Articles Posted in What It Takes To Be A Great Trial Lawyer

The Tennessee Bar Association has been kind enough to republish my "What it Takes to be a Great Trial Lawyer" series as the cover story in the November edition of the Tennessee Bar Journal. Click here to read the article.

Closing Thoughts As I said in my first post on this subject, a great trial lawyer need not have all of the attributes set forth in this series of posts.  Admittedly, the "great trial lawyer" hurdle has been set  high.  Very high.  Indeed, if complete fulfillment of all of these…

The Knowledge That You Are Only as Good as Your Next Verdict. I stole this idea from a friend in Atlanta who told me about it over a decade ago.  While I disagree with the notion some might take from this statement (that a lawyer has  to win or has done a…

The Willingness and Ability To Delegate. It is not impossible to be a great trial lawyer on your own, with no help from anyone.  But I don’t know one. At a minimum a great trial lawyer needs an extremely competent secretary, one who can think for the lawyer  and keep that plates…

An Appreciation for the Discretion Vested in the Trial Judge Trial judges are human.  Each of them have certain strengths and weaknesses.  Some may not have been at the top of their class in law school but know how to preside over the trial of a lawsuit.  Others are very bright but…

An Understanding of the Human Condition and What It Takes to Motivate Jurors to Action You can’t try jury cases if you don’t understand how people think.  I am not talking about how  the way other members of the club think.  Nor am I talking about the thought processes or values of  the people you see…

A Healthy Respect for the Judicial System Great trial lawyers have a healthy respect for the judicial system and, if they are jury trial lawyers, for the right to trial by jury and the jury system.  They demonstrate that respect in the way they speak and act around lawyers and…

A Passion for the Work It is hard to be a great trial lawyer if you don’t like what you do. Most people can quickly determine whether a lawyer – or the cashier at McDonald’s – has a passion for the job. You can see that passion  in the face…

The ability and willingness to undertake (and share with the client) a cost-benefit analyis throughout the litigation. Things change in litigation.  For example, as mentioned in a least one previous post in this series, almost every deposition changes the value of a case. But there are many other things that impact the…

The Courage to Tell The Client the Truth Many clients don’t want the truth.  A number of them want re-assurance that they are "right," regardless of the reality of the situation. Others demand to know that, at the end of the day, they will prevail. And some will fire or lose…