Have you ever had to break bad news to a client about a case? How did you handle it?
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This week, we took note of some advice about how to share bad news with your higher-ups about your own shortfalls on the job.
This prompted a commenter on that post to suggest that perhaps more useful information for lawyers would be how to talk to clients about disappointing results in cases. “Seeking forgiveness internally versus externally requires substantially different approaches, particularly in the case-oriented environment of the law, where clients are in a make-or-break situation, or are just not reasonable people to begin with,” commenter William Able noted.
Good point! So this week, we put it to you, readers: Have you ever had to break bad news to a client about a case? How did you handle it?
Answer in the comments.
Read the answers to last week’s question: How do you describe to children what you do as a lawyer?
Posted by tar: “When my girls were elementary age, I was a prosecutor and my husband was, and still is, a tax attorney. My husband would tell our daughters that I put bad people in jail and he kept bad people out of jail. Of course, this explanation was insufficient. When my middle school-aged child was asked by a friend’s mother what I did, she responded: ‘My mom is a prostitutor.’”
Do you have an idea for a future question of the week? If so, contact us.
