Podcast Show Notes

Episode Details

• Host: Rafe Foreman
• Guest: Elizabeth Larrick, Trial Consultant
• Published: June 30, 2025

Episode Summary

In this insightful episode, trial consultant Elizabeth Larrick joins host Rafe Foreman to discuss the power of gaining outside perspective in legal case preparation. The conversation explores how strategic tools and fresh viewpoints can help attorneys unlock compelling case narratives and strengthen their trial strategy.

Key Topics Covered

Focus Groups & Research

• Utilizing targeted focus groups to test case themes
• Gathering authentic feedback from potential jurors
• Understanding how your case resonates with different audiences

Trial Preparation Strategies

• Smart Vocabulary Lists: Developing language that connects with jurors
• Role-Reversal Exercises: Gaining perspective by viewing your case from opposing viewpoints
• Theme Development: Fine-tuning compelling narratives that resonate

Practical Applications

• Deposition Preparation: Using insights to improve questioning strategies
• Voir Dire: Better understanding and connecting with potential jurors
• Opening Statements: Crafting more compelling and focused presentations

Key Insights

The Power of Outside Perspective

Learn why bringing in external viewpoints can reveal blind spots in your case preparation and help you see your arguments through fresh eyes.

Staying Curious

The importance of maintaining curiosity throughout the trial preparation process and how this mindset can transform your approach to legal strategy.

Community & Collaboration

Discover how leaning on your professional community and collaborative approaches can keep your trial skills sharp and your strategies effective.

Main Takeaway

Question for Reflection: “What if an outside perspective could help unlock the story of your case?”

This episode emphasizes that sometimes the most powerful insights come from stepping outside your own perspective and viewing your case through the lens of others – whether through focus groups, peer collaboration, or structured exercises that challenge your assumptions.

Who Should Listen

• Trial attorneys preparing for jury trials
• Legal professionals interested in trial consulting
• Lawyers looking to improve their case presentation skills
• Anyone interested in the intersection of psychology and legal strategy

Episode Transcript

Hello again to all the warriors for justice out there who are righting wrongs and upholding our greatest American freedom, the right to an unfettered and unlimited trial by jury of your peers. I’m your host, Rafe Foreman, for this podcast brought to you by the original Trial Lawyers College. Hello out there, TLC listeners, and welcome to the Trial Lawyers College Podcast.

I’m Rafe Foreman, your host, and today our special guest is Elizabeth Larrick, and she is an extraordinarily talented trial consultant. Welcome, Elizabeth.

Wonderful. Thank you so much for having me, Rafe. I’m excited for our conversation.

Yeah, me too. So where do you work?

I’m down in Austin, Texas, so I’m kind of your neighbor.

Hi, neighbor.

Hey, neighbor. I actually grew up around the Fort Worth area, so I was excited to see that about you.

And are we going to talk about trial consulting?

You bet. You bet. I think we can talk about some trial consulting stuff, some trial strategy, persuasion, just some fun stuff that I know your audience and probably you, and stuff we can talk about and give lots of examples.

You bet. Well, of course, I’m always available to talk for hours about voir dire. So if you have any comments about voir dire, I would love to chime in.

But tell us, why do we need a trial consultant? And what value does a trial consultant add to a plaintiff’s case?

I mean, I think that having an outside perspective is something that is so beneficial when you’re walking into trial. And when you have a trial consultant that has hundreds of trial experience, right? All these different varieties of trials, they’ve seen all kinds of experiences.

It really helps then translate that experience, that education over to the lawyer that they’re helping. And so you actually can see and be educated on so many different things for your trial and put on the best possible case for the jury that’s seated in front of you.

Yeah, a couple of friends of mine are pioneers in trial consulting. The late Catherine Bennett and Robert Hirshhorn, he’s up at Flower Mound, and Robert and I have been friends a long time.

He’s got a fun new little thing out there. Have you heard about it?

No, I haven’t.

Oh gosh, you’ll have to check it out. He’s got a little, he’s got an AI jury thing out there going on, and I’m happy to, I’ll send you an email with the link to it.

Yeah, I do agree with this needing an outside perspective and a new set of eyes.

So tell us what your experience is. You’re a lawyer.

Yeah, I’m a lawyer by trade. I always have worked as a plaintiff personal injury lawyer and absolutely loved helping folks, everyday folks get in to the courtroom and help them. And I really, along my journey, found myself working in different spots and actually got to work for Don Keenan for about a year and do a couple of trials with him and came back and opened my own office to start helping folks do more trials and just really felt pulled to help lawyers with focus groups and witness prep and was doing that in my own work.

And then, you know, pairing up with folks here in Austin and trading off, hey, if you’ll help me with this, I’ll help you with that kind of stuff. And just really found that talking to focus groups, you know, talking and doing the witness prep with folks was very natural to me and a ton of fun. And I love getting creative and helping people on their cases.

And so it just kind of grew into a true kind of consulting role. And that’s really why I enjoy doing what I do, because again, helping people see blind spots

And so it just kind of grew into a true kind of consulting role. And that’s really why I enjoy doing what I do, because again, helping people see blind spots or helping people, you know, phrase something in a way that is clear communication, that is also persuasive, is such a great tool that consultants can bring to any lawyer they’re working with.

I agree with you. I do focus groups on every case I try. And I think that the feedback you get from those innocent civilians is what I call them, instead of guinea pigs.

I just think that feedback is invaluable.

It’s so priceless, and that’s one of the things that I think is so important. Like you said, every trial, you should be doing a focus group. And it doesn’t have to be high tech.

It doesn’t have to be over the top. It just, you know, get some folks in the room or get some folks on a Zoom and show them some stuff and talk to them. And hearing people talk about your case is always just so beneficial to observe.

And I think that’s why I encourage, you don’t need a consultant, You can do your own focus groups just to sit back and listen to people talk and how they’re talking about your case.

Right on. Well, tell us what else we need.

Well, I’m sure we could probably keep talking about, you know, focus groups and ways to do those and leading up trial. And let me ask you a couple of questions. Do you ever use, you know, focus groups when you’re developing a case?

Like, you know, just getting ready for depositions?

Yes. Unfortunately, not as much as I need to, but I do because I’m a big believer in vocabulary list. As a matter of fact, in every case, I make a

vocabulary list because I need highly charged language that is persuasive in my direction of justice.

And so I often find those words or phrases, but I need to find them before I do the deposition because, as you know, once they’re in the record, they’re in the record. And so I love having the corporate designee or the guy that did the bad thing using my language. And that happens in a deposition a lot of times.

Absolutely. I love that idea of a vocabulary list because I think we get, you know, sometimes bombarded as lawyers, oh, here’s all the power words or here’s all this. But I love that you’re individualizing it for the case.

And I’m, you know, I’m visually thinking that you’ve got this, you got this vocabulary list for all the depos that you go to. Is that what you do?

I sure do. And I have more dry erase boards than you can count in this office. And one thing you’ll find on every one of them is my vocabulary list for this particular case.

That is excellent. So then everybody else who’s working with you uses the same terminology.

Right. Because once they start telling our story, we win.

Absolutely. I had a good friend down in Florida, and he had this premises case, and it was a dripping, a pipe dripping and creating a puddle. And he would go to every hearing and every deposition with the same description of how the case.

And finally, he gets up to go to trial and the judge says, Oh, is this the case? We have this dripping in the blood. And he’s like, yes.

So you get everybody saying it, then you’re definitely going to win it.

Well, what do you find is particularly valuable about doing a focus group?

I think, you know, you nailed a really big piece of it, which is how do regular people describe what’s going on in the case? And how will they be thinking about it, right? Like his words, thoughts, and so you’re basically telling them what’s on their mind.

But also, I think focus groups, like during and before your depositions, really kind of help nudge you one way or another on a claim and really also can kind of help you figure out where the rocket fuel is. Sometimes I feel like we as lawyers can get really caught up in some small minutiae detail. When it’s really the jury is not with you and they’re like, what’s the big deal?

But if you don’t know, then you chase all the rabbits in deposition only to then narrow down a trial. When let’s make it easy for you from the beginning and know which ones to chase, and nail those down for deposition and try to chase all of them.

I just think that’s so valuable what you’re saying because I’m guilty. I mean, we all get busy and we don’t have time. But I promise you, if you’re listening to this podcast, if you’ll do a focus group before you do depositions, and maybe before you do written discovery, you’ll find that it becomes easier for you to know what language to use and what questions to ask.

Absolutely. And I’ve seen this happen too, where people will chase something for, we’ll say damages, and they think this is the important thing, and you run a focus group, and then they give you a whole different direction. And I’ve seen the lawyer go in that direction, and they get the extra before and after witnesses.

They go get that vocational expert, and they take that information and process it and put it in demand. And it got the case settled, because they actually followed the place that was much more dangerous than the damages that they had on its amul.

I agree. In case you’re listening and you’re wondering, what are we talking about? I do a lot of employment cases, and rather than talking about, and this is only if it’s true, my client didn’t just lose his job, he lost his career.

And once you start playing around with Elizabeth with the word career and finding out what’s the difference in a career and a job, you find out it’s part of his identity, it’s part of his DNA, it’s part of who he is. It’s not just a job, it’s part of his identity. And

Absolutely. I mean, you didn’t know my example, but that is exactly what the lawyer went after, which was his inability to do his job at the same level that he could, and how that was deteriorating him as a person, and everyone around him was talking. So, I mean, you nailed it.

I mean, there’s so much emotional pulls and purpose wrapped up in our jobs. And a lot of times I’ve seen lawyers say, well, you know, it’s only a couple of days they missed, or they found another job. And it’s just like, you know, there’s something to work for us as humans.

And it’s so important to tap into that and not dismiss it. Because again, I know you’ve probably heard it in all of your focus groups. I definitely hear it in mine.

That work, that job is tied to so many things we value as our core person.

So true.

The psychology of it is, we really don’t want you to mess with the things that keep a roof over our head, keep food on our table, and keep us feeling secure.

Absolutely. Everybody’s got to work, right?

That’s right.

Everybody’s got a boss. So tapping into that is definitely one of the things I think people can do. And I think it also makes wonderful story making for your case story, your trial story, and so helpful for the client to be able to explain some of those things in deposition and really be very therapeutic for them in their deposition, to have somebody listening to them tell about how important their job was or their job skill or even their job environment.

I know so many of us, and I know lawyers are definitely in this group where we have a whole other set of life at our office because we are so intertwined with work and we spend so much time there. And so, it becomes a whole other big part of our lives.

You’re so right in what you just said. Clients want to be heard. They don’t really want you to guarantee that they’re going to win.

Of course, they do want to win. Well, more than anything, they just want somebody to hear their side of the story.

Absolutely, and I know that you definitely believe this. I know all the tales of people that I know and trust say, there’s so much power in the client telling their story and the power of you listening and feeling heard. And I get crushed sometimes when I hear people say, well, my client’s going in for deposition, I got to spend about an hour with them, then I’m going to let them go and I’ll see them at the depo.

And I’m just like, oh, soul crushing.

Yeah, I agree with that. We don’t just do an hour depo prep.

No, I don’t think so. But I’ve seen people talk about how, well, you just need to tell them to tell the truth. And now these days, I just kind of scratch my head and think, well, who’s telling the truth these days?

So how does that actually end up being a good instruction for anybody?

Yeah, I find that my clients, they’re kind of afraid of this thing called the vocabulary list. But when they find out it’s not my list, it’s their list and what they say gets to go up on the board, not what I say. They start liking it because they realize, hey, those are my words.

Those aren’t anybody else’s words, those are my words. And they take ownership in it. And it really is kind of a fun exercise to go through with the client.

And they’re saying, look at my smart, educated lawyers using my words, not their big fancy words.

They might say that about you. They don’t usually say smart, they can’t by me.

You know that’s not true. But there is, I love the visual aspect of literally writing their words in front of them on a giant dry erase board, because there’s a whole other thing that happens in our brains. You know, when we write, we have this visual and we’re making these memories and we personalize it.

It just, it takes things to a whole other level of value and importance that, you know, you just really can’t mirror any other way.

Yeah. All right. I want to shift gears on you.

Let’s do it.

Can we talk about story for a minute?

Absolutely.

I find a lot of resistance, not resistance to telling the story, but here’s the conundrum that I have encountered most. Which story? Everybody wants to know which is the magic story, which is the story that wins.

You know, this case may have a thousand stories, but how do I decide which one is the winner, which one’s important?

Well, we talked a little bit about focus groups. We’ll help you with that. We’ll tell you what’s important, but…

Because that tells you what your audience’s story is. And we don’t pay near enough attention to about what story is the audience putting together on this tale that we’re telling.

Absolutely. And I think when we think about story as lawyers, we put it together in our lawyer story. And it’s not necessarily the jurors story.

And that’s the one that, like you just said, you want to know what they’re telling themselves, how they’re crafting this story. And there are definitely ways using and we don’t pay near enough attention to about what story is the audience putting together on this tale that we’re telling.

Absolutely. And I think when we think about story as lawyers, we put it together in our lawyer story. And it’s not necessarily the jurors story.

And that’s the one that, like you just said, you want to know what they’re telling themselves, how they’re crafting this story. And there are definitely ways using focus groups I think is very helpful to hear them. But also I think there are just generally some stories that always work well.

And people will say, well, it’s a hook, and then there’s a villain, and there’s a hero. And we can talk about templates. Those are definitely some that exist.

But I think for us, getting feedback from focus groups is probably the strongest way to find the best story and get out of the way. You know, that’s one thing I feel like sometimes we as lawyers, we get in the way because we have so many details and thoughts. And this has got to be the way, or this is what I heard works

And listening to the focus groups will help you, again, think through their point of view.

I agree, you need to, point of view is such an important part of story, because you can reverse roles. And when you do that, you get another person’s point of view. You can change your altitude to change your attitude.

You can go up or down, and you can find a different point of view and different perspective. I’m all about different points of view and perspective. And that’s what you’re talking about, is trying a few different perspectives on before you settle on the one that you’re going to tell.

Uh-huh.

Uh-huh. And it, you know, depends on who your audience is, right? You go in and the judge, you need to sit in that point of view and figure out what’s the best two, three sentences to start with, right?

To tell the story of this case. Well, then you can go to the jury, it’s going to be a little different, right? So, definitely that is an amazing tool to help you get a lot of perspective.

And it’s pretty cheap, right? Just, you know, old school way, get two chairs and sit in one chair and then jump in the other chair with a different point of view to, you know, figure out another way to think about it.

That’s right. And you can invite your staff to participate and do the same thing, and they may have a different perspective or point of view than you do.

Absolutely. Somebody down the hall, or, you know, I love that we can now just zoom with everybody and say, okay, I need some help with this deposition. I can’t figure out all the ways they’re going to, you know, okay, get on, we’ll role play and then we’ll reverse and help each other out.

Now, I got to tell you, I’m tainted about trial consultants because of knowing Robert Herschhorn. And, you know, I think people, well, let me not judge other people. I have always thought that a trial consultant was the person who’s going to come pick the magic 12 that are going to win my case and give me the magic story and show me where the magic three beans are to lead me show me where the magic three beans are to lead me up to Beanstalk to find those golden eggs.

But that’s not what I hear you saying.

No, I, you know, gosh, that sounds so wonderful. I mean, if I found somebody who could do, pick the perfect 12, I think that, you know, my experience is from a point of view of always teaching folks. And, you know, I think people who want to be trial lawyers should get out there and pick their juries and do focus groups themselves and grow because we can kind of sometimes stunt ourselves by relying on, oh, you’re just going to come in and do that for me.

So I always think it’s important for people to have their own point of view and skill set when it comes to a lot of those things. I do think consultants 100% bring a new perspective, bring a whole lot of experience that it’s difficult for you to rack up otherwise. But I also think, you know, if there were true, Robert Hirshhorn might be the only trial consultant out there that he could pick the Magic 12 with the Magic 3 beans to

the Magic 3 beans to get you to the Golden Goose.

But, you know, there’s lots of ways to skin a cat. And, you know, I just think there’s lots of ways to work with folks and help them grow as a lawyer.

Well, I hope Robert’s listening to this, because even he can’t do that. We have to do it ourselves. The lawyer that’s trying the case ultimately at the end of the day is going to be responsible for the 12 and for the story.

And there are no magic beans. That’s a fairy tale. What there is is the honest truth about your client’s case that can come from your client if you’re willing to spend the time to help them develop the truth and that emotional connection to our fellow human beings.

Absolutely. And there’s nothing more powerful than being able to stand up in front of a set of jurors and connect with them, even if it is completely silent. And that ability to do that takes a lot of time and practice and effort.

But it starts with want to. And I know that there are a lot of people who want to do that. And it’s difficult to rely on, oh, just going to have a trial consultant do that for me, and I get to walk away and worry about connecting with the jury later.

So I really appreciate you saying those words.

Well, I mean, I’m from the bottom of my heart. What I feel like just we’ve never met Elizabeth, but I already feel like we’re kindred spirits. And I feel like that maybe you can give me a perspective or a point of view that I haven’t thought of.

I might get in a routine and I’ve told the same story a couple of times, and I’m kind of mailing it in. And so your ability to give the lawyer that you’re working with a fresh perspective is invaluable to me.

And I will tell you, and you’ve probably felt the same way is you get a whole new set of energy when somebody comes in and has a couple of fun ideas. When you listen to a focus group talk, you get so much more energy and energized about a case, because I know our cases can drag on for years and years, and sometimes it’s hard to rebuild that energy. But you get so much more excitement and creativity when you can work with somebody else, even if you’re just working with a focus group, to help you re-energize and get a new perspective.

Because we all come from a different walk of life. And I think if we keep gathering up and meeting new people and asking them experiences and being curious, we’re just going to be better humans.

Everybody listening to this podcast is shaking their head yes to what you just said, because that’s exactly what we do at Trial Lawyers College. We re-energize each other, we work on our cases together, and we learn the TLC methods of how to try a case. On our case, not on some hypothetical or somebody else’s case, but on our own case.

So all our listeners have got a big smile on their face, and they’re agreeing with you right there.

Good, good, good. I know being curious about all the things is half the battle sometimes, when we are lawyers and can get kind of focused in on our point of view.

How do you deal with a lawyer who is resistant to finding a different story? In other words, he’s made up his story, he’s pushing his agenda, he’s pushing his story on the client, and it really just didn’t come in a… It’s kind of flat, you know what I mean?

Uh-huh. Unfortunately, I’ve seen this. I know you have too, I’m sure.

I’m talking to you right now.

I know.

You know who you are.

That’s right. Tune in, tune in.

So how do you get them off high centers, what I call it?

Yeah. You know, I’ve had this happen where… I had an excellent lawyer.

He’s been, you know, 35, 40 years, and just gets real, you know, fixated on, you know, the example is like just using medical terms that just, you know, blow by everybody. It’s just really confusing. And we just, you know, I said, all right, you feel real strong about it.

Let’s go talk to a focus group and see what they think. And they gave them some feedback. And then I said, you know, I got somebody who I know does a really great job with some PowerPoint.

So why don’t you talk to them and see to get their point of view. So it took a couple of point of views, more than just the focus group. But he finally came around to, okay, okay, I can see how I might be losing people.

But it’s kind of like, you know, you lead a horse to water, but you can’t make them drink. Well, that’s where the focus groups kind of can help people come around. Or, you know, it’s very difficult when somebody kind of has their mind made up to change their mind.

I don’t know if that’s probably pretty common. So, you know, having people learn the experience in a different way versus saying, don’t do that story. You’re going to lose people.

And here are the three reasons why. You can use brain science, research, whatever it may be. But until they actually see how lost the jury would be in a focus group, I think it’s kind of difficult.

Well, I agree with everything you said, and I think that’s a great suggestion. I want to add to it, when I’m teaching a lawyer or working with a lawyer that’s in this stuck attitude, I just ask them to, okay, you’re going to go with the story that you’ve told, but would you just try a little bit and put on this alternative story just to see if there’s any different reaction? And they’ll say, “oh, bother” Then they do it and they get this reaction from the focus group, which is critical to what you said. And he says, do you really like this story better? And they’re like, yes.

Why? And they can tell him. They know why.

Yeah, it’s true. And I think, we talked a little earlier, having somebody be just a little curious, can you just try this out? If you don’t like it, you can go back to other way.

It’s just people learning on their feet. There’s no real replacement.

Right. Okay, we’ve talked about what a Trial Consultant is not. He’s not your guardian angel and it’s not your fairy godmother.

And there are no magic beans. But it sounds to me like there is an opportunity to kind of pick and choose from the menu. Like for example, if someone came to a Trial Consultant and said, can you help me with Voir dire?

Is that something that’s possible? Or do we have to say no, we’re going to go through focus groups first. Now, maybe focus groups is how you’re going to help them with Voir dire.

I’m just trying to say, can you pick and choose? Is there a menu of options?

Well, let me just say from the view point is, there are so many people out there that specialize in doing just one thing. And then there are a lot of consultants that have the menu, right? And I think, and then there are even people who will literally walk in the door because they’re lawyers, just do it for you, to literally pick the jury for you.

And so, there are so many ways and so many different consultants. I always tell people is, how do you want to work? How do you want to learn?

Do you even want to learn? Do you want to have something that you get to take away and build your skill? Well, that would be then somebody who is going to use focus groups, so you get on your feet and you try the questions out, you know, you hear the stuff.

And then there are other people who just say, you know, I feel really comfortable with that. All I want is someone to look at my questions and maybe take them to a focus group or maybe take them to an online or an AI focus group. And so there are so many flexible ways that consultants work with lawyers.

That’s the question I always ask people is, how much do you want to be involved and learn? Because I do think there’s a lot of menu options, depending on how you like to work as a lawyer.

Okay, I agree with that.

And it’s the same thing with like, if you pick a consultant, that some of them focus on just the courtroom, right? So they’re not going to be as versed at thinking through depositions or thinking through focus groups for depositions. And you’re going to have people who really are great at the visual part, right?

The PowerPoints and the stories and stuff like that. So I think we have such a unique opportunity right now to work with all different kinds of folks depending on what we’re looking forward to build the skill in ourselves.

I think that’s very well said. So you’ve opened my eyes as to the utility of a focus group. And more importantly of a trial consultant, I’ve been doing focus groups for a long time, but it’s making me feel rather comforted that a lot, everything you’re talking about is we do in TLC.

And so I think we’re on to something. And what I’m taking away from today, Elizabeth, is that a trial consultant isn’t necessarily going to come and fix my problem in my case. They may be going to come and tell me and help me recognize all of the problems in my case so I can try to work on fixing them.

Absolutely. Or I would say sometimes I run into people and they have created a giant problem when it’s not a problem at all. Because again, we get worried and we overthink things.

And so I do think you have made a very good summation of trial consultants can really help you see so many different things that you may miss or in so many solutions you may not even thought of.

Well, I appreciate you being here. Man, time goes fast when we’re having fun. I just want to ask, is there anything else that you would like to say to wrap up our podcast as we close out this edition of The Trial Lawyers College Podcast.

Of course. Thank you so much for having me come on. I always love talking about trials and ways that we can be better as lawyers.