In our previous episodes, we’ve been sharing some how-to’s when it comes to doing focus groups. But it’s also important to take a pause and think about why we are doing focus groups, to begin with.
There are various reasons we might be holding ourselves back from doing focus groups. Maybe, there’s some confusion around why we have to do it. At times, too, we could already be too deep in case preparation that we get lost and no longer see what’s coming behind us. It’s so easy to lose those points of view, and that includes the jury’s point of view. When that happens, we start discounting the weaknesses of the case and the points the opposing counsel is trying to make.
Hopefully, this episode will help give you a new perspective around focus groups by recognizing not just the exterior barriers to doing focus groups which we have discussed previously (cost, lack of skills, lack of time, etc.), but also some internal barriers that we need to think about.
In this episode, you will hear:
- Figuring out the facts that fuel the weaknesses of the case
- Testing the emotional buttons that people are deciding the case on
- Finding the big picture
- The importance of writing out first impressions
Episode Transcript
Hello and welcome to another episode of Trial Lawyer Prep with me, Elizabeth Larrick, your host. This podcast was designed and thought up as a way to provide how to tips and tricks and other things and interviews to help trial [00:01:00] lawyers prepare better for their courtroom appearances and also to prepare their clients.
Today, we’re using this episode to step a lot of what the other episodes have been about when it comes to focus groups are really focusing on how to, I know there’ve been how to episodes about setting up focus groups, even down to logistics of the Craigslist ad, the Google form. Emailing, confidentiality, and also questions, moderating, setting up presentations.
A lot of that is very much point, click, and execute. I think it’s also really important to stop and answer a very important question, which is why are we doing this? We’ve talked another episode about what we get, but a lot of folks out there are not conducting focus groups. And for [00:02:00] whatever reason, I think there’s a lot of confusion.
it’s not really clear about why you do these. We hear again, people at CLEs or in talking about verdicts, we use focus groups to find how participants describe brain injury or what the word that they use. And that does really tell you what you get, but at times I think that we get lost and we create other barriers to.
doing focus groups, including exterior barriers of it’s costly. This case is not big enough, or I don’t have the time to do that in my schedule, like just to do the focus group. And also I don’t have the skill. I’d have to get my, assistant to take time out? Or am I apparently able to take time out to figure out how to do it?
It’s just an unknown set of skills. The learning curve is too high. I want to use this episode to talk about that internal barrier we have, which may be [00:03:00] holding us back to stepping into doing focus groups to help prepare cases. And that internal barrier was just kind of like, huh, why would I do this? I’m busy.
I know about my case. And. Most of us do know really intimately about our cases, up to the point where it’s almost like we’re buried in the sand all the way up to our necks in cases. In a specific case, we know the details, we know the facts, we’ve got deposition testimony swirling in there, our experts, their experts.
We’ve got motions piling in there as well, motions to compel. That’s all we’ve got. Maybe disputes with the opposing counsel. We’ve got motions for summary judgment. All of these things build up and we end up getting so far deep in case preparation that we’re up to our neck, which means we probably can’t see all the way around us.
And it makes it really hard because we then [00:04:00] lose other points of view, including the point of view of the jury. And we can also start to discount our case weaknesses and the opposing counsel’s points that they’re making because we’re just, we’re full of details. We have all these facts. We have all these things that, well, we got this, we got that.
One of the two main things I want to talk about why we do focus groups, and that would be the first one, is we do focus groups to hear the bad stuff. To hear the weaknesses in our case, because we can forget those, or we can just totally discount that. And the part of learning about our weaknesses is learning what facts are fueling that weakness.
What beliefs, what assumptions are people making that then fuel that weakness for them? That emphasize that, that is what [00:05:00] I’m hanging my hat on. We want to know that. We want to know our case, but we want to know the other case as well. And we may know their facts, we may know their experts, but knowing the jurors from that point of view is also really important because we can get lost and can’t see it.
If we can see it, we can analyze it, we can figure out a way around it, we can figure out, Hey, I know that this is there, this is something I need to be aware of, but also maybe I need to talk about it, right, figure out how we’re going to combat this point of view, these belief systems, assumptions, these facts that are out there.
Stepping back, focus groups are research. At the core, this is research. This is why we, I take so much painstaking time to remove my bias from presentations. [00:06:00] I work really hard with my lawyers to make sure that if we are doing a narrative, we are being neutral. We are presenting truth. Both facts from both sides and we’re making it very balanced because we want to see how it shakes out.
We want to see how it plays out. And that’s what we got to do. So remove our influence when we do these focus groups. And that again is going to get us to hear the bad stuff. One of the biggest key points about this, and I talk about it when I start my focus groups with my participants is who am I like, I’m your moderator, but where do I come from?
And what am I doing here? And am I invested in this? Because you got to remove that investment. As far as presentations and moderator, because they’re going to be influenced. They know I’m paying them to be there. I’m paying for their opinion, but am I influencing it by putting my hand on the scale? If I do [00:07:00] that, am I going to pull some jurors my way?
And maybe I don’t get the full opinions. Like they don’t want to hurt feelings, that kind of stuff. So that’s why we always take a step back and be like, okay, this is research. I need to find out those weaknesses, those bad parts. Another really big why we do focus groups, and that’s to get the big picture.
We talked about being buried in the sand. When you’re buried in the sand, you’re missing the whole picture. You’re neck deep in all the sand, the tiny little details. You’re missing the full beach, all the waves, right? The whole thing. And that’s really where we can lose focus. The emotional points, the big waves in the whole picture.
And that’s really how decisions are made when it comes to jurors, when it comes to claims adjusters, when it comes to companies looking at this and making a financial decision, there are still big emotional pulls. There have been [00:08:00] many lawyers that I’ve talked to where it’s like the person making decision about this case and settlement just doesn’t like My client doesn’t want them to have settlement is going to roll the dice.
based on credibility and personality of a witness or of a client. That’s all emotional. And we get so buried in logic that we can lose that emotional part of our cases. So that’s what we want to take a step back and see that big picture. What are these emotional buttons that people are ultimately decided in the case on?
And a lot of times people say, well, that’s just not fair. But that’s just kind of how people work. It’s not necessarily that things should always be fair. They’re not always going to be. But that emotional pull and tug is always there. And let’s make sure that we know what it is. Don’t ignore it. Maybe you think you know what it is.
Test that out, right? You think that people are gonna be so upset about this particular [00:09:00] fact? Well, let’s just see and then we can ask and see if that’s gonna help that big picture. So we run focus groups to prepare ourselves and prepare our cases better. Well, how come? Because when we do that, we’re improving value and we’re reducing the risk of losing.
So important. So how do focus groups do that? They find those weaknesses, right? They give it back. Here’s the bad parts of what I heard. And they’re just giving it back to us. They’re not saying that it’s bad or it’s good. They just tell us, this is what I see. This is how it shakes out for me. And obviously for us, it’s negative for us, but we have to, okay, there it is.
And then also finding. that big picture. Finding it, or what I would say, sometimes we just got to get back to it. We can pick up a case and then two years later, it’s worn on us, right? Again, we’re back up to our, our neck in [00:10:00] details and also just the function of the system, meaning we’ve got to get back to it.
Motion’s done. We’ve got to get preach already. And we can lose that big picture and then focus on all those details. And George just wants, what’s the big picture here, right? And we got to remind ourselves and that’s okay. We need to do that. And we got to remind ourselves that this is research. We can become blind.
to weaknesses. We got to make sure that we are covering that. And the focus group is that way to reduce the risk of losing. It could be the risk of losing trial, could be losing value. It’s a tool. And that’s why I stress so much that it really provides so many things to us on top of this. But at the end of the day, This is a little bit of our flaw is getting those blinders on.
And this is a reminder for me as well. Don’t get me wrong. I can finish a focus group and just be sitting and [00:11:00] swirling with all of the comments thinking like, Oh my gosh, this is terrible. I have a terrible case. What are we doing here? I’ve just spent all this time and effort and money and nobody likes my case.
And it’s really, it sinks, but I always just, okay, just write down first Um, and then I go back in and I look at my first impressions, write it out. First impressions. Okay. Even if it’s a bullet point list, I write out my first impressions and then I leave it. I come back to it the next day. But look at the chat, look at those paper votes and then I rewatch the video and then I step back because I need to make sure I’m getting that research, which is what we learn.
Okay. We heard all these like super negative comments, But where was that coming from? Was there an emotional?
And then you’re able to basically condense it down to a few takeaways that come back to you. Okay. Did we learn about [00:12:00] weaknesses? Did we learn about big picture? Instead of thinking, oh my gosh, I heard six negative comments and I heard 20 questions about more things that they need to hear. Ah, it’s overwhelming.
Oh no. Again, we’re thinking about those details. Just got to pull it back. I like to think of it. It’s like when we are, when you’re making roux. roux, it’s a wonderful brown liquid gold that you use a lot for different kinds of soups and stews, but it’s flavor intensive, right? So you got to stir constantly, right?
It’s just boiling, boiling, boiling, boiling, thicken, thicken, thicken. And I mean, we’re talking minutes here where you’re just stirring, stirring, stirring, stirring, stirring, and you want to get off the excess, right? You want to get it down to that brown liquid gold. And that’s what you want to do. It’s get it down to that brown liquid gold and not, not get so overwhelmed with some of the negative things that you heard and come back to that.
Why did I do this? [00:13:00] Okay. It’s research. Okay. Condense it down. And I have, again, I have to remind myself of this because sure, I get invested in focus groups and in cases and in a hundred percent, but that’s why we want to call it down and come back to our why. Occasionally. Why are we doing this? How is this helping me prepare?
So just wanted to put this all into an episode for you because, you know, I had a couple focus groups lately where this came up where it’s just like, wow, this stinks. Why are we doing this? And also hoping that people who maybe are on the cusp of thinking about doing focus groups and maybe there’s an internal barrier, hopefully that will help.
Give you a new perspective, if not give you that friendly reminder here today in this episode. So, uh, appreciate your time. If you enjoyed the episode, please rate review us on your favorite platform. If you have a question or you would like a particular topic covered in an episode, please scroll down to the show notes.
My email is in there. Please shoot me an email. I, I will respond [00:14:00] and I’ll see you next time. Thank you.
