Managing the Client Relationship – Family Law (State Bar of Texas Annual Meeting 2024)

Episode Notes

Transcript

Rocky Dhir:

Hello and welcome to another episode of the State Bar of Texas podcast. We are recording live from the state bar annual meeting in Dallas, Texas. This is your host Rocky Dhir, and I’ve got a fun one for you. Now we’re going to talk about family law. Now I know a lot of you’re thinking family law. I would never want to do family law, but you might actually change your mind after we talk to Britney Harrison. She’s our guest today. Britney is not only an attorney with Turner McDowell and Rowan, but you might remember hearing her name back in the Covid years. She was the president of TYLA. She did a phenomenal job leading our young lawyers through that, through a very trying time. And now you’re a family lawyer, so you give a talk Britney about managing the client relationship.

Britney Harrison:

Yes, I did. It can get a little difficult with family law clients. Sometimes the emotions are pretty high, and so you really have to set expectations and really manage your clients to get through everything.

Rocky Dhir:

Is it different with family law than it is with general, say a slip and fall case or business litigation case? I mean, everybody’s emotions are charged in any litigation, right? So what is it about a family law case that makes it so different?

Britney Harrison:

So for me, I used to be a commercial litigator, and so my clients back then, your client really was more of the partner. You really didn’t get to really deal with people. You’re dealing with family law, more of a personal thing. This is their personal life. They’re paying your fees out of their bank account. So everything is just more of a personal level and it’s heartbreaking. We’re usually having divorce or a child custody battle, something like that that’s involving your children, your family, that’s just necessarily going to be more emotionally charged in a business litigation.

Rocky Dhir:

So you used to be a commercial litigator, so did you find it hard to not get emotionally vested in your clients?

Britney Harrison:

For me, I didn’t because I’ve always been able to compartmentalize. And so I always remember at the end of the day, I did not create the issues. The clients brought the facts to me. My job is to try and help them navigate those facts through our law and figure out what’s the best course going forward. When I can just compartmentalize and just at the end of the day, no, it’s not my problem, I’m just helping someone else with theirs. It makes it a little bit easier.

Rocky Dhir:

Does it make it harder though, when maybe something doesn’t go their way, a custody issue doesn’t go the way they wanted, and now how do you get them to understand that this wasn’t you who caused the problem, the judge ruled the way the judge ruled. How do you manage those expectations from the client on that perspective? I imagine at some level they’re looking at you thinking you’re going to fix everything For me,

Britney Harrison:

Yes, they do expect that, but you have to kind of go in before the hearing. You can’t do it afterwards. You have to go into the hearing ahead of time and explain, these are all the advantages, these are the disadvantages, these are the facts that you have in your favor. These are the ones that could go against you. The law is X, but reasonable wines, they can differ. So you might end up having what might seem like a slam dunk thing on your side, but the judge could come out in the complete opposite direction. And so whenever you do that, you just have to explain to the client ahead of time though, Hey, this may not go in your way. We’ll do our best. But the facts are what they are, and we don’t know what mood the judge is going to be in today.

Sometimes this is why we always say sometimes it’s better to settle because you have a lot more control over that than going into court. And particularly in Dallas, we get 20 minutes per side to argue our case at trial, at a temporary orders hearing, you get 20 minutes per side. And so unless you get a special set, which are very hard to get, but at the most part you just have to get what you can in those short amount of time and what happens, happens. And so you have a chance to appeal it up to a district judge, but for the most part you’re stuck with that for the temporary orders.

Rocky Dhir:

Sure, sure. I will tell you, in my experience, this is just me talking. I’m not representing the state bar or the podcast or anything, but this is just, I’ve done a couple of family law cases in my day just helping people out, and I noticed that family law attorneys were either the very best of the best or they were committing ethical violations left, right and center. How as a family law attorney, do you kind of navigate that? Because I think a lot of times from a client’s perspective, they’re looking for somebody who’s going to give them the answer they want to hear as opposed to telling the truth. So as a family law practitioner, how do you educate them while still allowing them to understand the value you bring and not steer them towards somebody who might just temporarily make them feel good?

Britney Harrison:

Yes. No, that’s the huge issue. So whenever someone comes to me, I’m going to be upfront with them right away. The first initial consultation, I’m telling you, this is what the law says, this is what my ethics rules say because I can’t push a frivolous position. And if you want me to do that, then I’m not your attorney. I’m not the attorney for you. So I will send them packing early on. But you just have to let them know, these are the constraints that I have and I’m not going to pursue an action that’s frivolous or against my ethics rules. And so you let them know that right away and you’re like, these are the options that you have and let’s go down this route and try and get a result that you would like. But it’s going to be from an ethical perspective, I’m not putting my license on the line for any of my clients.

Rocky Dhir:

What role does objectivity play in that? And here’s where I come at with this is a lot of times it’s tempting to just believe your client’s side of the story. This happened or they said this and they were mean to me or whatever. Then as a case progresses, you start learning other facts that might kind of sway things a little bit more in the other party’s favor. How do you get yourself ready for that upfront and how do you get all the facts from your clients so that there’s no surprises down the road? I have to imagine that’s one of the toughest parts of your job.

Britney Harrison:

Yes. We always hate being in court, and then we hear a fact. It was like, that is not how you told that to me. So I do stress upfront, tell me the complete truth. And I ask, a lot of times I’m like, what bad things would they say about you? Because when you say it from that perspective, they’re like, oh, we’ll say this. And so usually kind of get a little bit more of the truth. And generally, we always know that there’s always your side, the other side, and then some version of the truth in between. And so maybe I’m a little, I don’t know. I always go in, I know that my client’s not telling me a hundred percent everything, so I’m going to always going to go in there and be like, okay, well you’re telling me this. They’re probably going to say this. How am I going to react to that in court? And usually that helps kind of balance it out. But I always know that my clients, they come in pairs, they found each other. So if one person’s saying, this person’s this, this and that, it’s like, well, what did you do? And so it’s usually there’s some kind of way of teetering it out. And once you’ve been doing it long enough, you kind of learn and hear the same stories. You’re like, okay, well, let’s talk about it from this perspective.

Rocky Dhir:

What about the relationship with opposing counsel? And I know that may not directly be part of the client relationship, but it might be part of the universe of relationships that help you kind of manage this litigation. So how important in family law is it to have a good relationship with opposing counsel? And to what extent do you kind of rely on your opposing counsel to give you the facts that maybe you didn’t get upfront? And to what extent then do you extend that same courtesy to opposing counsel?

Britney Harrison:

Yeah, so yeah, I always have to make sure you’re not violating any attorney client privilege. Of course. Sure. But at the end of the day, we all see each other all the time. So the family law bar, it might be the biggest section of the state bar of Texas, but we see each other and we all kind of know each other. And so I honestly appreciate it when I see an opposing counsel on the other side that I know is ethical. I know as a great attorney, I love having that person on the other side because I know that they’re going to do a good job. It’s going to be done professionally. They’re going to treat me with the professional courtesies that I would also give them. And it honestly makes things a lot easier. A lot of times we’ll joke with each other. It’s like, Hey, if we didn’t have clients, we could just get this settled because we know how to be reasonable. But I think that I’m always going to make sure that I’m professional with my opposing counsel because again, lawyers creed, I’m always going to follow my ethics rules. Sometimes I don’t always get that same courtesy back, but

Rocky Dhir:

I’m what I’m wondering about. But

Britney Harrison:

I don’t ever stoop to that level. I’m always going to maintain my professionalism. And you always just take the high road because courts, they also see that. So they see that you’re being reasonable and you’re being professional. That’s going to play out later on. So it’s like you just always just do the right thing, even if they don’t do it to you.

Rocky Dhir:

So I’m going to ask maybe I’m assuming this might be one of the toughest aspects of the attorney client relationship, especially in family law cases, but it goes back to the word that starts with the letter M, and that’s money, right? The fees that you have to really, I guess we could call it the F word fees. Alright. What do you do about, how do you set expectations about fees to your clients upfront? Because at the end of the day, there’s aspects to this that aren’t predictable, and so you might tell ’em it’s going to cost about this much and then it may end up being higher, or you need to hire outside experts and there’s other things that go into all this. How do you get them prepared for that upfront?

Britney Harrison:

So a lot of times in the very initial meeting, I’m going to tell them what my hourly rate is, what my paralegal’s rate is, and how we approach our cases. And then I’ll say before we start going down as a very expensive line of courts of action, we’re going to talk about it and we’re going to talk about what does it cost to do discovery? What does that mean for you? What are the time that’s going to take with that? And before we go down that route, I’m going to make sure you can pay for it. And if you can’t afford that, we’re going to have to try and do something else that’s within your budget. Because if you’re good at something, don’t do it for free. Of course, I can’t finance litigations. So we just make sure we talk about it upfront so they understand if you want to go down this route, take depositions, do all this stuff, hire experts, you’re going to have to pay for all of that upfront. And if you can’t, then we’re going to have to find another routes and another course of action.

Rocky Dhir:

But I’m sure it’s happened before where you estimate it’s going to be about X and then it becomes X plus Y there adds a component to it. How do you manage that or how do you think family lawyers should manage that?

Britney Harrison:

So I would say I don’t like to estimate fees upfront because I always go with, there’s so much outside of our control and you can’t control the speed with which the other side’s going to give you information whether or not they’re going to give you everything, but you can control some things on your side. So I tell them, this is how you can kind of help keep costs down by making sure you are doing what I’m asking you to do in a timely manner, and I’m not having to chase you down. So we can control our side of things, but if we need to start going into commotions to compel, then we can do that. But we’re going to ask for fees on that. So we control what we can from our perspective and then look at what’s happening on the other side.

Rocky Dhir:

So then in terms of, because I know in family law, again, it can get contentious even with lawyers. Absolutely. In between the lawyers, as you roll your eyes and say, yes, the sigh of, yes, I have to work for weekends or else I’m going to go crazy, I get it. If you have an opposing lawyer who is ratcheting up fees for whatever reason, the parties may not even be able to afford it, they’re just ratcheting up fees. What is, in your view, an ethical way or maybe a professional way for an above board attorney to kind of deal with that and address it so that it doesn’t spiral out of control?

Britney Harrison:

Those are the times where you have to request those interim fees. You just have to request them in there. If the other side continues to take actions and then call their behavior to the carpet, essentially let the judges know what’s happening. And you can do that through asking for fees or to equalize fees. That happens sometimes when you have one spouse that has a lot of money and they’re just spinning through things, we’ll have a motion for interim fees where we’re asking for an equalization of fees or to segregate fees to allow a certain amount to be allocated to our clients, so that way they can also kind of compete with what’s going on. Those are harder to win, but those are the only options you really have.

Rocky Dhir:

Okay. So now as you’re dealing with all this, though, I’m sure it’s some point, it’s got to be hard not to become an emotional crutch for your clients. So how do you set that boundary up? I mean, you said early on that you try to make it clear that, Hey, I’m your lawyer. I didn’t set, I’m not the one that caused the problem. But how do you set those boundaries up? Do you make sure they don’t have cell phone numbers? Do you turn off your cell phone at a certain time? Do you give ’em a different cell phone that you use only for work? I mean, how as a family law attorney, do you balance that so that you’re not getting calls on Sunday morning? Yeah,

Britney Harrison:

So for me personally, I do not giving out my cell phone. I’ve had the same numbers since I was 14 years old. I’m not learning a new one, and you can’t get Austin numbers anymore. So I don’t give up my cell phone if I don’t have to give it out. And I let them know it’s like, Hey, I don’t like to transact business over text message, so you need to email me or you need to call my paralegal and set up an appointment to do that. So you kind of have to just set those boundaries early on and don’t start bad habits that you’re not going to keep up. So I don’t like to respond to emails at 10 o’clock at night. I may actually be working, but I’ll hit that little delayed delivery and I

Rocky Dhir:

Need to learn about this. Okay. It’s the

Britney Harrison:

Best thing. And now Microsoft actually, it prompts you for it when you’re sending an email outside of your normal business hours. So you can just say, Hey, send this tomorrow at 8:30 AM even though you’re working on it at 11 o’clock at night, no one knows you’re working on it and your client doesn’t assume you are because the one time you decide to answer on the weekend or you decide to answer, they know you’re, they’re like, oh, you’re now going to be available to me. And then you’re getting those calls on Christmas Day or Thanksgiving Day because they’re upset. They don’t have their children on Thanksgiving that year. So we get those calls, but you just, I don’t answer them, and I will wait until, if I have an out of office and it says that I’m on my holiday vacation, I will wait until Monday when I get back to respond. So you just have to set those boundaries and maintain them by not rewarding the bad behavior.

Rocky Dhir:

Sounds like the maintaining might be the tough part. One final question, and that is, in terms of managing the client relationship, part of that is knowing when to terminate it. So at what point should a family law attorney start giving some real consideration to maybe withdrawing his counsel?

Britney Harrison:

So yes, when those clients are deciding to go down the rogue path and start doing things that are kind of frivolous or against your advice, you need to warn them and warn them in writing. And if they continue down that you got to get out and just follow the rules, make sure you give them their file back, but get out of the case. Well, I’ve never met an attorney that regrets withdrawing. They always regret not withdrawing sooner. Sure. So you just have to set a hard line, and I give second chances because sometimes people, like I said, it’s emotionally charged. They may make a bad decision, I’ll give you a second chance. But if you continue to not follow my advice or do the things I’m telling you not to do, this relationship isn’t working anymore. So you just have to cut bait and walk away.

Rocky Dhir:

Then they’re not listening. So it’s time to walk away. Well, unfortunately, that is all the time we have for this installment of the State Bar of Texas podcast. I want to thank you, Britney, for joining us. It’s been a pleasure.

Britney Harrison:

Thank You. It’s been wonderful to be here

Rocky Dhir:

And also, I want to thank you, our listeners for tuning in. If you like what you heard, please rate and review us in Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Spotify, Amazon music, or your favorite podcasting app. I’m Rocky Dhir. Until next time, thanks for listening. We’ll see you soon.