Learn case-winning insights from trial lawyers from across the country as they share proven approaches to resolving personal injury cases for top dollar. In Winning Settlements, authors Nick and Courtney Rowley, Joe Fried, Randi McGinn, Charla Aldous, Patrick Malone, and others, offer strategies and tools designed to help you maximize outcomes for your clients. In this collection, you will find lessons that will help you:
- Write effective demand letters that will maximize case value
- Achieve success in mediation—and know when to walk away
- Obtain transformational results that will help your clients find closure and improve public safety
- Increase the leverage you apply when dealing with the defense and strengthen your negotiation skills
- Leverage focus group results to heighten your case value during mediation
- Negotiate liens with providers, insurers, and Medicare
- Improve your practice and obtain better results through fighting secrecy
- Avoid taxation issues for you and your client by negotiating confidentiality
- And more
Benefit from lessons learned over the course of hundreds of cases prepared, settled, and tried by trial attorneys with repeated million-dollar wins. The authors share successful settlement case studies, detailing specific methods for negotiating pre-suit and during both mediation and trial that will help you obtain meaningful outcomes for your clients.
From effective negotiation strategies to examples of successful demand letters, advice on how to counter defense tactics designed to waste your time and wear down your client, and discussions of issues like timing during negotiations and how you can build credibility to improve case values across the course of your career, Winning Settlements offers practical ideas you can start using to improve the value of your cases today.
- The Nuts & Bolts To Achieving Appropriate Settlements by James Abernethy
- Demand Letters & Other Factors in Obtaining Maximum Case Value by Aaron DeShaw
- A Running with the Bulls Mini Update by Courtney Rowley & Nicholas Rowley
- Tactical Advice, Ethics & Mindset for Settlement by Aaron Broussard
- Leverage & Settling Injury Claims by Michael Neff
- Giving the Defense What they Need to Help Your Client by Michael Leizerman
- Re-defining Your Win by Joe Fried
- Using Your Settlement to Change the World & Make Your Community Safer by Randi McGinn
- Settlements That Can Heal the Soul by Charla Aldous & Brent Walker
- Getting Better Settlements by Fighting Secrecy by Patrick Malone
- Taxability of Confidentiality Agreements by Mark Kosieradzki & James Stout
- Settling Third-Party Cases That Have Companion Workers’ Compensation Cases by Sean Simpson
What Legal Leaders Are Saying
— Rick Friedman, coauthor of Rules of the Road and past president of the Inner Circle of AdvocatesFor most of us, law school taught us nothing about how to negotiate and settle cases. And just as with other aspects of trial practice, there is no single “right way” or magic formula for negotiating and settling cases. Winning Settlements is a graduate course in the variety of approaches available to plaintiff lawyers interested in improving their negotiating skills. Some of the best lawyers in America share their strategies for obtaining the best possible results from settlement. Anyone who takes the time to read this book will become a better negotiator.
— Gary A. Dordick, CAOC and CAALA Trial Lawyer of the Year, president elect American Board of Trial Lawyers (ABOTA), Los Angeles ChapterI highly recommend Winning Settlements. It is an amazing compilation of insights from some of today’s greatest lawyers about every aspect of settlement negotiations. The authors share settlement techniques that they learned through a lifetime of hard work and dedication that the reader can immediately implement. It includes unique settlement techniques, but even more important, it covers essential aspects of settlement that most lawyers have never learned.
— Hon. Steven R. Denton, retired Superior Court Judge and past president of San Diego ABOTA and consumer attorneys of San Diego.Winning Settlements is a comprehensive compilation of settlement tactics, strategies, and common-sense tools that should be required reading for any plaintiff’s counsel. The authors are distinguished litigators who offer valuable insights into virtually every aspect of the modern-day settlement process. Experienced litigators and aspiring young trial lawyers will come away with valuable new insights from reading this book.
— Chad Dudley, partner at Dudley DeBosier Injury LawyersIt is our duty as plaintiffs’ lawyers to do everything we can to get the best possible results for our clients. In order to accomplish this outcome, we must actively develop a number of skills to be great at what we do and we are fortunate to have lots of resources on those topics. However, prior to Winning Settlements, there have been very few books on the extremely important art of negotiation in our field. This book offers invaluable insight into how some of the best out there are getting great results for their clients by doing great legal work and how they approach negotiation. As a partner at Dudley DeBosier, where we have over 50 attorneys, and as a consultant that works with dozens of plaintiff firms each year, I am adding [Winning Settlements] to my list of must reads and I recommend that you do as well.
— Guy Levy, injury attorney at Guy Levy LawWow, what a handy guide that is a must-read by any lawyer who negotiates settlements. Comprehensive, yet very easy to read. A nice collection of settlement concepts covered, with gems from a solid cast of successful lawyers. No matter how experienced in negotiations you may be, this book will take you to the next level.
— Keith Mitnik, senior trial counsel at Morgan & Morgan, author of Don’t Eat the BruisesA lot more cases settle than go to trial. It only makes sense to treat the skills needed in mediation rooms with the same reverence as we do the skills needed in courtrooms. Don’t fall into the trap of seeing settlement negotiation abilities as being too obvious to spend time honing. The truth is there is a big difference between basic and expert negotiating. One is like coloring with crayons, and the other is like painting masterpieces. Reading Winning Settlements is like enrolling in an intense class taught by world class artists. The value to you will be enormous.
— Sari de la Motte, author of From Hostage to HeroIn Winning Settlements, renowned trial attorney Randi McGinn writes, “If you truly want to get justice for your seriously injured clients or those who suffer a wrongful death, you need to ask for more than money. You need to ask for change.” Randi practices what she calls “transformative law” where she uses the law to create safety in our communities. But can this be done with settlements? Don’t we need to take cases to trial to create real change? In Winning Settlements you’ll learn that change can come from settlements, and through the expertise of the authors in this book, you’ll learn how to create change in the world and get justice for your clients.