The Human Side of Litigation by Attorney Liz Vennum

A client called me recently to go over discovery responses. At least that was my plan.

Before we got into the mechanics of interrogatories, document requests, objections, and deadlines, I asked him how he was doing. It is a question we ask lawyers ask all the time, often as a reflex. This time, he answered it.

 He told me the lawsuit was wearing on him. He owned a growing business, and the case had begun to feel like a second job: expensive, distracting, and constantly present. He was trying to keep employees paid, customers served, and operations moving, all while carrying the uncertainty and expense of litigation. The financial strain was real. So was the emotional strain.

That moment was a useful reminder: litigators may live in lawsuits every day, but our clients do not.

 To us, litigation becomes ordinary. We talk about pleadings, discovery, depositions, leverage, exposure, and risk. We are trained to spot issues and evaluate claims.  That training is necessary. It is also incomplete if we forget what the process feels like to the person whose business, savings, reputation, peace of mind, or future is at stake.

 No one comes to a litigator on a good day.

 Even plaintiffs, who have chosen to file suit, are usually doing so because something has gone seriously wrong. A business relationship collapsed. A contract was breached. Money was not paid. Trust was broken. The lawsuit may be necessary, justified, and strategically sound, but that does not make it painless.

 For defendants, the experience can be even more destabilizing. Being sued can threaten a person’s sense of safety and security. It can turn ordinary business decisions into exhibits. It can make every email feel consequential and every billable hour feel like another loss. For owners of small and growing businesses, litigation can consume not only money, but attention, energy, and the mental bandwidth they need to run the business that is supposed to be funding the fight.

 Lawsuits take up space. They occupy calendars, inboxes, evenings, weekends, and the quiet moments when a person is trying to be present with family. They impose a cost that does not always appear on an invoice.

 I often tell clients, somewhat bluntly, that the only people who reliably benefit from lawsuits are lawyers. We are the ones who get paid whether the case settles, proceeds through discovery, goes to trial, or ends in some unsatisfying compromise. Plaintiffs and defendants may obtain justice, vindication, leverage, or resolution. But they pay for it. Sometimes dearly.

 That does not mean litigation is wrong. Some disputes need to be litigated. Some claims need to be brought, some defenses need to be asserted, and some lines need to be held. But seriousness is not the same thing as inevitability, and strategy is not the same thing as momentum.

 As litigators, we should be careful not to mistake hustle for progress. There are times when the right next step is another discovery request, another deposition, another motion. There are also times when the right next step is to pause and ask whether the current path still serves the client’s objective.  That conversation can be hard. Clients do not always want to pay the other side and understandably so.  Doing so can feel like admitting the other side was right about you even when everything they claim is wrong. Settlement often feels like surrender, especially when the client believes, rightly or wrongly, that he has been wronged. But sometimes the real choice is not between “paying them” and “winning.” Sometimes the choice is between paying the other side now, paying your lawyer more over time, or paying in stress, lost focus, and uncertainty while the case works its way through the system.

Good litigation counsel requires more than knowing the rules. It requires judgment about when to fight, when to negotiate, and when to make sure a client understands the possible benefit of an early settlement. It also requires listening.  When we casually open a call by asking, “How are you doing?” we should be prepared for the possibility that the client may actually tell us. And if he does, we should be willing to hear not only the words, but the weight they carry.

We are not therapists. We are not financial advisors. We are not friends in the ordinary sense (Let’s be honest, nobody would pay us hourly to be their friends.) But we are attorneys and counselors at law. The second half of that phrase matters.

Clients come to us with legal problems, but legal problems do not stay neatly confined to the legal file. They affect businesses, families, sleep, confidence, and sometimes identity. Our job is not to absorb all of that for them. It is to recognize it, account for it, and give advice that is not blind to the human cost.

 It is easy as a lawyer to focus on legal strategy and lose sight of our human touch.

The best litigation counsel considers not only the legal strategy, but the person living through it.