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Scott Benton: Hi everyone. Scott Benton here. How are you? I am the host of the Classroom 2 Courtroom podcast, where we help you easily transition from a law school student into your professional career as an attorney and where we make the practice of law fun. And today we’re going to look at building relationships with opposing counsel.
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Scott Benton: Today in order to help assist your overall use of the success cycle where performing legal services is concerned, we’re going to take a look at building relationships with opposing counsel. Now generally speaking, when you’ve got a client who wants to negotiate with another party, that means there’s going to be two sides.
Two clients and usually two attorneys. This means, as an attorney for your client, you’re going to be interacting with the opposing party’s attorney as you go back and forth in filing complaints, or negotiations, or trying to form a settlement that everyone can live with.
Conversations you have with opposing counsel are largely going to be used to advance an agenda based on the legal goals that your client has come to you with. Let’s say there’s a property in a trust on a probate case your client believes they’re entitled to half ownership of. Your conversations [00:02:00] with opposing counsel are going to have an agenda of positioning your side to receive one half ownership of this property.
Now, this type of communication will go on indefinitely, in theory, until the case is settled and you or your client are no longer have any reason to talk to the opposing party.
This kind of conversation is what is called advocacy because you’re advocating for your client on their behalf. But in order to build a relationship with opposing counsel, advocacy can become a barrier. Not all conversations need to have an agenda or become a negotiation or a competition. In order to build relationships with opposing counsel, you instead want to use basic communication without advocacy.
Not every conversation needs to be about pushing an agenda or making an argument. By mastering more of a neutral and open communication style, you can improve your relationships on a case, you can reduce [00:03:00] conflict, and that’s going to lead to a more favorable outcome. So there’s a big difference between advocacy based communication and basic communication without advocacy.
Advocacy communication includes conversations where persuasion, arguing, and defending a client’s position are involved. This kind of advocacy would likely be used in legal negotiations, or hearings, or trials. or between one attorney or another when they’re talking about their clients. It would also be largely used in business negotiations of all varieties which would largely include attorneys once the deal points have been finalized and drawn up for signature.
Then there’s basic communication without advocacy that’s used as a tool for building relationships. That includes the use of understanding. and professional relationship building, and it’s more of a form of a casual conversation.
If you’re building a relationship with opposing counsel while you’re, let’s say, [00:04:00] on a break or discussing non case related topics, then you’re switching from advocacy to basic communication without advocacy, which is much more designed to foster trust on a person to person level and it really humanizes the relationship.
Instead of using language to argue and dissect points for positional gain, you’re using language to build a basic human connection with one another. These types of conversations can go a long, long way in creating an atmosphere of mutual respect as you show genuine interest in the other attorney’s perspective.
So by asking questions and being curious about the opposing counsel’s thought process, you can actually lead the conversation to a much deeper and more substantial understanding of their position, which is going to help you to shape your own position and your own strategy. Asking the opposing counsel about why their client believes they’re taking the best course of [00:05:00] action and asking that question in a calm, respectful tone can really help de escalate any tensions that are left over from the courtroom and even potentially set a more cooperative tone even when opposing counsel is aggressive in nature, which can shift the dynamic into your favor.
At first, opposing counsel may still be speaking from an advocacy position during the break in our scenario, but your tone and your approach may reset that interaction. Opposing counsel will likely pick up on what you’re doing and humanize the conversation as well, so you both have a lot to benefit from, such Such as coming to a settlement more quickly by using basic communication. Without advocacy.
Debates on a case are largely gonna be held in the courtroom while dialogues about a case are likely gonna be held in a hallway. The difference between the two can be the difference in tone that’s used. Debates often have an aggressive or combative tone, while dialogues tend to be [00:06:00] calm and respectful, which immediately de escalates the pressures of a debate and leads to a more cooperative and respectful tone.
Breaks that are taken during trials and hearings, as it turns out, can be incredibly effective. In terms of advancing a case forward and finding a mutually satisfactory resolution for both parties, which stems from knowing how and when to use basic communication without advocacy and to use it to connect on a human level and less on an attorney level. So the bottom line is that it’s important to know that there’s a difference between communicating as an advocate, and communicating as a non advocate through the use of basic communication without advocacy.
Which you can do when you’re on breaks and probably out in the hallway. And you need to know that when you use each style to create the best possible advantage for you and for the case that you’re working on. Focusing on building professional relationships with the opposing party is a tool that you can include in [00:07:00] your legal toolbox to enhance the overall effectiveness in the courtroom sessions and during negotiations.
I’m Scott Benton. I’m the host of the Classroom 2 Courtroom podcast. Thank you so much for stopping by and checking out this episode. Now, if this is a podcast that you like and you’d like to get more information about us, you can always visit our website@classroomtwocourtroom.com. That’s classroom, the number two, courtroom.
com, where you can send us a message to keep in touch with us. You can even inquire about our seasonal associate programs we have available for law students. You can apply to come and work with us. And as always, don’t forget to like, share, and subscribe to stay on top of all of our latest episodes. And until next time, we hope you’ll join us in making the world a better place, one client at a time.
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