The Value of Professional Assistant Week

In the legal profession, attorneys run into roadblocks constantly and to deal with them you have to have two things: a sense of humor and a great assistant. You can get by with just a sense of humor by itself but you'll go nuts in the process. You have to have the right legal assistant. Period.

For one week out of the year (perhaps thanks to Hallmark?) we get to express our appreciation to those who help us get through every day, and Lord knows they deserve more credit than they ever get. Their contentment and happiness is crucial to your success as an attorney.

Your assistant is the interface between your clients and yourself. Clients will not feel appreciated and pleased if your assistant just doesn't "click" right with them in every call, every interaction. It may be hard for many attorneys to realize how critically important it is to have a great assistant, but it's a fact of business.

Think about the last time you went to a restaurant and how the whole experience was affected by the interaction of each person along the way --- and you never even met the chef or the owner! It's a fact. If the waitress/waiter is not attentive and helpful, friendly and cheerful, it will affect the whole experience and your opinion of the restaurant itself will suffer. It's the same thing with your assistant.

Find the right assistant and everything works great. Get the wrong person for the job, and you professional life will be terrible.

So, the moral is make sure you get the right person in the right job, especially your legal assistant. And then pay them good. And then take every opportunity to make sure them realize that you realize just how important they are to you. Start by telling them when the opportunity arises. And then show it when you can. A good assistant doesn't expect to be treated as though they can walk on water, but they do expect to be treated with respect, courtesy, and appreciation.

But that calls for a whole other discussion...so let's talk about Professional Assistant Week. It's time to make sure your assistant knows how appreciated they are.

One of the best ways to make sure your assistant, and every female support staff member, is happy is flowers. While a male assistant might not be appreciative, there is something about flowers that say "thanks" with sincerity to women. For a male assistant, you'll have to come up with something far more specialized to the person.

For our firm, we try to share humor whenever we can, wherever we find it. Sometimes we even get to cause a smile to brighten up someone's day. When you can, that's a great professional assistant gift.

For us, the Burdge Law Team is more than just lawyers. Each of our attorneys has an assistant, and an entire staff, of dedicated professionals who tirelessly work to squash every lemon and make every manufacturer pay for it.

For them, this week is dedicated. Today they each received a beautiful (and humorous) lemon flower arrangement like the one pictured above with the heartfelt thanks of our attorneys and our clients. Our professional assistants work hard every day to help our clients get rid of their lemon car or lemon truck or lemon rv or lemon boat, or deal with another Consumer Law issue. Because of that, a lemon flower arrangement just seemed right. For your law practice, try to find something that works with your "firm theme".

And say "thanks" too. Flowers are nice, but a personal statement of appreciation is worth so very much more to your assistant. They know that you are a very busy professional, so the fact that you took a minute to express your thanks will say more than the words will ever accomplish.

Try it. No, we should have said try it right now.

Ronald Burdge
www. The Law Coach .com
Helping Consumer Law Attorneys Win Cases Since 1978

Click here to see a list of some of the topics we can help you with on your road to success.

How to Write a Letter to a Client

Law school teaches young would-be-lawyers a lot of things but there are a lot of basics that they don't teach law students at all. One of them is how to write an effective letter to a client. Historically the most common grievances come from lack of clear attorney-client communication skills.

After awhile, letter-writing gets to be automatic but until you get there (and as a reminder even if you are already there), here's some tips on what a client letter should cover, in the order they should appear in the letter.

1. The Why. Tell the client why you are writing (to update them on status of their case or an issue, to ask a question, to provide an answer to a question they asked, to send them documents to review, etc).

2. Just do it. Provide the update, ask the question, give the answer, explain the documents, tell them what you want them to do, etc. Do it.

3. Get a response. If your letter requires a response from the client, tell them how (via email, phone, etc) and when you need their response (a firm deadline). If your letter does not require a response, then say that (so the client doesn't wonder if they are supposed to respond). If a conference with the client is needed, then ask the client to make an in-office or on-phone (say which way you want it to be) appointment to discuss the issue and their resulting response.

4. Explain it. Tell them why or how the immediate inquiry fits into their case at that moment, so they understand why it matters and why it is important to respond.

5. Predict the future. Tell them what will happen next in their case, so they realize that you are working on their case and that you need their response in order to proceed to the next step of the case.

6. Say something good. Use the opportunity to say something positive or provide reinforcement to the client. Your letter may cause concern so your client will appreciate hearing some "good news" in their case, even if it's only your opinion or reassurance that things are proceeding normally as far as you are concerned.

7. Express thanks. Thank the client for their continued patience and assistance and say that if they have any question to let you know and how to contact you (phone, email, etc).

More tips on letter writing:

Generally, your message should be sent in the manner that you expect a response to occur (if you want them to email you, then you use email to send the message, etc). However, always remember that some things require the personal touch of a phone call.

The letter should generally be less than one page or two at the most. Everyone knows that lawyers sometimes like to talk at length. Lawyers often fail to realize that non-lawyers don't like to read (or listen) at length.

If appropriate, a copy of the letter should be put in your follow up tickler system as a reminder for a specific future deadline date.

First-timers need to remember the above. Later, after years of letter writing, you may need to remind yourself again. Good client communications are critical for long-term professional success.

Ronald L. Burdge
www. The Law Coach .com
Helping Consumer Law Attorneys Win Cases Since 1978.

Two Bucks is Worth It

Some things you see are so cheap you can't hardly find a reason not to get them. This is about one of them.

A lot of attorneys still miss the point that the practice of law is a business first and a law practice second. Other attorneys understand that but still have a hard time figuring out how to treat it like a business. One way to start is to begin reading publications that are directed at the business side of your law work because you law work should be about your business.

While in an airport lounge recently I picked up a copy of Business to Business magazine and was surprised to see how much of it was useful to the legal profession. Highlighted articles dealt with a variety of topics that affect a law practice everyday.

"Alive & Well" is an interesting discussion of the policies and politics of health care. If your law firm is concerned about health care costs, and who isn't, then you can get a good dose of health care issues right here. If you aren't at the Delta lounge in Atlanta, you can read (or listen) to it by clicking here.

If you're in charge of hiring, you probably ought to read "The Mellennials Cometh" which is also in the April issue. I learned a thing or two that I'll keep in mind for the next associate hiring and you probably will too.

There's a fascinating article on "The ROI of giving" that talks about the generous return on investment a business can get from charitable donations, a topic discussed a few months back, which deals with stats and studies that show a real benefit to being beneficial.

There's lots more in this issue, and every issue, and it's certainly worth the very modest $24 annual subscription cost. They didn't pay us to write this but, speaking of business to business, maybe they should've.

Ronald L. Burdge
www. The Law Coach .com
Helping Consumer Law and Other Attorneys Win Cases Since 1978

A Disposable Laptop?

Finally. An ultralight laptop that's so cheap you can just throw it away if it breaks, without losing sleep over it. And it only weighs 2 pounds. Light, small, cheap. What more could you want?

The Asus Eee pc has been getting rave reviews that all seem to start out with the fact that it costs less than $400 but quickly point out that it has a solid state hard drive (no moving parts), a built in camera and Wi-Fi and comes loaded with a decent set of 40 basic programs that'll get you running right out of the box. And it'll keep you running for over 3 hours on the battery too.

This is one laptop you have to check out. Read the review in PC Today magazine by clicking here at PCToday.com or check the company's website by clicking here.

Ronald L. Burdge
www. The Law Coach .com
Helping Consumers and Consumer Law Attorneys Since 1978.

Handling Abusive Deposition Tactics

Every once in a while you see an article that you wish you had seen years ago. This story is about one of those.

We've had lots of depositions where the opposing attorney obstructed and interfered with a smooth orderly deposition before. You can takes years, and dozens of depositions, before you begin to figure out how to deal with some of these people. Or you can check out the Ohio Trial "Abusive Deposition Tactics" article published in the Winter 2008 issue by Ohio Association for Justice.

Authored by attorney Rebecca Castell and attorney Raymond Tisone, you'll get great examples and tips, with lots of references to the Civil Rules. If you haven't seen it, go online here to find out how to join OAJ and get a copy. The OAJ membership cost is worth it just to get a copy of this article alone.

The topic is similar to Salt Lake City attorney Robert Sykes' article in The Utah Trial Lawyers Association, December 4, 2003 title "Abusive Deposition Objections: How To Ethically Even the Playing Field" which is another good article on this topic.

A classic example of "lawyers gone wild" appears on YouTube here. If you haven't seen the off-screen fight between two lawyers, and the hapless witness caught in between, it's worth a look. It's a great example of what not to do.

If you've been lucky and have not had to deal with an opposing counsel who abuses the deposition process, then now is a good time to read the OAJ article. You don't want to be reading it later and mumbling to yourself "so that's what I should have done."

Ronald L. Burdge
www. The Law Coach .com
Helping Consumer Law Attorneys Win Cases Since 1978

Ohio Attorney General e-Newsletter on Consumer Law

Ohio Attorney Marc Dann is working hard to find ways to help consumer advocates protect consumers everywhere. He's off to a good start already but now he even goes himself one better.

Attorney General Dann has started a monthly "e-newsletter" that will bring the latest updates on consumer laws, fraud alerts, and prevention tips to your email inbox. Each issue promises to provide links to more in-depth resources to help advocates protect consumers and their clients.

Among recent articles was a list of the Top 10 consumer complaints, showing auto issues at the top spot, followed by credit issues, and more. That list will certainly tell you the heartbeat (or heart ache) on the street. Most people don't know that a more detailed explanation of the Top 10 and other AG office activities can be found in the annual AG Office's report (click here for the 2007 Report).

Tips for online shopping were noted and a nice article on the problems of Tax Refund Anticipation Loans, which is perhaps one of the more clever ways to get into consumer's wallet without all the usual appearances of a ripoff.

If you're a consumer advocate, this free newsletter is for you. It's off to a great start and I strongly recommend you sign up for it. It'll keep you up to date and, best of all, it's free.

You can subscribe by sending an email to ConsumerEnewsletter@ag.state.oh.us or by just telephoning them at 1.877.AG4Ohio.

Ronald L. Burdge

http://www.thelawcoach.com/

Helping Consumers, and Consumer Law Attorneys, Win Cases Since 1978

Teaching Consumer Law Conference in Houston May 23

More than 30 experts from around the world will converge in Houston on May 23rd and 24th, 2008 to discuss issues of importance to any consumer law professor at an international conference entitled "Teaching Consumer Law -- The Who, What, Where, Why, When and How."

The conference gathers participants to examine issues such as: what materials should be used in teaching consumer law; alternative teaching methods; new developments in consumer law; innovative ways to look at traditional consumer problems; global approaches to consumer regulation; and methods and teaching issues related to how consumers can collect attorneys fees.

The Law Coach, Ron Burdge, will be one of the speakers, discussing attorneys fees issues with Pennsylvania attorney Cary Flitter.

The conference is hosted by the University of Houston School of Law (the best Consumer Law-oriented law school in the country, without a doubt) in cooperation with the National Association of Consumer Advocates (the nation's foremost professional association for consumer advocates), and underwritten by a staunch friend of Consumer Law, Moriarty Leyendecker Erben, P.C.

This conference provides all participants with the opportunity to polish their techniques and skills in teaching tomorrows attorneys important Consumer Law topics. Along with the conference discussion, attendees get a special bonus: conference participants are invited to watch the Houston Astros play the Philadelphia Phillies. Even without the ball game, this international Conference on Teaching Consumer Law would be worth the very modest registration cost. With it, it's a bargain. We hope to see you there.

Click here for more information and a registration form or you can call Professor Richard Alderman at 713-743-2165 for details.

Ronald L. Burdge

www. The Law Coach .com

Helping Consumers, and Consumer Law Attorneys, Win Cases Since 1978

What Judges Really Think

Bryan Garner is one of the best speakers around when it comes to understanding how to write briefs and how to make an impressive oral argument. Not just the mechanics, mind you, but the practical side of the process too. Now, he's gone one better.

If you ever get the chance, go to one of his seminars. There's no one better on the subjects he discusses. But, have you ever wondered what judges really think about appellate briefs and arguments they see and hear?

Well, there's only one US Supreme Court and what they think is probably not a lot different from what other appellate judges and state supreme court judges think. Now you can find out. Better yet, you can watch them voice their opinions.

Garner conducted a series of video interviews with 8 of the 9 US Supreme Court Justices and has posted the eight videos on the web site of LawProse where you can watch the Justices tell their thoughts on what is good and what is bad about the briefs and arguments they see and hear.

The pet peeves you hear the Justices talk about are surprising and run the gamut of all things meaningful and otherwise. Take the time to watch and learn. It's well worth it. And you can't beat the price.

Ronald L. Burdge
www. The Law Coach .com
Helping Consumers, and Consumer Law Attorneys Win Cases Since 1978

Rent-a-desk Lawyering

In these days of outsourcing, it's no wonder that even legal work is being farmed out to off shore "legal help" companies who provide part time and single job work by foreign workers trained in US law. Well, with that happening, it's no surprise that some firms are now looking for other ways to cut costs but keep using their current associate-level lawyer personnel.

One way was found by Canadian law firm Thackray Burgess that decided they didn't need lawyer associates anymore. Instead they just rented out desk space to them and cut them loose, sort of, and renamed them as Consultants. The associates, errrr, consultants, do as much work (or as little) as they want, setting their own hours and even working from home if they want.

The idea certainly has some appeal for the right circumstances. The Firm rents a desk to a lawyer but they don't work for the Firm. Instead, they do piecemeal work for the Firm (and get paid for it) or do work which they have generated on their own (and for which the Firm gets paid a cut of the fees). It's not much different from the kind of business real estate leasing where a business rents a location and pays a base rent (the desk) plus a percentage of the business generated from that location (the cut of other non-Firm-generated fees).

But is it good for you? That depends on which end of the equation you are on and what the terms are, but it certainly could be. Lawyers who want to work but want to balance that workload with a more fulfilling home life may find it a very attractive alternative to the grind that the "partner" path seems to be. And law firms that are looking to cut costs, while providing a different kind oand perhaps more satisfying working relationship, may find this approach suits them perfectly.

And with the glut of new lawyers, Rent-a-desk Lawyering just might be the best answer to the unemployment line blues that can await the new grads who can't find a full time job.

Ronald L. Burdge

www. The Law Coach .com
Helping Attorneys Win Cases Since 1978

Getting Recalls Into Evidence

One of the aggravating parts of handling a product defect case is when the government recalls
the very product in your case and the defendant argues that you shouldn't be able to use the recall in evidence to persuade the jury that the product is defective. Aggravating indeed.

Seems like there's lots of recalls on the news nowadays and the mere existence on the news can help people understand both the reality and the prevalence of defective products in our society. But how can you actually get the recall into evidence so the jury in your case can hear about it?

Well, the first rule is to remember that if the recall indicates that a defect was present when the product left the manufacturer then it is relevant in your case. Relevant evidence is just something that makes it more likely, or less likely, that a disputed fact is true. So, does it?

Some judges will want the defect in your case to be the same as the defect in the recall. Others are more liberal about it. Just remember, your argument should focus on the fact that the recall makes it possible that a defect existed in an entire group of products and your case involves one of those products. Take a look at Bailey v Monaco Coach (ND Ga 2004), 350 F.Supp.2d 1036.

And when the defendant argues that the recall is hearsay, don't forget that you can argue that it is actually admissible as an admission by the defendant so it isn't really hearsay at all. Still, you have to know your evidence rules and be ready to quickly cite the rule numbers that apply.

Keep in mind that if a defendant claims its product is safe or the best or carefully designed, etc, you may be able to use the recall as evidence that can impeach the defendant's claim.

Impeachment, direct, rebuttal, hearsay --- whatever. The bottom line is that you need to carefully plot out how you can use recall evidence in your case and be prepared for a tough fight from the defendant. Recall evidence can be crucial to prove the truth of a product's defective nature or history, so don't give up easy.

Ronald L. Burdge

www. The Law Coach .com
Helping Consumer Law Attorneys Win Cases Since 1978

Click here to see some of our common coaching topics and how we can help you.

Economy Tightens Patience for Legal Services

Okay, the economy is certainly tightening up, thanks to the credit crunch and the mortgage mess.

Clients are getting impatient with the time it takes to get good results. And they can't understand why defendants don't just "do what's right" and settle their case.

Of course the reason is money. It probably has nothing to do with who is right and who is wrong. It has everything to do with holding on to the money for as long as you can.

Defendants are stalling longer than ever before, trying to keep the money in their own pocket for as long as they can. And they are arguing over every nickel and dime like it's someone's eye teeth.

Defense attorneys seem to be practically inventing ways to work their files more, which stalls the file more and builds up more fees, and that costs the plaintiff more. With defense law firms now cutting back and laying off, it's no wonder that the remaining attorneys are looking for ways to pump up their billings.

You'd think their clients would wise up, but then again they appear more willing to pay their lawyers to fight than to pay a plaintiff to settle --- even when it's cheaper to pay to settle. That doesn't make good business sense to us, but apparently it does to them.

And some people wonder why the public disdains the legal profession. Heck, even some lawyers do.

For now, plaintiff's lawyers need to get economically smart in a hurry if they are going to ride out the current economic slump and the settlement slump being cause by defense tactics. Time to watch the billables, income, and expenses very carefully.