Raising the bar
Mark Bennett discusses "lethal generosity," a concept taken from a discussion of social media on the Global Neighborhoods blog, and its application to criminal defense trial lawyering. The underlying issue I believe is competition among criminal defense attorneys.
Global Neighborhoods defines lethal generosity, in the context of social media, as:
that the most generous members of any social media company are the most credible and influential and as such, they can devastate their competition in the marketplace.
Competition for clients, for some attorneys, can be fierce. Lawyers spend huge amounts of money on marketing themselves in an attempt to bring in clients, including yellow pages ads, billboards, television ads, websites, and a multitude of other methods to get your name out to potential clients. For some lawyers, this drive to obtain and retain clients can spill over into their relations with fellow defense attorneys.
Although I use various methods of advertising and I feel it is necessary in this day and age, I believe that the best way to attract clients is to do the very best for the clients that you have. If you are fighting for your clients the word will get out. If you love your job and believe in your cause it will show and people will see it.
Back to the concept of lethal generosity, which I had not heard before and is a fascinating concept. Some lawyers carefully guard their motions, briefs, research, and ideas, I can only assume because they feel that it will somehow benefit them to keep their secrets. I always share motions that I have drafted with anyone who asks, and it does not hurt me in the slightest. I am always happy to return a call to an attorney who is looking for advice or a second opinion on an issue they have, in part because I hope that someone will return my call when I am looking for advice.
If I have drafted a motion that works in a given situation, and have put hours of research into the issue, there is no need for another attorney to re-invent the wheel and waste hours researching something that I have already done. They can then use that time to research another issue or motion or work on another aspect of their case.
I will draft new motions and research new issues in new cases, and always strive to learn more and to improve my advocacy. Although the concept of lethal generosity is fascinating, being generous with acquired knowledge should not, after all, be about competition. If other lawyers benefit from work that I have done then their clients are also benefiting from that work, and the overall quality of representation for citizens accused of crimes has improved. This is also the concept behind our local, state, and national criminal defense associations, and the listserves that we have set up for each. It is about raising the bar.
