client was able to set up a life care plan that will provide for the client’s future. The client remains in touch with members of the firm who helped him to this day. In another case, the client was involved in a minor collision, but experienced significant soft tissue and spinal injuries from whiplash. The client had to have two spine surgeries and a wrist surgery. Listening to the client and understanding that even small incidents can have big impacts, Wacker analyzed the case and the medical records to present the evidence of causation that was critical. The case resolved in a $3.4 million settlement.
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Wacker is positive and enthusiastic about the future of the Law Offices of Ted B. Wacker. He says, “I think that we bring experience as well as sincere passion for our clients to each case. We invest a tremendous amount of time on each case, we hire investigators and undertake significant investigation for each case, our litigation skills including deposition taking are among the best. We have trained well in some of the toughest legal environments possible and we have won and won big for our clients. Like our growth in the past eight years, I see that trend continuing to expand.” n Contact Ted B. Wacker Law Offices of Ted B. Wacker (TBW Law) 1000 Newport Center Drive Newport Beach, CA 92660 (949) www.tbwlawfirm.com706-7100
Sara Bedirian (Partner), Vincent D. Howard (Partner), and Ted B. Wacker (Founder & Partner).
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STEP THREE Ruthlessly eliminate everything else from your life except the five things that are the best use of your time. The idea is to delegate or otherwise permanently dispatch these things from your life. Get rid of them completely.
4. If something in your email will need longer than 5 minutes of work, schedule time to handle it. Actual ly, put it on your calendar—as long as it is one of the five things you are focusing on. Another area people complain about is the telephone. Here is my solution for that problem: Never take an inbound call. Have all your calls go to voice mail. Have the voice mail transcribed and emailed to your assistant or paralegal. Have the assistant handle the issue or schedule time on your calendar for you to handle the issue later on (as long as it is one of your five areas of focus).
Whenever I introduce this concept to my clients they always push back on certain items. Email, for example, is one of the biggest time wasters on the planet. Here’s what I encourage you to do with email:
How to Double Your Productivity in 30 Days
Typical Excuses
STEP ONE Write down everything you have to do and everything that takes up your time and energy during the course of the week. Make a big list. On this list put everything you spend time working on and thinking about. Then lump these activities into categories. For example: driving to and from meetings, research, preparing a talk, returning client phone calls, sifting and sorting email, networking, drafting an agreement, etc.
1. Never keep email open on your desktop while you are working.
n Dave Lorenzo helps solo attorneys, large law firms and small independent law practices make a great living and live a great life. People say his downto-earth personality reflects more of his street smarts than his Ivy-League education. He can be reached at 888.692.5531.
by Dave Lorenzo A ll of us are plagued with too much work and too little time. Many of us have experimented with various time management systems and various electronic scheduling programs that we hope will keep us focused and on track and help us improve our productivity. In reality we all possess the tools we need to double (and in many cases even triple) our productivity. The secret is focus. I’m not talking about listen-to-your-wife-while-you-watch-the-basketballgame focus. I’m talking about focus on one task and one task only to the point of excluding everything and everyone else. And I’m talking about that kind of focus all the time. But for most people, this is easier said than done. Here’s how you can do it:
2. Train your assistant or paralegal to sort your email. Have her alert you to anything urgent, handle what she can handle and flag things that need your attention.
STEP TWO Select the five areas of focus that are the best possible use of your time. Notice: This step has a hidden step within it. You must determine what your time is worth and decide what is the best possible use of your time. Once you have selected the five things (or categories) that are the best possible use of your time, you can move on to step three.
3. Schedule time to check and respond to email every day. Select an hour in the morning and an hour in the afternoon.
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California Offices: Irvine, Los Angeles and San Francisco 949.660.8200 | ankura.com Solving challenges with the right combination of expertise. Ankura Consulting Group (Ankura) is a specialized independent consulting firm that provides litigation, financial, restructuring, strategic and operational consulting services. Our clients are corporations, legal counsel and government agencies facing the challenges of uncertainty, risk, distress and significant change. We focus on industries undergoing substantial regulatory or structural change and on the issues driving these transformations. Ankura is comprised of more than 1,500 professionals, including highly experienced eDiscovery experts; financial analysts; economists; certified public accountants; certified business appraisers; merger and acquisition specialists; professional engineers; and information management analysts. We have offices in over 38 cities worldwide. 24 Attorney Journals Orange County | Volume 198, 2022
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mail marketing should be a central part of your law firm’s marketing strategy as it provides a direct line to your target audiences. A newsletter sent out on a consistent basis is an excellent way for your firm to capture new business and stay top-of-mind with past clients. However, not all newsletters are created alike. Your law firm newsletter should strive to provide valuable content and keep your audience in the know. To remain impactful and ensure readers come back for more, we encourage lawyers to get creative and constantly test out new content ideas.
Laws and regulations are always changing, and the average person doesn’t have the time or inclination to keep up with them. Especially when it comes to business dealings. There are constant updates that professionals should be aware of, but might not be. Make sure to include brief updates on these in your law firm newsletter.
CHANGES TO THE LAW
According to Wordstream, 86% of people would like to see more videos from brands. Why not include some of this content in your law firm newsletter? As with all email content, it’s important to avoid simply promoting your
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FAQ Are there certain questions that your attorneys get asked all the time? Maybe they pertain to your firm’s specific practice areas, or maybe they are questions that are commonly asked as part of an initial consultation. Whatever the format may be, it’s a smart strategy to lay out a few frequently asked questions – and their answers – in one simple newsletter for your readers. Practice social listening, and stay on top of trendy topics for your industry. Then, you can answer people’s most pressing questions in your newsletter.
Highlight successes or interesting cases your law firm has worked on in your newsletters every so often. Doing so not only helps establish your firm’s credibility, but it can generate ideas for your clients or prospects, and provide education that they will value.
INFORMATIONAL VIDEO
14 Law Firm Email Newsletter Ideas to Try by Noreen Fishman
14 Law Firm Newsletter Ideas to Try This Year
If your law firm has an active blog, you can utilize your newsletter to promote your most popular posts. This adds a lot of value to your law firm newsletter, as now users can expect a wealth of information on the latest topics in your industry.
BLOG POSTS
Whether you’re already producing a law firm newsletter or hoping to create one as part of your marketing mix, just following the same old, same old won’t cut it. Experiment with different email types, layouts, and content. After all, the average email user receives 100 emails a day. So it’s important that you make your newsletter stand out. Try these 14 formats, and then remember to collect data on the newsletter’s performance. As always, test, analyze, and optimize.
CASE STUDIES
NEWSJACKING
If you’re on Twitter, you see examples of this practice all the time. Newsjacking refers to piggybacking off of today’s news to bring attention to your own content. Newsjacking provides an immediate impact, and the legal industry is a prime sector for this type of marketing. There are so many stories in the news about policy changes, PR problems, lawsuits, and regulations affecting every industry from healthcare to finance. That makes it easier to find press about niches that your law firm specializes in, and share content along those lines.
For a more in-depth look at capitalizing on social media success, check out this free eBook: Advanced Social Media Strategies for Law Firms. DEVELOPMENT
HIGHLIGHT COMPANY EVENTS
TALK ABOUT COMPANY CULTURE
Readers are constantly looking for more in-depth information that they can digest on their own terms, or save for later. Publish links to download long-form thought leadership pieces created by your firm within your email newsletter. This may be an eBook, a checklist, a guide, etc. You can include some sentences teasing the content, with an easy button and CTA so they can go to the form to download. ROUNDUP A content roundup will be especially interesting to your subscribers. Choose a few items that you think offer practical insights, and create a brief post highlighting all of them to send via email. For example, you might develop a newsletter such as “The 7 Best Articles to Read if You’re Preparing to Patent a Product”, or “Our Five Favorite Posts on New Healthcare Regulations”. This is a great way to promote older content that’s still evergreen but maybe has experienced a drop in views. Content roundups are also great for capitalizing on timely seasonal topics.
Highlight your expertise, include testimonials, and share any special offers your firm is running. For example, if you offer free 30-minute consultations, this is your chance to promote them and try to get some new meeting slots filled.
If you’re planning on hosting an in-person event or webinar, your newsletter is the perfect place to highlight this. In the weeks leading up to it, make sure subscribers get all the info they need on the event with a clear CTA on how to RSVP. Then, after your event is over, you can give a recap and include any new content you’ve developed from the event/ entice users to sign up for the next one.
ASK FOR FEEDBACK
This is your one chance to be a little more self-promotional, so make sure you use this format sparingly. Using this method, you’re attempting to get more leads and build relationships.
A big to-do in the legal industry is humanizing law firms/ lawyers and finding ways to ensure potential clients see how relatable they are. Sure it’s great to talk about recent cases and testimonials to show your chops, but it can also be useful to share news about internal events, PR initiatives, new hires, promotions, job postings, etc. Sharing these little snippets of law firm life helps users form connections with lawyers, and eventually see them as someone they’d like to work with.
If you’re stuck on ideas of what to include, chances are your audience has an idea of what they’d like to see. Try including a simple form in your newsletter so users can respond with what they’d like to see in the newsletter.
A strategic, consistent newsletter marketing strategy will ensure your law firm captures the right attention, from the right people, at the most crucial times. Incorporate some of these content ideas and most importantly, be a genuine resource for your target audience. n
SOCIAL MEDIA Use your newsletter to highlight social media to generate more followers and engagement. You can tease some of the content you’ve been sharing on your social media, with easy links to your pages so users can follow. Also, don’t forget to include social sharing buttons as needed under other content as well like blogs. This will ensure if users see something they like, they can easily share it to their own feed.
BUSINESS
CONTENT
Noreen Fishman is the director of client services at Good2bSocial. Her primary responsibility is to help clients achieve their digital marketing goals. This includes managing the Good2bSocial team, ensuring constant communication with clients and updating them on their progress. Connect with Noreen on LinkedIn or good2bsocial.com.
Takeaway
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firm and instead offer valuable information via video. We recommend keeping your video under 2 minutes. CONTENT
DOWNLOADABLE
SHARE THOUGHT LEADERSHIP CONTENT
Constantly creating new content like blogs and eBooks may seem daunting for a lot of firms. Luckily, a big part of thought leadership is also engaging and replying to ongoing conversations. You can include links to relevant articles from non-competitors and then add your own thoughts on it in a few sentences.
3. Overcommunicate clarity. After the first two steps (behavioral and intellectual alignment), leaders can take the third step: over-communicating. Leaders of healthy organizations constantly repeat themselves and reinforce what is true and important. They err on the side of saying too much, rather than too little.
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To get healthy, leaders need to take four simple, but difficult, steps:
Jeff Wolf is the author of Seven Disciplines of a Leader and founder and president of Wolf Management Consultants, LLC, a premier global consulting firm that specializes in helping people, teams and organizations achieve maximum effectiveness. A dynamic speaker and highly requested executive coach, he was named one of the country’s top 100 thought leaders by the prestigious Leadership Excellence Magazine. For more insights from Jeff Wolf, check out his book, Seven Disciplines of a Leader.
Attorney Journals Orange County | Volume 198, 202228
byofDisciplinesaLeaderJeffWolf
1. Build a cohesive leadership team. Get the leaders of the organization to behave in a functional, cohesive way. If the people responsible for running a team, department, or organization are behaving in dysfunctional ways, then that dysfunction will cascade down and prevent organiza tional health. And yes, there are concrete steps a leader ship team can take to prevent this.
2. Create clarity. Ensure that the members of that leader ship team are intellectually aligned around simple but critical questions. Leaders need to be clear on topics such as why the organization exists and what the most import ant priority is for the next few months, and eliminate any gaps between them. Then people who work one, two, or three levels below have clarity about what they should do to make the organization successful.
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4. Reinforce clarity. Leaders use simple human systems to reinforce clarity in answering critical questions. They custom design any process that involves people from hiring and firing to performance management and deci sion-making to support and emphasize the uniqueness of the Healthyorganization.teamsget better at meetings. Without making a few simple changes to the way meetings happen, a team will struggle to maintain its health. Healthy teams rarely fail. When politics, ambiguity, dysfunction, and confusion are reduced to a minimum, people are empowered to design products, serve customers, solve problems, and help one another. Healthy teams recover from setbacks, attract the best people, and create exciting opportunities. People are happier, the bottom line is stronger, and executives are at peace when they know they’ve fulfilled their most important responsibility: creating a culture of success. Applying the principles of great performance is hard, but the effects of deliberate practice are cumulative. The more of a head start you get in developing people, the more difficult it will be for competitors to catch you.
Four Disciplines
A ll the competitive advantages—strategy, technology, finance, marketing—that we’ve pursued in the past are gone. The disciplines haven’t disappeared, but they have lost their power as meaningful competitive advantages, as real differentiators that can set your company apart. Why? Virtually every organization has access to the best thinking and practices on those topics. As information has become ubiquitous, it’s almost impossible to sustain an advantage based on intellectual ideas. However, one simple, reliable, and virtually free competitive advantage remains—team health. Healthy teams all but eliminate politics and confusion from their cultures. Thus, productivity and morale soar, and good people almost never leave. For those leaders who are a bit skeptical, rest assured that none of this is touchy-feely or soft. It is as tangible and practical as anything else... and even more important. Even the smartest team will eventually fail if it is unhealthy. But a healthy team will find a way to succeed. Without politics and confusion, it will become smarter and tap into all of the intelligence and talent it has. Team health requires real work and discipline, maintained over time, and the courage to objectively confront problems hindering true team achievement. Leaders must confront themselves, their peers, and the dysfunction within their teams with honesty and persistence. Persistent leaders walk into uncomfortable situations and address issues that prevent them from realizing the potential that eludes them.
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