It Takes A Village: Yet Another Focus Group Advantage

 

I consulted on a case where one of the possible witnesses was an individual in a highly respected line of work. This person had been involved in criminal activity some 30 years ago, but in the years since had made a wonderful turn-around, and was a veritable pillar of the community, loved and respected.

The attorneys who interacted with the witness said she was credible, quite charming, and would make an excellent witness.

With such a brilliant present, would the past matter? The attorneys and I weren’t sure and figured the best way to find out would be to present the witness to a focus group.

Imagine our surprise when what struck the focus group members wasn’t the long-ago criminal activity, but the witness’s “smarmy-ness.” They didn’t find the witness charming, they thought she was smirking. The focus group members stated the witness wasn’t taking the present matter seriously, and that her attitude was entirely too cavalier. They did not find her credible at all.

With that, since the witness’s appearance at trial was not obligatory, it was quickly decided not to have the witness take the stand. We would never have realized the impact of this particular individual in front of a jury had it not been for the valuable input of the focus group members.

 Once again, a focus group saved the day.

 

Don’t Undermine The Value of Your Focus Group

A focus group has many benefits, among the primary the opinions the “jurors” offer on the case: strengths, weaknesses, validity of themes, etc.  However, focus group jurors can only provide opinions if they are asked the right questions. Too often, lawyers ask focus group jurors to deliberate and discuss just the verdict questions. This is a woefully inadequate use of the focus group.

Don’t rely solely on verdict questions to elicit opinion, develop a list of questions that target your areas of concern. Every single one! It is far better to develop too many targeted questions and have whoever is facilitating the juror discussion eliminate them as necessary, than to develop too few questions and miss the opportunity of hearing valuable juror opinions.

If the target questions are well designed, the juror discussion will reveal the weaknesses in the lawyer's presentation of the case. Too often, lawyers will interrupt juror deliberation to respond to juror criticisms with a vigorous “Yeah, but..." defense of their position. This response undermines the entire value of the focus group. Why should an attorney bother asking for “juror" opinions if the end result is to tell focus group members that the lawyer is right and they are wrong?

You will gain the most by embracing criticism, looking for its benefit, and not trying to defend against it. Lawyers who dismiss the focus group's criticisms and opinions and fail to incorporate them in their trial strategy might as well not conduct a focus group at all. Lawyers who do not mind losing the focus group in order to win the trial are the lawyers who will profit most from the process.

Don’t Be Blindsided by “the Curse of Knowledge.” Clarify!

Jurors will not find for what they don’t understand. Simple, right? Yet laying your case out in such a way that jurors readily understand can be more challenging than it at first appears, due to what the authors of the book “Made to Stick” call “the Curse of Knowledge.”

Namely, that you are so deeply steeped in your case, the issues of your case, the whys and wherefores of your case, that you can’t imagine what it is like not to know about it.

Oh, sure, you are well aware that the jurors are uninformed as to the legal aspects of the case, but too often, you don’t tune in to how necessary it is to explain everything about your case in a way your jurors can readily and easily understand.

This doesn’t mean to give excessive detail. It doesn’t mean to “talk down” to jurors, either, a phrase I heartily dislike. Jurors are no different than the folks you interact with every day, from the barista to your mechanic to your support staff. They just have different areas of expertise in which they are far better informed than you are.

Build your jurors’ confidence in their ability to make a wise decision in rendering their verdict by streamlining your arguments, and presenting your key evidence with stunning clarity. Wherever you can, use visuals to further clarify and explain.

Whenever possible, run a focus group of individuals similar to your jury pool. They will tell you, with unerring accuracy, exactly what persons not afflicted with the “Curse of Knowledge” will understand and fail to understand.

And yes, that includes how your experts present their testimony as well.

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A WINNING CASE Dr. Noelle Nelson recently consulted on:

*Congratulations to A. Barry Cappello and Leila J. Noël of Cappello & Noël, LLP, and co-counsel, Proskauer Rose, LLP for their Defense Verdict. After an eight-week trial and less than four hours of deliberation, a Santa Barbara Superior Court jury rejected a $27 million lawsuit filed by Johnson & Johnson/Mentor Worldwide LLC against Santa Barbara-based Sientra, Inc. for interference with prospective economic advantage, contract interference, breach of fiduciary duty and misappropriation of trade secrets.

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Focus Groups Save the Day–on Broadway!

In the spring of 2012,  Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, was widely believed to be headed for total flopdom: media were comparing it to the Titanic. Yet, this fall, the show has already grossed more than $160 million, a Broadway blockbuster, largely due to co-lead producers Jere Harris and Michael Cohl’s willingness to take drastic measures to turn their incipient flop into a fabulous success.

Among those measures were—you guessed it—focus groups. The producers realized that audience members were leaving the preview performances confused, so they conducted focus groups investigating specific aspects of the show. Production was stopped—a radical move--in order to make changes based on the focus group feedback.

It worked.

Your cases deserve no less. A focus group is a relatively low-cost pre-trial strategy to give you the winning edge. There is nothing that can replace vigorous discussion of your case’s strengths and weaknesses among a group of people rigorously selected to match your jury pool.

Unlike Broadway, you can also receive (if the focus group is conducted with this purpose in mind) juror profiles as to “best” and “worst” likely jurors, assessed from the responses of the focus group members.

Yes, it takes effort and the courage to withstand open criticism from a group of strangers, yet given that these strangers are willing to give you the feedback that can put your case in an advantageous posture, it’s well worth it, even when you don’t think your case resembles the Titanic. 

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A WINNING CASE Dr. Noelle Nelson recently consulted on:

*Congratulations to Dave Luce and Meghan Lamping of Carmody MacDonald P.C. (St. Louis), and Spencer M. Taylor and M. Todd Lowther of Balch & Bingham L.L.P. (Birmingham) for their $11,106,420 Jury Verdict in TAMKO v. Factory Mutual (FM), a hotly contested business interruption insurance case. FM claimed that TAMKO's damages, which TAMKO sought in the amount of $12.2 million, were less than $2.5 million. FM argued that TAMKO did not suffer a loss of production due to an absence of raw material but instead was impacted by the late 2008 economic downturn, and that TAMKO could not demonstrate that it had actually lost any sales. Clearly, the jury did not agree with FM.