For 20 of the 25 years of my legal career, I represented management. I defended claims, countered union activity and advised employers on avoiding legal trouble. By contrast, the first five years of my career were spent representing employees and a union.
I believe those five years proved to be of great service to the employers I served, as well as to me. The experiences I gained helped me from a strategic standpoint. More importantly, they gave me a healthy perspective on why employees file claims.
As I describe in another column, employee claims arise primarily from failed workplace relationships. Whether or not the assertion has legal validity, the claim is rooted in a relationship where dignity, trust and respect were casualties. They were replaced by bitterness, anger and a desire for revenge—and the legal system became the employee's outlet to vent.
During my career, I continually observed bright young attorneys joining corporate management-side law firms right out of law school. In my view, these lawyers tended to be overly zealous and risk-averse. The zealousness came from a desire to beat the other side. Often, it was accompanied by contempt for both opposing counsel and the client. This resulted in claim resolution being more protracted, costly and hostile, with negative consequences for everyone.
As a managing attorney, I would admonish our younger attorneys, "Ditch the word 'disingenuous,' even if plaintiff's counsel uses it with the regularity of teeth...
As he said he would on Sunday morning, FBI Director Kash Patel filed a defamation case against The Atlantic and reporter Sarah Fitzpatrick this morning over a story that characterizes him as an inc...