When Miguel Alexander Pozo stepped down from the podium, 18 eager lawyers and in-house counsel gave him their business cards so they could retain him. Pozo, a partner at Lowenstein Sandler in New Jersey, had spoken at the Network of Trial Law Firms CLE event in New York City for only 20 minutes.
When he got to his computer, he discovered a dozen more email requests for his legal services. The speech wasn’t a home run, it was a bases-loaded business development grand slam.
The formula for law firm marketing success for the 7,000 lawyers in the Network of Trial Law Firms is giving away their time educating fellow lawyers, who are referral sources and in-house lawyers who are potential clients. The New York event at the august Association of the Bar attracted 300 registrants who got more than five hours of CLE credit, including hard-to-find ethics credits, plus a free breakfast and lunch. What’s not to like?
The wizards behind the “Litigation Management in a New York Minute” CLE event on August 5 were Network Chair Tony Lathrop, a partner at Moore & Van Allen, Executive Director and General Counsel Ellis R. Mirsky, and technical magician Edd M. Schillay, MCLE Administrator. "Our presentations at the CLE program were very well-received, and the audience was the largest and best qualified that we've ever had," Mirsky said.
What makes the CLE program so successful is that each topic was concisely presented within 20 minutes. There was such a variety of speakers, topics, video and audio clips and clever PowerPoints that it actually made CLE entertaining. Attendees could join eight separate break-out sessions led by Network law partners. Did I mention there was a free lunch?
For the Network lawyers, all of whom are superb trial lawyers (real courtroom lawyers), each presentation was a 20-minute audition in front of a ballroom full of A-list list referral sources and potential clients. The Network also offers free online CLE eligible for credit in 16 states at www.Trial.com. It is the only organization to do so.
The Network of Trial law firms is a not-for-profit corporation producing cutting-edge CLE. It includes more than 7,000 attorneys in 25 independent trial awl firms practicing in more than 140 offices throughout the US and Canada. If you omitted this extraordinary CLE event, it will be held again next August in New York. Here’s what you missed:
- Ethics: Ethical morasses facing in-house counsel managing litigation presented by David Spector of Akerman Senterfitt in Was Palm Beach, FL.
- Preparing your client to testify by Overton Thompson of Bass Berry & Sims in Nashville.
- Trial strategy: admitting liability and other damage-limiting tactics by Steve Fogg of Corr Cronin in Seattle.
- Demolishing expert witness and expert witness malpractice by Marshall Grossman of Bingham in Santa Monica, CA.
- Consumer product safety information by Charles Pritchett of Frost Brown Todd in Louisville, KY.
- In-house counsel guarding against expanded liability by Steve Imbriglia of Gibbons in Philadelphia.
- Predatory raiding and high-end executive defections by Joel Hoxie of Snell & Wilmer in Phoenix.
- Proportionality in e-discovery by Beth Fancsali of Wildman Harrold in Chicago.
- The effect of corporate IT policies on privileged communications by John Sandberg of Sandberg Phoenix in St. Louis.
- Class Action Update by Tony Lathrop of Moore & Van Allen in Charlotte, NJ.
- 60-minute working lunch breakout sessions.
- Protecting your brand from social network abuse by Miguel Pozo of Lowenstein in Roseland, NJ.
- What’s your story? It’s simply the key to winning your case, by Joe Cohen of Beirne Maynard in Houston.
- Ethics: paying fact witnesses by Walter Boon of Forman Perry in Jackson, MS.
- Ethics: preserving e-data as litigation looms by Bob Mullen of Schiff Hardin in San Francisco.
- Ethics: an in-house lawyer’s professional duties vs. rights as an employee by Joseph Ortego of Nixon Peabody of New York City.
