10 Tips to Be a Successful Litigator

Episode Notes

Transcript

Dave Scriven-Young:

Hello everyone and welcome to Litigation Radio. I’m your host, Dave Scriven Young. I’m a litigator practicing environmental and construction law in the Chicago office of Bo Hagen Meier. And I also coach young lawyers on how to accelerate their careers without burning out on the show. We talk to the country’s top litigators and judges to discover best practices in developing our careers, winning cases, getting more clients, and building a sustainable practice. Please be sure to subscribe to the podcast on your favorite podcasting app to make sure that you’re getting updated with future episodes. This podcast is brought to you by the litigation section of the American Bar Association. It’s where I make my home in the A BA. The litigation section provides litigators of all practice areas to resources we need to be successful advocates for our clients. Learn more at ambar.org/litigation. Today’s episode is all about setting up new litigators for success, whether you’re fresh out of law school or just starting to find your footing in the Courtroom.

Litigation is a craft that takes years to master, but the right guidance can make all of the difference. So that’s why we’re bringing you 10 essential tips that will help you sharpen your skills, build your reputation, and navigate the challenges of a litigation practice with confidence. So get ready to take notes from the wisdom of our three guests on today’s show. And all of them are leaders of the a, a litigation section and exceptional litigators in their own right. So let me introduce the guest for today. Our first guest is Monette Davis. She’s an associate in stone pigments New Orleans, Louisiana office. She concentrates her practice on insurance, defense and commercial litigation matters. Monette dedicates time to the legal community by serving in leadership positions with several bar organizations where she mentors minority young lawyers and law students. She also is responsible for planning award-winning training programs to help law students navigate their journey through law school and then becoming a lawyer. Monette, welcome to the show.

Monette Davis:

Thank you for having me.

Dave Scriven-Young:

Our second guest is Mark Romance. He is a partner in Dave Pitney’s Miami, Florida office. He’s a seasoned trial and appellate attorney representing diverse clients and complex civil litigation matters. Mark has extensive experience representing clients in cases involving multimillion dollar claims and high stakes litigation on behalf of high net worth individuals, corporations, and fiduciaries, mark also serves as co-chair of the firm’s fiduciary and probate litigation practice. Great to have you back on the show, mark.

Mark A. Romance:

Thank you so much. Thanks for having me.

Dave Scriven-Young:

And our last but certainly not least guest is Joseph Schafer. He’s a shareholder in Babs Callan’s, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania office. He’s in the firm’s litigation group and co-chairs their appellate practice group. He focuses his practice on environmental energy and complex commercial litigation matters and has tried these cases before. Environmental hearing boards, courts and juries. Joseph, welcome to the show.

Joseph Schaeffer:

Great to be here Dave.

Dave Scriven-Young:

Alright, so we have 10 tips for young lawyers and we’re going to start off with Joseph for first tip.

Joseph Schaeffer:

Dave, our first tip is know the rules. And step one, before knowing what the rules even say is knowing where to find your rules. Hopefully during your law school career, you’ve been introduced to your state or federal rules of civil procedure and gain some familiarity with those. But what you might not have been taught is the various other sources of rules. For example, courts often have local rules in my home jurisdiction in Pennsylvania, for example, the state rules of civil procedures specifically authorize and in some cases require the courts to have their own local rules, which means that every one of the counties in which we might practice has its own set of local rules. And then of course, within those jurisdictions you may have specific judges who have their own standing orders and requirements. And of course there are broader rules that we need to be familiar with, such as, for example, the rules of professional conduct that we need to comply with.

And so a starting point in every case is knowing which rules govern your proceeding. And then once you have done that, the next step is to actually confirm that you are complying with those rules, which means reading them. I can’t tell you how many times I have had a conversation with a more seasoned attorney, someone who has been practicing for quite a while, who bemoans the fact that an associate has come to them with a question that could have been answered simply by picking up the rule book. So starting the process in every case by reading the rules, knowing what they say can save time and can also save some heartache on the assigning associate or shareholders’ point of view.

Dave Scriven-Young:

Great tip, knowing the rules. All right, we’re going to kick it back to mark for the second tip.

Mark A. Romance:

Thanks Dave. So this topic is called allow no surprises. And let’s face it, most people don’t like surprises unless it’s maybe their birthday. But in the practice of law, surprises can be really bad for your practice and really bad for your reputation. Clients and partners that you work with are especially unhappy to have surprises come into their case. So when you’re working up a case, it’s really important to have good communication and to manage expectations. Very important to have these two attributes part of your daily practice. For example, you have an event, a deposition, a hearing, a trial. Maybe you want to make sure that you’re communicating with the key players, whether it’s your client or the partner that you’re working with. And you are talking about potential outcomes. Once you’ve been practicing for many years, you’ll know that you’ll win hearings that you should have lost and you’ll lose hearings or trials that you should have won.

It’s just part of the nature of the business. We’re dealing with human beings and it’s unpredictable. So it’s really important to anticipate as you prepare for something, whether it’s a hearing or a trial or a deposition, to anticipate what might happen and hopefully plan for dealing with those contingencies. But it’s not just enough to anticipate them, it’s really important to communicate those with the stakeholders and where possible communicate that in writing for example, not only do people not like surprises, but the people that you’re dealing with oftentimes report to others. Whether it’s a client in-house counsel that has to report to a board or an individual who has to report to business partners oftentimes or your partner has to report to the client, the people you’re dealing with and that you’re reporting to may have to report to others. So you have to give them the information that they need to allow them to manage expectations of the people that they report to. So managing expectations, keeping the client informed and anticipating outcomes are really important to establishing a successful relationship. Whether you win or lose the case, the relationship is key.

Dave Scriven-Young:

Great advice, mark, appreciate that. And Monette, let’s bring you into the conversation for our third tip.

Monette Davis:

Alright, so our third tip is be prepared. Being prepared is one of the most important aspects of being an attorney and it allows you to be successful in your practice. Some things that I do to be prepared is to monitor deadlines once I receive them from the court or once I receive them from the partner that may be on the matter or opposing counsel, any deadlines that I may have as it relates to any of my matters, I make sure that I monitor them and I make sure that they’re on my calendar. So I try to make sure I get my secretary or my paralegal involved to make sure that those deadlines are calendared. Definitely being responsive to pleadings, briefs, scheduling orders is something that will help you stay organized and prepared. Something that I tend to do often is to look ahead maybe a week or two just to kind of see what I have coming up so that way I know how to prepare for the cases that I have before me.

And another aspect of being prepared is knowing the technology of where you’re going to be. So if you’re going to be in a particular court or you have a scheduling conference that may be via zoom, it’s important to know that technology of what you’re going to be doing, which will allow you to be prepared, which will allow you not to have any time wasted because of course in the practice of law we are very busy and our time is very demanding and something that always sticks to me is something that my mentor has drilled in me since I was an undergrad. And that is to have a plan for everything. And I truly believe that if you have a plan for everything, that you will be able to be prepared for what you have coming up.

Dave Scriven-Young:

So smart strategic preparation. Great tip, Monnet. Joseph, you’re up next for the fourth tip.

Joseph Schaeffer:

Great, thank you Dave. Our fourth tip is to be the trusted person in the room. Before I talk about what that means, want to talk a little bit about the types of rooms that young lawyers might find themselves in. Most obvious of course is the Courtroom, but it can also be the office of a senior associate or a partner or it can be a client’s office or client’s boardroom when there’s a discussion of a case that you’re handling. And in all of those cases though, it’s just so critical to be the trusted person in the room. And what do we mean by that? Well, it means a couple different things. In part it means to be prepared, as Monette just said, you want to be the person that someone looks to when they need an answer to a fact about the case because you know the case well, when the upcoming deadlines are, what the factual allegations are, where the discovery file stands, where the pleadings file stands.

That’s part of being prepared to know the case inside and out and be the person that’s trusted to answer a question about its status at any given time. But it also means to be trusted in the sense of your demeanor and your reputation. We’ll cover a bit of this later, but when someone is talking to you, they don’t want surprises. And so being able to speak honestly to a client and deliver bad news or deliver bad news to a junior senior associate or a partner is critical to maintaining that trust in the relationship. It may seem easier in the short term to color the potential outcomes of a given case, particularly when the client or the assigning attorney is looking for that. But long-term you will gain more trust by being upfront and being able to deliver that hard news and people will come back to you as a result.

Dave Scriven-Young:

Great tip, Joseph, being the most trusted person in the room, great piece of advice for young lawyers and I believe you have our fifth tip as well.

Joseph Schaeffer:

I do. And our fifth tip is to be a good teammate. Of course, this can mean from a very high level, not throwing your colleagues under the bus and taking account of your own obligations and your own responsibilities and making sure that you are satisfying those as they come along. And what can this look like in practice? Litigation is very much deadline driven and we have court deadlines which really can’t be missed, but we also have the internal deadlines that we need in order to meet those. And so depending on which stage of your career you’re in, you may be accountable to different people. You may be accountable to the senior associate who needs to turn around a project to a partner. You may be accountable directly to the partner or you be accountable directly to the in-house counsel or the client at the company who needs to review a filing before it can be submitted to the court in any of those cases.

Knowing what that person has on their plate and being respectful of their time, not giving them something with only, for example, a few hours turnaround is just part of being a good teammate and it hearkens back in many ways to the golden rule of treating others as you would like to be treated. None of us like to have an emergency review dropped in our lapse immediately before the filing, and so giving people plenty of time is a critical part of being a good teammate. Another way of being a good teammate is when things come up and for example, a soft deadline needs to be moved. Giving someone advanced notice and working with your teammates on those types of situations to make sure that everyone is aware, as Mark said, to come back to that again, allow no surprises. And that’s true for deadlines and being a teammate as well. One last example of an associate who really impressed me with how she acted as a teammate was by sending me an email 15 to 30 minutes in advance of every call that just reminded me of who the participants were going to be, what our goals were for that call, any outstanding items that we needed to cover.

Dave Scriven-Young:

Oh, that’s a great piece of advice. And knowing what the expectations of your senior attorneys are with respect to communications and the like is really key and part of being that great teammate. So thanks Joseph for that tip. We’re going to move on to Mark for tip number six.

Mark A. Romance:

Thanks. So tip number six is entitled Maintain your Reputation. So as a new lawyer, you’re going to develop a reputation among the people you work with, the partners, your colleagues. You could develop a reputation for being a good teammate, for example, with your office staff. And so it starts there and then as you get into your career, you’ll have a reputation among your opposing counsel and eventually you’ll have a reputation among the judiciary. So you should decide early on in your career what reputation you want to have. Some people, for example, have a reputation for being a pit bull litigator. Some people have the reputation for being a problem solver, some people have the reputation for getting it right every time. Some people have a reputation for being reliable and trustworthy and timely. So you as a young litigator should start to think about how you want others to see you.

That’s what your reputation is. And in this business reputation is everything, whether it’s in your office, in the legal community, bar associations. Really it is everything. So similar to the that Joe covered about being the trusted person in the room, you want to figure out what you want your reputation to be. It starts with the first time that you are interacting with someone. So for example, the first time you interact with a client, the client is going to immediately develop an opinion of you. And sometimes it’ll evolve, sometimes it’ll be immediate, but you should think about these things before you have that first interaction with let’s say a client or a court. Similarly with your opposing counsel from the first email that you have or the first meet and confer conference or in my practice, I always like to have an introduction to my opposing counsel in a new case.

That first call, that first email is going to set the tone for how you are going to be viewed in the case. And with regard to the court, it doesn’t start when you introduce yourself to the judge at the hearing. Oftentimes it starts with how did you schedule the hearing where you are dealing with the court staff, maybe court staff is essential to having a successful career in a courthouse. The court staff talk to each other, the court staff talk to the judge. If you treat the court’s judicial assistant with respect, that will get back to the judge. But conversely, if you do not treat a staff person very well, that will absolutely get back to the judge and then that will transcend to other judges in the same courthouse. Also, having a reputation for being honest and ethical is critical. If you are not sure about something, don’t take a position, be honest and say, I need to get back to you. Or if the judge asks you a question and you don’t know the answer, you have to be brave enough to say you don’t know the answer and that you’re happy to get back to the judge or to a client or to a partner when you don’t know. But if you take a position on something that turns out to be incorrect, that’s going to affect your reputation going forward. So being professional, being ethical, being honest and treating people with respect are all really important characteristics for you to develop your reputation.

Dave Scriven-Young:

Those are great values and certainly something for young lawyers to think about. So thanks Mark for that. Monette, we’re going to turn to you for tip number seven.

Monette Davis:

Thanks Dave. So tip number seven is take responsibility for your professional development. I remember when I first started practicing about five years ago, I had the mindset that my firm would primarily be the force that would help shape me as a new litigator. But it wasn’t until I had with mentors that I realized that I’m responsible for my professional development and that comes with growing your network. And how can you do that? It’s important to accept new opportunities that may come your way, whether that be getting involved in a pro bono case or a committee at your firm. For me, getting involved in pro bono cases and also committees in my firm and accepting those new opportunities have allowed me to become a better lawyer. It allowed me to have skills that I didn’t have when I first started practicing, and it also allowed me to be well-rounded.

Another area where you can take responsibility is to be open-minded and never stop learning. The practice of law is so big and so broad, and sometimes we can be in a mindset of only wanting to focus on the things that we like, but sometimes getting involved in other opportunities, other practice areas may be something that can benefit your legal career. And an example personally for me is when I got involved on a board for an organization that is actually a client at my firm, this help opened doors for me for business development opportunities, even though I am primarily a litigator. And another area where you can take responsibility for your professional development is getting involved in bar associations in your city, state, and region. For example, I got involved with the pretrial practice and discovery committee through a mentor Ashley who suggested it to me. And since then I have been able to be active in the A, BA and have been able to be in leadership positions. So definitely realize that your professional development, your legal career is your legal career, so you have to take responsibility for that, but also accept those new opportunities. Be open-minded, never stop learning and get involved in various bar associations that can help open doors for you. You never know what opportunity may come when you get involved in these various bar associations and leadership positions.

Dave Scriven-Young:

Thanks for that great tip. And Mark, we’re going to send it back to you for tip number eight.

Mark A. Romance:

Tip number eight is be receptive to criticism. As Monette just said, every opportunity is an opportunity to learn. And I would say that every day presents an opportunity to improve as well. Every project you take on every task you undertake, whether it’s a written project or a presentation, it presents an opportunity to improve. But sometimes you can’t just improve on your own. Sometimes you really need the input from others who have different perspectives and you can’t be afraid to put yourself out there and invite criticism, whether it’s positive criticism or constructive criticism. All criticism is an opportunity to improve you as a lawyer. So if you are working on a written project, for example, oftentimes you’re going to get feedback, you’re going to get feedback from maybe a partner that you had review it or a client that provided input. So that is often a quick way to get feedback and don’t accept red lines in written products as a negative.

Try to be positive in the sense that this is an opportunity to improve. It’s an opportunity to learn better techniques in your writing. That’s usually an easier way to get criticism. The harder way is to ask for criticism on presentations such as a hearing or a deposition or a client presentation. And to get there, you have to develop a relationship with others, whether it’s a colleague or a partner or even sometimes a client. And you shouldn’t be afraid to say, Hey, I worked really hard on this presentation or this hearing, and I’d love your feedback on ways in which I can improve. And no one likes to be criticized. It takes a brave person, a courageous person to be willing to put themselves out there and ask for the criticism. But your career will be enhanced by receiving that feedback, improving your skills, and it’ll make you a more well-rounded person because you’ll be able to improve and develop relationships with people who can help you.

Dave Scriven-Young:

That’s great advice. Being open to criticism and learning from it. Love it. Monette, you’re up with tip number nine.

Monette Davis:

Thanks Dave. So tip number nine is to be willing to ask for help in the practice of law. There is so many things that as young lawyers that we don’t know and that’s okay, but we have to be willing to ask for help in those moments where we may not have the answer or where we may need some advice. I think it’s very important for young lawyers to be able to have mentorship, whether that be in your firm or outside of your firm. For me, I personally would not be where I am today without mentors, without those friendships, those individuals that are in the legal community. So being able to have those mentors, friends that you can talk to, to ask for help. And it may not be anything case related, but it can just be advice on how to maybe approach a partner or maybe how to approach a situation.

I think it’s always important to have those mentors by your side. And in this profession we’re developing, as I mentioned before, we are responsible for our own personal development. So with that development that comes with mentorship, that is something that we must have because we can’t do it on our own. I don’t think there’s any lawyer that actually became who they are on their, so I think that mentorship is very important. Personally, I have a mentor that I meet with once a month and that’s my opportunity for me to just let my hair down, for me to ask various questions, whether it relates to the practice, maybe something personal. I do that personally for myself because that is something that I feel I need. Especially sometimes it’s not as easy to maybe have a mentor in your firm or maybe discuss certain things with folks in your firm.

So having someone outside that can relate to you or can help you in those instances is very important. I would also provide the notion that, as I said before, we don’t have all the answers. So it’s important to ask for direction, ask for help from the partners or the superiors that you’re working with. And being able to ask for help doesn’t mean that you’re incompetent or that you’re not willing to develop. It actually shows your strength. That’s what I truly believe. We all need help. Again, we all need help. So I think it’s very important to just be open-minded and just realize that just kind of putting your pride to the side and being able to be open-minded to get the help that you need to be a great attorney.

Dave Scriven-Young:

We can always use help. And sometimes being a litigator is lonely and reaching out to other people is essential to our practice. And Monette, we’ve reached tip number 10, the end of the line here. What is your final tip for us?

Monette Davis:

Yes. So Dave, my final tip is practice self-care. This is probably my favorite tip because the legal profession can be quite demanding. A lot of times we are overwhelmed with assignments, overwhelmed with cases, and sometimes we don’t make the necessary time for ourselves. I think that is very important to take the time that you need to yourself, whether that is taking a break just to clear your mind or taking a vacation regularly. I make it a thing for me to take a vacation at least once a year. I allow that time to be for me to unwind and just enjoy life. Something that I do on the regular basis is exercise, fitness, and that allows me to focus on myself for some time. We give out a lot of time to the profession, to our clients, to our superiors. I think it’s important as well to take some time each day for yourself.

So as I mentioned, I like to work out, I like to meditate and I like to take the time just to be with myself. I think that will allow you to be more connected with yourself while we’re still in such a busy profession and also take time to rest. Resting doesn’t mean sleeping necessarily, but it can just be doing something that’s mindless, whether that’s watching TV or just enjoying the atmosphere. So I think it’s just very important practice self-care to put yourself first because if you’re not good, then you can’t be good to your clients. You can’t be good to your superiors. So if you take that time to hone in on yourself, allow yourself to be well and to take care of yourself and to motivate yourself, I think that’s something that will be very beneficial. I want to add one more thing. Another thing I do on a regular basis is speaking words of affirmation and motivation to myself. Because again, the legal profession can be quite dawning on your mental. I think that is very important to speak words of affirmation and an encouragement in yourself that you can do it, that you’ve come this far and that you are still going to proceed in the legal profession. So yes,

Dave Scriven-Young:

Very wise words and Monat, mark and Joseph, this has been a great conversation. Hopefully all young lawyers have been able to find a lot of value in your words. And certainly this is something that I’ve gotten from the ABA Litigation Section over the years is meeting and being taught by really wise litigators who have walked the walk before me and all of our young folks. So Monat Davis, mark Romance, Joseph Schafer, thank you so much for being on the show today.

Monette Davis:

Thank you so much. Thanks

Dave Scriven-Young:

Dave. Thanks for having us.

Thanks to litigation section Premier sponsor, BRG for sponsoring this podcast. BRG is an award-winning global consulting firm composed of world-class experts in accounting, damages analysis, economics, finance, intellectual property valuation, data analytics and statistics who work across industries, disciplines and jurisdictions delivering clear perspectives that you can count on. Guiding principle is intelligence that works. Learn [email protected]. And now it’s time for our quick tip from the ABA Litigation Section. I’m pleased to welcome Sherri-Ann Grant Clark to the show for her first tip, Sherri-Ann practices general liability litigation and construction defect cases at Cat Siegel and Maple in Palm Harbor, Florida. What’s your quick tip? Sherri-Ann,

Sherri-Ann Grant Clark:

Thank you so much Dave for having me. So my tip for today for newer practicing attorneys is knowing when to acknowledge mistakes and also importantly knowing when to inform his or her supervisor about that mistake. Most of us who attend law school we’re very high functioning. We’re used to being top of our classes, we’re used to making sure that we are the best of the best. And so oftentimes when we graduate law school and we are practicing in our first or relatively new to the practice of law, we tend to go above and beyond in the work that we produce, which is fine. And sometimes though we forget that we are still human and we are still subject to human error. I know that we are now in the time where ai, generative AI is becoming more and more advanced, but we are still heavily reliant on humans.

And so we do have to expect that that part of being human and making mistakes, it’s going to happen with that practicing coming out of law school when a mistake is made because it will happen. It’s inevitable when a mistake is made. And I’ve been in that position myself. Oftentimes we are more worried about the fact that we made a mistake and how that mistake may be a reflection of us and our work product versus acknowledging again the human aspect. And what I have seen happen is when an associate makes a mistake, he or she may then determine that it’s best to sit on the mistake and not inform anyone in the office in an attempt to try and correct the mistake, maybe try to Google or again, in this time maybe use a generative AI application like a chat GPT to maybe try and figure out how to solve the mistake when in fact the sooner a supervisor is notified of the mistake, the likelihood is the sooner that mistake will be remedied.

What I’ve also realized is when we first enter the legal profession, everything seems like it is dire in a case. And so if a mistake is made not knowing what we don’t know, we tend to think that that mistake is make or break in the case. And what we tend to realize down the road is depending on the type of mistake, especially in the civil litigation realm, we can probably fix it relatively quickly and it’s likely not make or break in a case. And so I just want to revert back to saying that we have to acknowledge that we are still human beings with a soul. We’re still human beings who are fallible to making mistakes in every aspect of our lives, but especially at work when we’re practicing. And it’s important to acknowledge that we will make mistakes so that when a mistake occurs, we can inform the appropriate individuals and see if we can remedy that mistake as quickly as possible. And that would be my tip for today.

Dave Scriven-Young:

Thanks Sherri-Ann for a great tip. Thanks so much for being on the show today.

Sherri-Ann Grant Clark:

My pleasure. Thank you.

Dave Scriven-Young:

And that’s all we have for our show today and I’d love to hear your thoughts about today’s episode. If you have comments or questions you’d like for me to answer on an upcoming show, you can contact me at dscr young at O’Hagan meyer.com and connect with me on social. I’m at Attorney Dsy on LinkedIn, Instagram X and Facebook. You can also connect with the ABA Litigation Section on those platforms as well. But as much as I’d like to connect with you online, nothing beats meeting you in person at one of our litigation section events. So please make plans to join us at the 2025 Section annual Conference, April 30th through May 2nd in Chicago. This annual conference provides unique opportunities to learn and interact with in-house counsel, outside counsel, academics, government employees, and judges from across the country. The conference will include over 20 dynamic programs highlighting all aspects of litigation, and of course there will be opportunities to network during our special events and programming breaks.

To find out more and to register, go to ambar.org/sac 2025. You won’t want to miss it. If you like the show, please help spread the word by sharing a link to this episode with a friend or through a post on social and invite others to join the show and community. If you want to leave a review over an Apple podcast, it’s incredibly helpful. Even a quick rating at Spotify is super helpful as well. And finally, I want to quickly thank some folks who make the show possible. Thanks to Michelle Oberts, who’s on Stafford, the litigation section. Thanks also goes out to the co-chairs of the litigation section’s audio content committee. Haley Maple and Charlotte Stevens, thank you to the audio professionals from Legal Talk Network. And last but not least, thank you so much for listening. I’ll see you next time.