Add Your PerspectiveNovember 22, 2011
BELawsuit.com Is Now Live
I don’t stray off topic often, but occasionally I do — with a warning like this one. This post is about BELawsuit.com rather than negotiation or settlement strategy; feel free to scroll to the next post if that’s why you’re here.
On a long plane ride home from New York in 2009 I wrote about BearingPoint, Inc.’s bankruptcy filing and the next steps in the process, which ultimately led to the sale of BearingPoint’s operations memorialized in press releases here, here, here and here. This post is about More…
Categories: Miscellaneous
4 PerspectivesNovember 21, 2011
Is Your Law Firm One Click Away from Extinction?
Fifteen years as a client have taught me that people don’t pay lawyers because they want to; they pay them because they have to. If you’re a lawyer in a law firm, this isn’t abstract advice for somebody else — like it or not, your clients are looking for ways to pay less for what you do. And I just found another way they will succeed.
Until recently I thought that clients’ drive for efficiency was a function of the economy, and that we’re just a recovery away from business as usual. Alternative fees are a great idea that most are afraid to implement, discounted hourly rates are as creative as most ever get, and outsourcing legal tasks to anyone other than a traditional law firm was, for all practical More…
Categories: Miscellaneous
2 PerspectivesNovember 9, 2011
The Decision Tree, Step by Step: How Much Is Your Million Dollar Case Worth?
What’s your dispute worth – to you and to the other side? It’s hard to imagine settling without knowing the answer, and a decision tree can be a critical tool to help you get there. As I have said before, there are plenty of reasons why we should use decision trees, but – until now – there hasn’t been a step by step guide detailing how to use them. It’s time to change that.
Smith v. BiggCo, Inc. – Case Background
To demonstrate how to create a decision tree I have used a few screenshots from Resolution Tree, a decision tree product from my friends at Unit Interactive and me. In this decision tree, you represent Smith, who plans to sue More…
Categories: Communication, Decision Trees, Negotiation, Resolution Tree
2 PerspectivesAugust 17, 2011
Breaking Impasse in Mediation: The Book
Impasse in mediation is an important topic to mediators, lawyers and the clients they serve, and I’m no exception — links to my prior posts on breaking impasse in negotiation can be found here and here, and a .pdf of a longer paper I delivered more than a few years ago can be found here. I’m happy to say that the New York State Bar Association has just published a helpful new resource that can help us all avoid impasse in settlement negotiations: Definitive Creative Impasse-Breaking Techniques in Mediation.
In the spirit of full disclosure, my chapter on “High-Low Agreements and More: Definitive Tools to Break Impasse in Mediation” is among those in the book, which contains 19 chapters filled with real tips and tactics you’ll be able to apply in your next mediation. As you can see from the book’s Table of Contents and Contributor Biographies, our (persistent and helpful) editor Molly Kapper, J.D., Ph.D. pulled together some of the best mediation personalities and commentators in the business:
Editor: Molly Klapper, J.D., Ph.D.
Authors:
- Simeon H. Baum, Esq.
- Professor Vivian Berger
- John DeGroote, Esq.
- Julie Denny
- Hon. William A. Dreier
- Professor Dwight Golann More…
Categories: Mediation, Negotiation, Settlement, Strategy, Tactics
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