A couple of years ago, I was involved in running a genetics conference focused on using genetics as a defense tactic in civil cases, much in the way that DNA evidence is used in criminal cases. I've been working with experts in this field ever since. A few months back, I wrote an article about the clever use by plaintiffs of litigation graphics and genetics in the baby powder (talc) cases (see Some Lessons for Defendants From the Talc Liability Trials), including a $4 billion verdict against a major talc manufacturer. When I write about various types of cases, I often hear from lawyers who handle the types of cases I write about. On my post on the use of genetics evidence in the talc litigation, how many talc defense lawyers do you think I heard from? If you guessed zero, you'd be exactly right. And that's a problem. Not ready to accept that this is a problem for defendants? Then I will ask whether the plaintiffs’ talc bar was similarly unresponsive. As you can probably guess from the way I posed the question, the answer is no. Out of discretion, I won't say exactly who or how many responded, but it was more than zero. Even though there is more to gain for the defense bar from understanding and leveraging these critical tools, it’s the plaintiffs’ lawyers who are most active in the field, striving to improve their approach. From the defense bar — crickets. And that's the problem I'm seeing in the way some of these talc cases are being defended. Defense counsel appear to be playing defense – and completely ignoring the key point that the best defense in litigation is a good offense. These verdicts are having an impact on the companies involved. Last Friday, on December 14, 2018, shares of Johnson & Johnson fell 10 percent and were set to have their largest percentage drop in more than 16 years, after Reuters reported that the company knew for decades that there was some asbestos in its baby powder. Yesterday, December 18, 2018, Johnson and Johnson ran the full page ad seen here in an attempt to manage this growing crisis. For trial lawyers and litigation consulting firms like ours, these asbestos allegations are not new or surprising. It's what plaintiff's have alleged recently and have used to prevail in these cases. The surprising thing in these cases is defense counsel's unnecessarily passive approach. When products are accused of causing harm, defense lawyers often choose one of the following defense strategies: Assert the harm was caused by something else but we don’t know what (the “idiopathic” defense) Assert the harm was caused by something else and we know exactly what. Typically, most defendants have chosen the ‘we don’t know what other thing caused it’ strategy because it avoids giving up the favorable allocation of the burden of proof and assuming the very specific (and often difficult) burden of proving an alternative cause – much as criminal defendants take advantage of the “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard. Not surprisingly, this argument generally falls flat. Recently, the plaintiffs’ bar won a multi-billion-dollar verdict by asserting that there is asbestos in talc and that it causes mesothelioma. This is highly improbable for several logical reasons — but jurors tend to follow emotion first and logic second when deliberating. If asbestos is present in baby powder at all, it would be in such small amounts that one could not reasonably connect mesothelioma to it. If defense counsel asserts (as they have been) that the mesothelioma was caused by some other identified source of asbestos, and not by talc, that leaves jurors without the necessary tools to argue for a defense verdict during deliberations. So, what if defense counsel could instead prove that the plaintiff’s mesothelioma was caused by something other than asbestos in baby powder? Something identifiable, measurable, and specific. Using modern genetics, this is now possible. And it is a major sea change.

Because (apparently), if we only had 15 more minutes, we could all save 15% or more on car insurance, GEICO has run a series of amusing TV commercials that imagine surreal sources of wasted time, including a Pictionary-playing sloth, Emperor penguins betrayed by faulty GPS, and an interstellar commander who loses his spaceship’s keys in the midst of an alien attack.

Roughly half of our business involves the creation of PowerPoint presentations for opening statements, closing arguments and expert witnesses. To create these presentations, our litigation consultants, typically seasoned trial lawyers and communications experts, work with our creative staff to turn the trial strategy into presentations that will motivate decisionmakers to make the “right” decisions. In a trial with millions or billions at stake, our final draft for an opening is typically version 30 or higher — and I've seen version 80 in a very large trial. Why so many versions? This is the result of what great trial lawyers do: They work with our team and iterate until perfection is achieved. However, every presentation starts with a first draft, and after three decades in this industry, I can say that a first draft sets the tone for the entire engagement. Handle it well, and trust is formed and there is a nice creative arc free from anxiety. Handle the rollout of the first draft wrong, and trust never kicks in, micromanagement dominates, and the deck becomes a “horse designed by committee.” So what’s the magic to the rollout of a first draft?

I've written about people who present well using PowerPoint many times before. Some of those articles include: President Obama: Presentation Graphics: Why The President Is Better Than You Law Professor Lawrence Lessig: Lawyer Delivers Excellent PowerPoint Presentation Dan Pink: Dan Pink, Pixar, and Storytelling for the Courtroom Nancy Duarte: Litigators Can Learn a Lot About Trial Presentation from Nancy Duarte Scott Harrison: Every Litigator Should Watch Scott Harrison Deliver This Presentation Me: 21 Steps I Took For Great Public Speaking Results Each of these articles offered some useful lessons both in designing good trial presentations and in the art of presentation. Yesterday, the world saw one of the great PowerPoint presentations of all time. If it were given in a courtroom, this presentation would be in the top one percent of courtroom presentations (not for beauty but for effectiveness). However, this presentation was not in a courtroom at all. Still, which famed trial lawyer do you imagine gave this presentation? As the title suggests, it wasn’t a trial lawyer at all. The presentation was delivered by Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. If you don't agree with the man or the content, put aside your politics and learn from the presentation. Every trial lawyer should do AT LEAST this well in the courtroom. There are few excuses not to, and every client should demand a performance at this level. If you have (or are) a client who understands the outsized value of investing in the most critical presentations of your case, our team can get you to this level. Every time. This is exactly the kind of work we do with the world's top trial lawyers every day. Watch all or some of Prime Minister Netanyahu's presentation and read my commentary on it below to understand why this presentation is so effective and how any trial lawyer can learn from it. The list of things done right in this presentation is very long. Let's look at a handful, and I will link back to an article where we made these recommendations. Each of these underlying teachings is a technique that our litigation consultants use to help coach trial lawyers and maximize their chance of winning. He looks the part: 10 Things Litigators Can Learn From Newscasters He chose the right tie: Litigation Graphics, Psychology and Color Meaning He delivers on all five of these promises: 5 Things Every Jury Needs From You He establishes a clear narrative and drama early: Are You Smarter Than a Soap Opera Writer? He uses an immersive style: New Study: A Graphically Immersive Trial Presentation Works Best He uses surprise to engage and persuade: Could Surprise Be One of Your Best Visual Persuasion Tools? Persuasive images are used immediately: Persuasive Graphics: How Pictures Are Increasingly Influencing You The use of deposition-like video is brilliant for setting the stage: 6 Tips for Effectively Using Video Depositions at Trial He presents in a modern 16x9 format (like an HDTV not an old tube TV): Free Webinar: PowerPoint Litigation Graphics - Winning by Design™ He does not talk over the messages: 12 Ways to SUCCESSFULLY Combine Oral and Visual Presentations Captioning is well handled on videos: 6 Tips for Effectively Using Video Depositions at Trial He is very practiced: The Magic of a 30:1 Presentation Preparation Ratio The core opening introductory message is clear and compelling: How to Structure Your Next Speech, Opening Statement or Presentation Netanyahu used a hot seater: What a Great “Hot Seat Operator” Can Add to a Trial Team The theatrics in the form of the binders and the CDs are just brilliant: Using Scale Models as Demonstrative Evidence - a Winning Trial Tactic The level of preparation is clear and is what is expected of elite presenters - even by juries: Practice, Say Jury Consultants, is Why Movie Lawyers Perform So Well The hand gestures are well done: 5 Things TED Talks Can Teach Us About Opening Statements The call outs are simple and excellent: 3 Styles of Document Call-outs Used at Trial The translating of scale and size into terms people understand is clear and convincing: 6 Ways to Convey Size and Scale to a Jury You don't have to read Farsi to understand the nuclear materials, he says: Your Trial Presentation Must Answer: Why Are You Telling Me That? He makes limited use of bullet points: 12 Reasons Bullet Points Are Bad (in Trial Graphics or Anywhere) He organizes his message into five points and enumerates on the slides: Litigation Graphics: The Power of Checklist Trial Exhibits He uses limited text on slides throughout the presentation!: How Much Text on a PowerPoint Slide is Too Much? His slides are clean, uncluttered and generally have a single message: 12 Ways to Eliminate "But I Need Everything On That PowerPoint Slide" He includes animated graphics: 16 PowerPoint Litigation Graphics You Won't Believe Are PowerPoint He contrasts what the Iranians said vs. the reality and deploys other credibility attacks in one evidence-backed attack after another: Like It or Not: Likability Counts for Credibility in the Courtroom He tells you what to conclude: Your Trial Presentation Must Answer: Why Are You Telling Me That? He repeats (language and video) for effect and clarity: A Surprising New Reason to Repeat Yourself at Trial His use of storytelling throughout the presentation is excellent: 5 Ways to Maximize Persuasion During Opening Statements - Part 2 He makes NONE of the 12 mistakes in this article: The 12 Worst PowerPoint Mistakes Litigators Make He has been well coached by presentation consultants like us: Your Coach Is Not Better Than You – in the Courtroom or Elsewhere Nothing about this PowerPoint presentation is particularly sophisticated. In fact, there are many things that could be done to make it considerably better and more persuasive. However, above all else, it shows what a well-practiced presenter can do. VERY few trial lawyers prepare to the point where they can present at this level and if they would work more closely with elite litigation consultants, whether A2L's litigation consultants (pdf) or others, they could do even better than Benjamin Netanyahu. Here's the ultimate takeaway: it's not some innate gift that helps a presenter be world-class. Instead, it's the humility that allows someone to practice over and over getting these critical presentations just right that makes anyone appear to be world-class.

I have the privilege of working on a regular basis with many of the top trial lawyers in the nation, and they are an impressive bunch. In addition to their knowledge of the law, their capacity for hard work, and their practiced trial skills, they tend to carry an unquantifiable charisma. The great trial lawyer is a person who, when he or she enters a room, knows how to command the room. And although they are not arrogant, they do know that they have that ability and that they can turn it on or off. This means that the great trial lawyers can develop an ineffable rapport with jurors, a connection that is hard to explain and remarkable to see in action. Trial consultants are well advised to leave well enough alone, to “do no harm” when that connection is clearly operational; their job then is to simply sit back and observe this meeting of the minds and hope it will carry them on to victory. But these top trial lawyers, who have developed great sensitivity to issues of rapport and communication, often voice a concern to me. The concern is that they may be using some PowerPoint slides, say to highlight the themes of an opening statement, and then they wish to move on to a point that is not on the slides. But the jurors, they point out, are still staring at that screen, and the personal connection, instantly made, will instantly be lost. Should the jurors be looking at the screen or continuing their focus on the lawyer? It must be noted that the great trial lawyer knows not to make his or her case strictly via PowerPoint and knows how important it is to limit the use of this seductive trial technique. Still, there is a place for PowerPoint at trial and thus a corresponding concern. The trial lawyers’ concern is, fortunately, overblown and easily remedied. The remarkably simple solution is to press the “B” key on the computer keyboard. In PowerPoint, this instantly makes the screen go black, thus removing all competition for the jurors’ attention. Just learn to switch fluidly back and forth, using that key. This will not only preserve the crucial emotional connection between lawyer and jury; it will also lay the groundwork for the lawyer to assume the role in the jurors’ minds of trusted counselor and friend, someone who can make sense of all the evidence and tell a convincing story that puts it all together. I wish all trial lawyers’ dilemmas were so easily resolved. Other A2L Consulting free resources related to PowerPoint, connecting with jurors, and what makes a great trial lawyer include: 10 Criteria that Define Great Trial Teams 16 PowerPoint Litigation Graphics You Won't Believe Are PowerPoint The 12 Worst PowerPoint Mistakes Litigators Make Like It or Not: Likability Counts for Credibility in the Courtroom How Many PowerPoint Slides Should You Use in a Typical Trial? The Redundancy Effect, PowerPoint and Legal Graphics 12 Things About PowerPoint You Probably Never Knew How to Make PowerPoint Trial Timelines Feel More Like a Long Document New Webinar - PowerPoint Litigation Graphics - Winning by Design Lawyer Delivers Excellent PowerPoint Presentation Why Reading Your Litigation PowerPoint Slides Hurts Jurors How Much Text on a PowerPoint Slide is Too Much? 12 Ways to Eliminate "But I Need Everything On That PowerPoint Slide" Do Professionally Designed PowerPoint Slides Get Better Results? 12 Reasons Bullet Points Are Bad (in Trial Graphics or Anywhere) 14 Tips for Delivering a Great Board Meeting Presentation 5 Things Every Jury Needs From You Jury Selection and Voir Dire: Don't Ask, Don't Know 10 Things Every Mock Jury Ever Has Said Your Trial Presentation Must Answer: Why Are You Telling Me That?

Most of the work that a trial consulting firm like A2L does for its clients takes place in civil cases. However, criminal cases also present unique challenges for trial lawyers and for trial consultants, and some of our most fascinating cases over the years have been criminal cases.

Environmental law is something that I have found fascinating for decades. In fact, I was involved in environmental litigation even before I founded A2L more than 23 years ago. It was a topic I focused on during law school and during the summers when I worked for a major pharmaceutical company. Since then, A2L has been involved in more than 100 environmental and energy cases involving more than 10,000 cleanup sites. These cases have ranged in size from a few million at stake to over $20 billion at stake. All these cases have a few things in common. First, most clean air and clean water cases necessarily involve with complex scientific concepts. Often topics such as plume migration, organic chemistry, and the concept of parts per million must be explained to the jury, the ultimate factfinders, in an understandable way. For the last ten years, another thing has become ubiquitous in environmental and energy cases -- the extensive use of PowerPoint. Here are three examples of the use of PowerPoint to show how complex topics can be translated into easier-to-understand pictures. First, here is an example of PowerPoint (converted to video format for easy viewing) that shows how one can illustrate both historical contamination issues and modern soil sampling by combining PowerPoint, photography and some simple illustration. This presentation is typical of those presented by experts in groundwater contamination cases. This next example is really a contract dispute with energy and environmental issues embedded in it. It is an example from one of the so-called Yucca Mountain cases. In this line of cases, because the government failed to build the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste storage site in Nevada, it is on the hook for ongoing damages for the costs of storing the waste, particularly spent nuclear fuel rods, at each nuclear power plant facility. Litigation occurs when the government and the plant operator cannot agree on the costs of this storage. This is an example of a PowerPoint that combines extensive technical illustration and PowerPoint to explain the hundreds of steps and the levels of complexity in removing the reactor pressure vessel and fuel rods from one facility. Hundreds of illustrations are loaded frame by frame into PowerPoint to create the feeling of an animation.

We don't have a Hippocratic oath (i.e. do no harm) in the legal field, but when it comes to using litigation graphics at trial, maybe we should. You see there are some times when using litigation graphics does real damage to your overall persuasiveness. It is incorrect to assume that when using visual aids such as demonstrative evidence, scale models, trial boards, computer animation, or the ever-present PowerPoint presentation you are always doing good and helping your audience. Here are seven times when you would be better off changing your approach or not using litigation graphics at all: You are reading from your slides: If you populate your trial presentation with bullet point filled slides and you read them, you are reducing the amount of information your audience will remember and understand. This is due to the redundancy effect or split-attention effect. See Should You Read Documents Out Loud at Trial? You are going to get caught cheating: Creating a chart that is persuasive is great. Creating one that is misleading can cost you your credibility. As one of our customers rightly says in the video below, "Finding ways to illustrate ideas but also to visually display the evidence in a way that's understandable to the jury is critical in order to earn their trust -- which is the most important asset you have." See 5 Demonstrative Evidence Tricks and Cheats to Watch Out For. You are not using storytelling in combination with your litigation graphics: All too often trial counsel moves chronologically through a case without considering whether there was a better approach to storytelling. I think timelines can lock us into this approach. Sometimes chronological is best but sometimes using more sophisticated storytelling techniques to persuade work best. In any case, if you fail to tell a story, a jury will make one up to fill the void. Therefore, be sure to combine your visuals with storytelling to win your case. See Storytelling at Trial - Will Your Story Be Used? and Don't Be Just Another Timeline Trial Lawyer and 12 Ways to SUCCESSFULLY Combine Oral and Visual Presentations

We write here frequently about the importance of using visual evidence in trials and indeed in all sorts of other legal forums. But technology is not the be-all and end-all of persuasion. It is a very useful tool, but the importance of technology does not lessen the need to tell a convincing story to a jury or another decisionmaker. In fact, if courtroom technology is not deployed correctly, presenting visuals to a judge or jury can detract from one’s message rather than enhance it. In other words, figuring out who will be victorious at trial is not simply a matter of determining who is using litigation graphics and who is not. Any trial is ultimately about how each side can use its graphics to support an effective story. Technology-based graphics, therefore, should not be used to make up for the trial skills a lawyer lacks, but rather to enhance the skills he or she already possesses. The type of technological visual is another variable to consider when presenting an argument. Some research has suggested that depending on the case, different types of technology-based graphics can have different persuasive effects on the jury. For example, researchers compared a computer simulation of an air crash, an audiotape with written transcript of a cockpit voice recorder, and a speaker reading the cockpit voice recorder, and asked people to decide whether they believed there was a pilot error based on the evidence to which they had been exposed. The researchers found that jurors who were shown the computer animation believed the flight crew to be significantly less negligent that the other jurors who did not. Animations are so powerful because they can take us to places human beings cannot go. But even without animations, simple PowerPoint slides can be quite effective in advancing your narrative if done right.

A trial team might reasonably start a meeting with their litigation graphics consultants by saying, “We’re looking to you to help us design the best litigation graphics possible for this case.” It's a reasonable sounding goal to be sure. But what does it mean really? I think this means a lot of things. Ultimately, it must mean those trial presentation graphics will help win the case. Nothing else matters more. So, when you are talking to your trial graphics consultants, consider what you really intend to communicate about your goals. Here are nine things that I think define the best litigation graphics and how to get to them for your case. Eliminate the Mediocre Litigation Graphics: In my last article, I wrote about how the team with the most litigation graphics will not necessarily emerge the winner. The winner will be the team that refines its PowerPoint deck sufficiently to only show the best litigation graphics. See also 10 Reasons The Litigation Graphics You DO NOT Use Are Important. Your Notes Are Not Your Trial Presentation: All too often, litigators start building their trial presentation by creating text slides in PowerPoint. Typically, many bullet point style slides are left over that hamper persuasion and recall. See Still Think Persuasion is About Talking While Showing Bullet Points? and Don't Use PowerPoint as a Crutch in Trial or Anywhere We're Not Talking About Just Documents: Some people believe that when they've hired a hot-seat operator, they've hired a litigation graphics consultant. Ninety-nine times out of one hundred, they have not. They've hired a technology expert with excellent courtroom experience. However, this person is almost certainly not trained in the persuasion sciences. See Why Trial Tech ≠ Litigation Graphics Beauty is Not the Goal: Most litigation graphics firms focus on form over function. I appreciate great design better than most people, but the best graphics are the ones that are the most persuasive, not the most beautiful. See Litigation Graphics: It's Not a Beauty Contest

Law360 is a top legal industry publisher owned by Lexis-Nexis. Its daily newsletters are a must-read for trial lawyers involved in big-ticket litigation. This interview, Trial Consultants Q&A: A2L Consulting's Ken Lopez, was originally published on April 28, 2017, and is reprinted here with permission. Links to A2L articles and resources have been added by A2L in this reprint. Q: What aspect of trial consulting do you and your firm specialize in? What is unique about your firm, compared to other trial consulting firms? A: Founded in 1995, our firm is a leading national litigation consulting firm that helps trial lawyers and other advocates more reliably win complex and high-dollar disputes. We are typically in trial year-round and deliver world-class client-pleasing results in three key service areas: jury research and consulting, litigation graphics consulting, and trial technology consulting. We have recently been voted #1 in each of these categories by major legal publications. The composition of our leadership distinguishes it from other trial consulting and litigation consultant firms. Unlike firms whose origins are rooted in the trial technology business, the engineering business or the marketing/public relations fields, our team is composed of experts in the persuasion sciences. These include former litigators from top law firms, attorney-artists and social science Ph.Ds with decades of experience working with judges and juries. We primarily serve AmLaw 100 law firms and their clients. However, the firm regularly works with boutique law firms and in-house departments. It counts amongst its clients nearly all top law firms and a large portion of the Fortune 500. Most people find A2L through its litigation and persuasion-focused blog, The Litigation Consulting Report. It has nearly 10,000 subscribers and was named one of the top ten blogs in litigation by the American Bar Association. Q: What was the most interesting or memorable case that you worked on? A: The average case at A2L Consulting is a business dispute between global companies with $100 million at stake where we provide jury consulting, a mock trial, litigation graphics, and courtroom hot-seat trial technology support. One of our most memorable cases was entirely — not average. Through a top trial lawyer, we were hired to work on behalf of a surviving family member of the 1996 crash of ValuJet Flight 592 in the Everglades. This was not a plane that exploded or quickly crashed. Instead, oxygen containers in the cargo area helped fuel a fire that caused smoke to fill the plane. Then, the oxygen-fueled fire burned through the passenger cabin floor from below. After some time, controls on the plane were destroyed by the fire. Then, the plane flipped and dove into the Everglades below. No one survived. It took a long time for the tragedy to unfold and the passengers had awareness of what was happened. We know this because the plane was equipped with recording devices in both the cockpit and the passenger cabin. The recording is confidential, but none of us who worked on this case will ever forget what we heard on that recording. To help the jury visualize the experience the passengers had, we could have created a 3-D animation to show what the experience inside of the cabin was like. Instead, we synced that chilling audio with an animation we created that helped tell the tragic story. Once the animation was admitted into evidence, the case quickly settled. Q: Which stage of the trial process is the most challenging, and why? A: While we support all phases of litigation from prefiling to appeal, our firm most often focuses its consulting efforts on the opening statement. Indeed, we speak and write about opening statements often. Perhaps second only to jury selection, the opening statement can make or break an entire case. It provides the framework and narrative upon which the judge or jury will hear the evidence. For many, consciously or subconsciously, the decision about the outcome of the case will be made during opening statement. Because the opening statement is so critical, the best trial lawyers expend enormous amounts of effort preparing for openings. I’ve seen some trial lawyers practice their opening more than 100 times over the course of a year. Not surprisingly, these trial lawyers tend to win their cases. In every type of litigation consulting we provide, the opening statement is a central focus. When we conduct a mock trial, the attorneys present their openings to mock jurors or mock judges. When our senior litigation consultants work with top trial lawyers to refine their trial presentation, we ask them to present their openings as part of that process. When we design a PowerPoint presentation for opening, we ask our clients to do run-throughs of openings. When we introduce one of our trial technicians/hot-seat operators to a trial team, we ask the first chair to practice opening statements so they develop a rapport with the trial tech. Indeed, sometimes, we are asked to draft an opening statement as part of our litigation consulting effort. Opening statements are the most challenging part of the trial process because they should be. Cases are regularly won and lost because of them. Q: How has trial consulting evolved over time? What major differences are there between the industry when you started and the industry now? A: Our firm, now a national litigation consulting firm with jury consulting, litigation graphics consulting and trial technology consulting practices all voted #1 by the legal industry, was started as Animators at Law, an animation and litigation graphics firm for trial lawyers focused on persuasion. Back in the mid-1990s when we started our firm, the idea of using demonstrative evidence/litigation graphics during a trial was new. Today, no serious trial lawyer would go to trial in big-ticket litigation without litigation graphics and nearly all would hire a litigation graphics consulting firm like ours. When we started our firm, PowerPoint did not exist. Most litigation graphics were printed trial boards. Today, trial boards are used as unique emphasis tools that supplement a PowerPoint trial presentation. The practice of jury research has changed too. It has evolved from a guru-dominated practice where gut instinct drove many decisions. Today, there is more scientific rigor among top jury research firms. They let the data speak for itself and supplement that data with advice based on experience. Of course, the trial technology practice has radically changed. In the 1990s, it barely existed. Now, the complexity of cases demands that an experienced trial technician/hot-seat operator run the technology, show the trial presentation and be ready to pull up evidence on a moment’s notice. Q: What are some of the biggest challenges when working with attorneys and their clients? A: One of my colleagues likes to say, “they call it the practice of law, but nobody is practicing.” I agree wholeheartedly. If I could change one thing about the way trial lawyers prepare for trial, it would be the way they practice. The correlation between open practice in front of peers and winning cases is unmistakable. Half of the time, trial lawyers practice extensively and seek feedback from litigation consultants and colleagues. These lawyers tend to win their cases. When we see a trial lawyer who wants to privately prepare their trial presentation on the eve of trial, we worry. It’s not that this approach can’t work. It often does. Instead, we simply recognize that the more a trial team openly practices, the more often that trial team wins.

by Tony Klapper (Former) Managing Director, Litigation Consulting A2L Consulting For the purpose of telling a story or presenting data, experts have, over the years, suggested two different approaches. I will call them the “static” approach and the “build” approach. The static approach, in the hands of outstanding practitioners of data presentation, can have memorable results. Essentially, it conveys a great many types of information simultaneously, using graphic elements to show the relationship among the different varieties of data. Long before the advent of computers, French civil engineer Charles Joseph Minard, a pioneer in the presentation of data, created brilliant drawings depicting Napoleon’s Russian military campaign of 1812. These are a classic example of the static approach. The drawings, published in 1869, show the size of Napoleon’s army at each point of the campaign, the distance traveled, the latitude and longitude, and other key pieces of information. The acclaimed contemporary information scientist Edward Tufte says Minard’s work is “probably the best statistical graphic ever drawn,” high praise indeed. Trial lawyers also need to tell stories and present complex data sets to juries. That, in fact, is a good summary of what trial lawyers do. Lawyers and clients sometimes ask us at A2L to use this “static” approach and create a demonstrative that “says it all” in one large graph or chart. However, despite Tufte’s praise for Minard’s classic design, we think that judges and juries often learn better from a “build” approach, which starts with the basics of a story and builds it up incrementally. In our view, there is great benefit to not overwhelming a jury but in reaching a result in baby steps, especially when using a PowerPoint presentation for a jury trial. If a jury went into deliberations using a Minard-type document, we are not sure that all the jurors would fully see the ramifications of all the data, no matter how skillfully it was presented. In fact, the presentation itself during trial may take too much time and may be ineffective—as the lawyer (or the witness) is trying to orient the jury as to what to focus on and not focus on at any particular moment in the narrative. People tend to learn incrementally, not all at once. When many variables need to be presented – say, corporate earnings and profits, the number of market competitors, and prices over time – we often prefer to start with a PowerPoint with just one of those variables and build it up slowly. Trials are one area of endeavor in which we think the “build” approach may work better than the “static” approach. Other free and popular A2L Consulting articles related to legal infographics, PowerPoint litigation graphics, PowerPoint presentation for a jury trial, and demonstrative evidence generally: 16 PowerPoint Litigation Graphics You Won't Believe Are PowerPoint 15 Fascinating Legal and Litigation Infographics Information Design and Litigation Graphics Litigators, Portray Your Client As a Hero In 17 Easy Storytelling Steps Litigation Graphics, Psychology and Color Meaning 6 Studies That Support Litigation Graphics in Courtroom Presentations How Much Text on a PowerPoint Slide is Too Much? 9 Things I’ve Noticed About Effective Litigation Graphics After 20 Years as a Litigator 16 Litigation Graphics Lessons for Mid-Sized Law Firms 17 Reasons Why Litigation Consultants Are Better at Graphics Than Law Firms Why Trial Tech ≠ Litigation Graphics Good-Looking Graphic Design ≠ Good-Working Visual Persuasion 12 Reasons Litigation Graphics are More Complicated Than You Think