What About Difficult Personalities?

Josh and Aaron discuss how they navigate different client personalities and what challenges they can bring.

Listen here or read the transcript below. FVF’s Summary Judgment podcast is available wherever you listen to podcasts including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, and more.

0:00:00.0 Aaron: Hey, Josh.

0:00:01.6 Josh: Hey, Aaron.

0:00:02.3 Aaron: Do you like my shirt?

0:00:03.0 Josh: It Just looks really good on you. I’m doing great today.

0:00:07.8 Aaron: Yeah, like are you tired of sharkskin suits and slicked back hair? Don’t you wish your lawyer was a little more like a dad in the mountains?

0:00:18.8 Josh: Yeah. I think if I were given the choice between those two, I’d probably choose dad in the mountains.

0:00:25.8 Aaron: Yeah. And that’s why I got the plaid.

0:00:28.3 Josh: That’s a good thing. I wondered, did you leave your hatchet in the car?

0:00:31.5 Aaron: [laughter] FVF law where at least half of our name partners are wearing plaid at any given time. [laughter], and we all…

0:00:40.5 Josh: At least half.

0:00:43.2 Aaron: Yeah. So, I said I brought some levity to our entrance because we kind of like, is this a downer topic?

0:00:52.2 Josh: Yeah. I don’t think it’s a downer topic. I think it’s an important topic from both. It’s a multifaceted topic in as well as an important topic because we’re talking about how we as an organization handle challenging clients and challenging can have multiple different meanings. That’s why this is a multifaceted topic. You can talk about clients that create problems within the firm, with maybe certain types of behavior which happens. And you can talk about clients who are in need of counseling in order for, not that aren’t challenging to us, but just are in need of counseling in order to help them understand how we can best help them navigate their claim through the litigation process or through the claims process to make sure that their attention is focused appropriately and that we’re doing what we need to do to troubleshoot the problems in their cases to get them the best possible results.

0:02:18.0 Aaron: This is a really, I think it’s an intellectually interesting topic because the idea of a challenging client, at first it may just sound like lawyers whining about like, ah, I gotta a customer service is hard and sometimes people’s expectations are high. This is not about that. We are dedicated professionals. We don’t care if our clients are challenging to us. We embrace challenges, we go forward, we work hard. That’s not the issue. What I think we’re talking about here today is the fact that the 12 people in the box, the 12 jurors who eventually will either decide your case or will be the thing that makes the insurance company settle your case because they fear those people.

0:03:03.3 Josh: That’s right.

0:03:05.1 Aaron: We’re concerned with their perception of our client. I guess that’s one of my main concerns. And we can talk about sort of the stuff that happens along the way before we get there, but in dealing with that, we’ve got this tricky problem of the prejudices of the world are inside that box. All the bad things about humans, they’re gonna judge people’s dress, like what they’re wearing, how they talk. They’re going to judge their demeanor, read things in to their body languages. So, let’s talk first about managing that and how do you approach it?

0:03:52.1 Josh: Yeah. So, to kind of to be clear, at the end of the day, when we’re handling a personal injury case, we have to accept the reality that it’s gonna be not you or I whose opinion matters on what a client’s expectations ought necessarily be for purposes of the outcome of the case. Ultimately, the power lies in a group of strangers that would be the jury. And it’s true that most cases never make it that far, but when we’re planning a case, we have to assume that it will. So, forward thinking about how a jury is going to respond to a particular case is critically important to our strategy and helping us help our clients secure the best result possible. So, in that vein, it’s our responsibility to make sure that we’re thinking about how we can best present that case to a jury to ensure that the jury fully understands and comprehends the nature and extent of a person’s loss, the circumstances surrounding an incident, and ultimately will value our clients’ losses in the way that we ask them to so that we can get the outcome that we believe that our clients deserve.

0:05:18.9 Josh: And Aaron, I know one of the big ways that we do that, I mean, there’s a lot of internal discussion about many, many cases in our organization along the way. We’re all working together to talk about problems that arise and we’re constantly communicating with clients, but there are some objective tools that we have available focus groups and things of that nature that you in particular have gotten really attuned to during your career. How are some of those tools used and deployed to address some of those challenges?

0:05:54.8 Aaron: I love a focus group. I do. Focus groups are great because they are giving you some perceptions that you’re not really gonna tell your client. If there’s people, maybe there’s lawyers listening to this podcast who are thinking, well, how do I tell my client, you’re not the most likable, or the jury’s not gonna like the way you say certain things. The answer is you shouldn’t. You shouldn’t put yourself in that role. You’re not a psychologist. You’re not really an expert in the inside of the heads of the jurors. The best way to get that feedback is from real people themselves. And compared to some of the things we spend money on, [laughter], getting to trial, we can talk about all the experts that are hired and the court reporters that are paid and the filing fees of the court.

0:06:45.8 Aaron: A focus group is like a tiny percentage of the overall cost of getting to trial. And you get this golden feedback from people. I like to bring in video maybe from depositions of our client and of the defendant and just get people’s perceptions and get those people to say things that I probably would never say to my client. Coming out of their mouth it will really help the client to see, you know what, this lawyer’s on my side. They’re trying to help me with the best presentation of my case possible. And so I think the focus group is a great tool for getting people to sort of self-correct some issues. It’s not quite the end of the story though. Great lawyering starts and ends with leadership. And when you have a client who’s maybe got like a bold personality or they’re cantankerous or argumentative or, whatever it is, the best defense is a good offense.

0:07:52.6 Aaron: Okay? A lawyer who knows where his or her case is going and is leading their client to that end point does, has a lot less to worry about than someone who’s sitting on their heels waiting for problems to come to them, being reactive to those issues. And sometimes that reaction trains the person that the squeaky wheel gets the grease and all of a sudden the person who is maybe a little bit from a customer service perspective challenging in the beginning is really challenging ’cause they’ve been trained by you that the only way they can get your attention is to start complaining. And then all of a sudden you start doing stuff. If you flip that and say, I’m gonna be the kind of lawyer that my client can’t even keep up with, ’cause I’ve got so much to do. I’ve got this trial to put on. I’ve got the presentation figured out. I need the client on board. People recognize and respond to leadership. And I think that’s where, if you put the focus group and that together you get a good experience, the best possible.

0:09:00.6 Josh: Well, part of good leadership is knowing your own blind spots too kind of to your point of the value of issue spotting. When you are hand in hand with your client and you’re preparing for battle, you know that trial is imminent and you’re spending a lot of time with your client, you’re getting to know them and you become biased in their favor because you know that they’re a great person, that’s got a great story to tell whose life has really been impacted by this incident. And you’re eager to tell their story. It can be easy to sort of lose your objectivity. You become the friend and confidant, but you still have a job to do in going through the focus group process or there’s other tools like, I mean, even mediation for example.

0:10:00.4 Aaron: That’s great. It’s a great tool.

0:10:00.8 Josh: We always go through mediation and in most of our cases before trial, where you’ve got a neutral third party who sees thousands of cases of all different types, keeps their finger on the pulse of what’s going on in the legal community. And oftentimes, they’ll come to you, you show up like guns are ablazing into mediation and through that process, spending several hours where they’re listening to your side of the story and they’re also listening to the defense side of the story and they’re bringing things to your attention that maybe you had not given so much weight to beforehand. But you have these tools available to learn some of the actual weaknesses or perceived weaknesses of your case so that you have time to remedy those. That’s good leadership.

0:10:50.7 Aaron: Yeah. It’s funny you say that because I’ve had, I drink the Kool-Aid. You read all your client’s medical records, you talk to them for months and months, you learn what they’re going through, even when they’re being ‘a jerk’ you can see why you’re like, I know this person’s suffering. I understand what their day-to-day is. They’re missing their job because of this, or they’re not the parent they want to be because of this, or the thing that was most important to them in their life, whether it be like working out or baseball or something is not happening for them. They’re frustrated this process is taking a long time, covid backed the courts up. Things were really taking a long time. And you’re sitting there saying like, I know this is a good person and I know that they, you don’t have to be a good person to have a good personal injury claim, your rights are your rights.

0:11:44.8 Aaron: And so you get very, not defensive, but you just, like you said, you’re kind of biased in favor of your client no matter what. All the warts and all. And then you come into mediation, [laughter] and you get that reality check. One mediator that I greatly respect. I know, I won’t say his name, but Josh, I know you have a ton of respect for him. I remember he called me during the mediation so that he could speak to me separately and said, “Hey, your client has smartest guy in the room disease. He’s a know-it-all. He won’t listen. The jury’s gonna hate him, and you need to settle this case.” And that was tough. That was very tough to hear because I was really on that particular case beating the drum and I wanted blood. I was like, gonna win this case. Sometimes a good lawyer knows to swallow that and say, okay, what duty do I owe to this person now and in the future? This person is gonna look back on this and will we make the right decision? The right decision might be in that particular context to get the case settled. And that’s good lawyering. You don’t necessarily have to all the way overcome the obstacle, get to trial and make those 12 people believe what you believe.

0:13:16.9 Josh: Yeah, no, absolutely right. Also, there are times when you’re getting real deep into trial or getting really been to trial prep, and you sit down and you’d maybe do like a mock cross-examination of your client. You pretend that you’re the defendant asking them some pointed questions, or you kinda get to understand their cadence and understand how your client is going to present themselves in this highly adversarial circumstance where they’re effectively being called a liar. You’ve got a stranger in front of you yelling at your face, pointing out any sort of misstep in your case, and it feels like a personal attack. And oftentimes people get defensive and it makes sense. They would get defensive being called dishonest effectively. And you have the opportunity when you get to know your client to help identify the opportunities for that sort of a situation to arise and coach them through it and help them understand, listen, you’re gonna have your opportunity to speak your piece, but that opportunity is a very specific time in a very specific manner. And you really, some people have an easier time bottling those emotions and being reserved and being patient than others.

0:14:45.0 Josh: There are some people that just want to engage, and that can be a big challenge, is helping them disengage and understand you have to have control over that switch. You have to know when to flip it off. And you have to trust me that you’re gonna have your opportunity to say your piece. And I find kind of going back to the other aspect of it. ‘Cause you’re talking about challenging clients and in the actual procedure of the practice, and then you’re talking about just challenging personalities. And we obviously do our best to vet and make sure that the people that we choose to represent our people whose values align with ours it’s really important to us, and it’s really important to the members of our team.

0:15:35.5 Josh: But you do have people, to your point earlier that have strong opinions. They’re going through, they feel wronged. They feel really, really wronged by what’s happened. Their life has been disrupted. They’ve been oftentimes treated unfairly by the insurance company leading up to that point. They’ve been dragged through the mud. And the best tool for that is listening. You just gotta give people the space to speak their mind, get it off their plate, and just take the time to get to know them. Take the time to educate them, take the time to help them understand the reality of the procedure that we’re gonna be in. Let them make their peace with it. But listen to their concerns. And that’s something that we learn in law school in the client counseling classes. And some people are better at it than others, but sometimes the clients just want to vent and you gotta give them that room.

0:16:35.5 Aaron: Yeah. I think advice to lawyers who are navigating this would be understand that if you just pulled 10 people off the street and asked them, is everything okay? And they were honest with you, their answer’s gonna be no. They’re late for picking up their kids from school. They’ve got assignments at work that are late, their house has some kind of leak in it, and their car’s breaking down and everything’s not okay. And then they get in a bad injury wreck that breaks a bone or causes surgery or knocks them out and affects their brain or their spine permanently and…

0:17:11.3 Josh: Kills a family member or something.

0:17:13.8 Aaron: Yeah. Or they’re going through grieving process and understand that as a lawyer, you’re gonna meet tons and tons of clients who go through that, swallow it and present a nice face anyway. And you should be really, really grateful for those clients. But assume that they’re gonna be the other way, tired, impatient wanting this to be over, not understanding of the process and not understanding why justice is taking so long. So, if you come into it with those expectations, you’ll be much better at handling them and convincing them, leading them so that when you have an explosive personality, you can say, look, we are all explosive when we’re on the defensive. When you corner someone, they’re going to be that way. But that you take that same personality.

0:18:15.0 Aaron: Maybe they’re controlling, maybe they’re angry, whatever it is, and you say, are you good at playing poker? They’re generally like, yeah, I’m pretty good. So, when you play poker, how do you do it? It’s like, well, I hide all this stuff. I don’t let anybody see where my hand is, you know? And it’s like, well, that’s what I need you to do for the next two hours during this deposition. I’m gonna give you a demeanor, you’re gonna be helpful and you’re gonna answer these questions truthfully. That’s it. We’re gonna walk out winners. And so it’s tough to get people there, but I think it starts with you. Like, you have to have the mindset of I don’t expect people to be super happy and joyous as they approach a formal interview under oath with opposing counsel who’s gonna be really aggressive.

0:19:00.0 Josh: Although some people put that face on, that’s a different kind of challenge that we deal with, is those clients who do swallow it.

0:19:07.3 Aaron: Oh, yeah. The opposite.

0:19:09.7 Josh: And won’t let it out. And you’ve just as much time as you have to spend with people who really wanna be vocal to keep it bottled in. Sometimes you’ve got the clients that you really need to work with and say, Hey, listen, you went through a lot and I understand that you’re trying to be the eternal optimist, but if you, this is your time now to tell your story about the reality of how this has impacted you. And this is not the time to just smile and say everything’s okay. But either way, we’re highly collaborative. We’ve worked with so many different people over the years, all different kinds. And we found that at the end of the day, we’re humans and humans want to be heard. They want to be seen, they deserve to be heard. They deserve to be to be seen. And ultimately choosing the right partner to handle your personal injury claim, people who will see you, who will hear you and help navigate you through that process is gonna be the best thing you can do.

0:20:15.1 Aaron: Absolutely. Partnership is key.

0:20:17.3 Josh: Yeah, Absolutely, man.