33. The Secrets of Persuasive Legal Storytelling

Legal communications specialist David Mann joins the podcast to encourage listeners become masters of persuasion through storytelling. In this episode, David explains that legal case storytelling is not just for trials, tells how to flip the narrative script and align the fact finder with your client, and reveals a trove of writing techniques that help sharpen your writing and storytelling skills.Content Warning: Mention of sexual assault. A brief, non-graphic discussion of a defendant’s sexual assault case occurring from 20:35 to 22:03.Topics2:52     Why boring opening statements are boring  7:08    The Seven Basic Plots and the stories we tell 10:38  Orienting the “characters” in your legal case story 12:04  Unifying the fact finder — counterintuitively 19:03  Defending the unsympathetic client 23:11  Building context through storytelling 27:16  Where facts and technical information fit into persuasion 29:01  Differences between telling the plaintiff’s story and the defendant’s  31:42  A daily practice to become a better writer33:19  Brainstorming and self-editing38:44  Workshopping your legal case story42:10  Signoff questionQuote“This is the fundamental difference between a legal case story told to, say, a jury versus narrative fiction that we watch in movies or read in books. The fundamental difference is that the narrative fiction that we’re used to watching in movies is a finished story. It has a beginning, middle, and end. The credits roll at the end, you walk away – that story is complete. In a legal case story, it isn’t complete because the jury is the end of the story. The story hasn’t been completed yet. They will complete the story.” David MannResourcesDavid Mann (website)Story Power: Building Persuasive Case Narratives (course)Presentation and Oral Advocacy Skills for Any Lawyer (course)The Seven Basic Plots: Why We Tell Stories (Wikipedia)The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity (book)Engaging the Jury in the First Two Minutes (free webcast)Winning Cases with Better Storytelling (free webcast)Give ‘em the Ol’ Razzle Dazzle, with Dominic Gianna (podcast)Metallica (v. Napster) and (v. Guerlain) litigation