Engaging Experts
After 25 years helping litigators find the right expert witnesses, Round Table Group’s network contains some of the world’s greatest experts. On this podcast, we talk to some of them about what’s new in their field of study and their experience as expert witnesses.
Engaging Experts
Engaging with Estate and Tax Attorney, John Hartog
Want to know why the best experts rarely “win” a case—and why they still matter so much? We sit down with veteran estate and tax attorney and expert witness John Hartog to unpack the real value of expert testimony: confidence backed by facts, credibility that survives cross, and preparation that starts early enough to shape the entire strategy.
John traces his first expert assignment decades ago to what makes testimony persuasive now. We talk about the line between confidence and overconfidence, how an expert adjusts for a judge versus a jury, and why swagger reads as advocacy when a jury is listening. He explains why experts typically don’t decide outcomes—the facts do—but how a disciplined opinion can frame those facts so a fact finder sees them clearly. If you’ve ever waited until the eleventh hour to hire an expert, John spells out the hidden costs, from shaky disclosures to weakened confidence, and makes the case for bringing experts in early to guide discovery, strategy, and settlement leverage.
We go deep on credibility management: handling old articles and books that pop up on cross, distinguishing best practice from the standard of care, and staying consistent without being rigid when new facts or law emerge. John breaks down smart communication under differing discovery rules, especially in states where an expert’s entire file is discoverable. You’ll hear practical tactics—phone-first for substance, tight emails for logistics, screen sharing for drafts—and how federal versus state rules change report strategy. We also compare venues, from California courts to federal cases and even foreign jurisdictions that admit expert opinions on California law, and why local counsel should set guardrails when testifying elsewhere.
Across it all, one theme stands out: productive tension. Lawyers sharpen an expert’s opinion by challenging it; experts strengthen a case by flagging weak facts and untenable theories. That respectful friction is where durable, persuasive testimony is forged. If you work with experts—or are one—this conversation offers a clear roadmap for building opinions that hold up when it counts.
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This episode is brought to you by Roundtable Group, the experts on experts. We've been connecting attorneys with experts for over 30 years. Find out more at RoundtableGroup.com.
SPEAKER_01:Welcome to Engaging Experts. I'm your host, Noah Ballmer, and today I'm excited to welcome Mr. John Hartog to the show. Now, Mr. Hartog is a partner at Nutter, McClennan, and Fish, where he practices estate planning, trust and probate, and taxation law. Additionally, he's a published author and a mediator. Mr. Hartog holds a JD from UC Hastings and an LLM in taxation from Golden Gate University Law. Mr. Hartog, thank you so much for joining me here today on Engaging Experts. And thank you for inviting me, Noel. Of course, let's jump into it. So you've had a long and illustrious career as an estate administration and tax attorney. How did you first become involved as an expert witness yourself?
SPEAKER_02:I was uh approached now, it's almost 35 years ago, on a will contest that uh a local lawyer needed an expert in. And I've I don't quite understand why they hired me because I was green, but they did. And um, I think I was cheap. That was what it was. I was cheap. And uh they hired me and I became an expert then. And from there, it just like most things in life, uh, grew. I was fortunate. People thought I could do a good job as uh a consulting and testifying expert. It it helped that I had publications so that people did not have to spend people be lawyers, did not have to spend a lot of time uh demonstrating my expertise. When one writes a book, one becomes um, especially when the book is pretty well regarded, which I was fortunate for to have that happen. Uh the the the obstacle to saying that this person is an expert is much reduced. And then I discovered that I liked it. I once was an expert in a case in front of a judge who I had a very good professional relationship with. We he and I were on a couple of professional uh committees outside the courtroom, and I you know expressed my opinion, and he looked at me and he said, Mr. Hartog, I think you're overconfident in your opinion. Uh and I told him that he was wrong, but and we uh went from there. Uh so uh one of the necessities of a good expert is to be confident in the expert's opinion. And so when someone is um looking to hire me, or when I'm looking to hire an expert, I want a an individual who is confident in the way that he or she expresses their opinion. Uh it's not um I've I've seen experts and I've hired experts, unfortunately, who were expert but were um because they were so smart, were always willing to admit that they didn't know everything. And that's not good for an expert. An expert really needs to when we're talking about a an adversarial process, we're talking about testify an expert. Uh, it's really important that that expert have the confidence to express the opinion to persuade the fact finder, whether it's a judge or a jury. I've uh I'd practice I had been an expert in trust and estate matters as well as uh malpractice matters for lawyers who have practiced in this area. And in malpractice matters, almost always it's a jury trial, and in the trust administration or um legal uh uh TD matters, it's almost always a judge, in my experience. And so about it's a fact finder. And when it's a jury, you want to be able the expert wants to be able to communicate clearly without being the pompous blankety blank. And um when it's a judge, the the the expert can be a little more um uh advisar, can't be an advocate, can't be an advocate, but can be a little more definite in their opinion, let's say. Whereas when when testifying to a jury, the the expert has to be careful not to sound like an advocate, because then the the other side will object, the judge will exclude the testimony, and the jury will be confused. So though it all comes back to the the confidence of an expert. Um obviously knowing the subject matter, I had a case once where uh the expert was um was an expert, boy, was he was he ever an expert. But he became very um anxious about testifying because he had decided somehow that he had to win the case. And the lesson that we had to point out to him was your job is not to win the case, that's our job. Your job is to be the smartest person in the courtroom, right? And just do that. And and that so that that's the line, I think. Uh experts, because they're smart people and they're and they have expertise, think that they can win the case. That's not the case. Experts won't win or lose a case. Well, uh 95% of the time. I can think of two cases in which I testified as an expert in which the judge adopted my opinion in whole cloth, and that was unfortunate for the other side, unfortunate for my side. Um, but for the most part, experts don't are not the key to the case, because after all, it's the facts uh that will win or lose a case 95% of the time. You know, when I'm hiring an expert, uh, I I look for those characteristics of are is that person willing to be confident and is that person willing to to sort of shade over to the advocate side? Because I almost and I think when lawyers hire me, they're looking for the same thing. Because it's um almost always the case that I get hired as a consultant and I become a testifying expert. So that from the beginning to I may be able to not worry about how I'm gonna testify, but knowing that ultimately I will have to testify governs and colors the way I approach my assignment.
SPEAKER_01:How hard is it as an attorney to take off your attorney hat or your attorney wig, as the case may be, and uh and not advocate? Because that's what we do, right? That's what that's normally what attorneys do. You're advocating vociferously for your client. So do you ever I should I shouldn't ask, do you ever? But how difficult is it to maintain that dedication to the neutral truth rather than advocating when uh you are actually an attorney and not just an expert with Nest?
SPEAKER_02:You know, it's an interesting question. It's the longer I've done it, the less difficult it has become. But in fact, a testifying expert as opposed to a consulting expert is really an advocate. The the key to a successful testifying expert is to advocate for the opinion that the expert has, which always uh supports the theory of the case of the side that's hired the expert. It's remarkable how often that happens. You know, you get hired by a side and your opinion seems to coincide with their theory of the case. So it's not it, in fact, you oftentimes one of the reasons I I enjoy being an expert is that I get to be a little bit of a judge. I get to tell the lawyers who hire me, this is a weakness in your case, you know, or I can't give you that opinion because that opinion is inconsistent with my my real opinion, if you will. It's inconsistent with my publications, it's inconsistent with the way I practice law. So you've got to figure out a way to get an opinion out of me that is that you're comfortable with. So I think for the inexperienced expert, it's more difficult because you're right. The lawyers are are taught and paid to be advocates and to find the case and ignore the bad facts and or at least try to gloss over the bad facts. And that is not what an expert should do. I have had the unfortunate experience of sometimes a judge saying you're being an advocate, not an expert, of course, and that that doesn't that hurts my credibility as an expert, because as an expert, the being forceful and clear in the opinion is important, but also being credible. Uh, because as I just said a few minutes ago, it's easy. Um, it's it's remarkable how often that the opinions of the experts hired by the side coincide with that ex with that side's theory of the case. And that's why they're always competing experts, because they each side finds an expert who can have a different dis um a different opinion. And it's important in order to maintain credibility to say, okay, to the side that's hired you, that you're who who is paying you, look, this part of your case really is not the best part of your case. And in fact, if you're a lawyer hiring an expert, you really do want to have an expert like that. Uh, because I think it really helps the lawyer to understand the weaknesses of the case from an expert's point of view. Uh if the lawyer who hires the expert says, I'm just going to give you this hypothetical set of facts, and I'm not going to give you any of the bad facts, and then you can express an opinion for me that's that helps my case, the risk is inevitably that the cross-examination is going to bring up those unpleasant facts, and the expert will is going to be in the circumstance of saying, gee, I didn't know those facts. Because the the typical question is, would your opinion change if the facts were different? And you have to be careful as an expert uh to say whether you say yes or no, because if you don't know those other facts, you can undermine your own credibility, your own opinion, if it's not your credibility. Um so uh it's it it's important for uh and it's useful for everybody involved in the case to have a good um understanding of the expert's perspective. And that's why it's good to hire an expert early. Um I think you know from painful experience, it's one of the first things I do is to try to find a good expert. Um in my field, they're in in my field and my geographic area, they are not a whole bunch of good experts. So we're sort of we know who the good ones are. And one reason to hire one of the good ones early is to neutralize that expert from being hired by prevent that expert from being hired by the other side. So that that's one. Two, if you have an expert who can help you plot your case from early on, you'll have a better case. And three, hiring an expert the day before disclosure is due, which I can't tell you how often that's been, it's happened to me, um creates a very high-risk environment. Um a, you're you're the facts that the lawyer tells the expert on the Friday before the Monday disclosure are necessarily going to be summary. Um B the confidence of the uh expert um uh is going to be a little shaky and uh because it's too soon and or too uh too narrow, too short a deadline, pardon me. And three, the disclosure, which uh is a a pleading that gets served on the other party, is going to be sufficiently broad that if the ultimate opinion is much narrower, the other side will be able to take advantage of the fact that there was a generic disclosure, and in fact, they didn't really know what they were getting into when they hired the guy, or woman, pardon me. Um it it's really uh that that's to me very important. And like as a lawyer and as an expert, I think one of the best things lawyers can do is to hire experts early. Now, the counter-argument to that is experts are expensive, it's hard to justify that if uh before the case is getting unless the trial is really a realistic possibility. I mean, I understand those economic factors, but in my experience, getting hired early has led to a better resolution, whether it's by settlement or at trial, um, than hiring late. Uh and so that's one of my uh takeaways I encourage your listeners um to take is hire well, but hire early too. And and the flip of that is that if if as you get into the case, the lawyer and the expert discovers that the expert's opinion is going to be not that terribly useful, if it's long before disclosure, then there's no harm, no foul. Um the expert as a consultant has been is is not going to be disclosed, and therefore all that work product remains privileged.
SPEAKER_01:I recently hosted an attorney panel, and they largely came to the same conclusion as you just stated, which is you need to hire early. And it's interesting, that's actually one of the more common complaints that I've had from expert witnesses is that they are brought on kind of last minute with not enough time to properly go over all of the case materials and develop their opinion into a report and all the other things that expert witnesses are tasked to do. Besides finances, which is one possible reason. What are the other reasons that occasionally attorneys wait kind of till the 11th hour to bring on expert witnesses? I think it's the 11th hour and 59th minute.
SPEAKER_02:Um there are a lot of factors that go into that. One, I think primarily it's finances, um, because uh you hear invariably that lawyers say, well, we're gonna have to hire experts and that's gonna be expensive. I think it's also um denial. You know, denial is I think one of the three or four most powerful human emotions across the board. And and here we've got denial about this case is gonna go to trial. Oh, yeah, I'm a trial lawyer. Well, whoops, I really don't want to go to trial, or really I'm scared about going to trial, or geez, I'm gonna have to confront the reality that I am going to trial. Um, that's a second reason. A third reason is that I think a lot of lawyers don't understand what they don't understand about a case. Um, and and that's usually in the field of expertise. I mean, the most lawyers, all good lawyers, develop the facts. And uh once they had the facts, they think that's all they need. And then they had the broad picture of the law. And so that you have a good lawyer who knows all the facts and has a broad picture of the law and doesn't appreciate the nuances because they don't practice in the field in the area on a daily basis. And and their lack of appreciation for the sophisticated issues or the sophistication of the issues uh is another reason why they wait. And then um I I think tied in with that it less frequently, but once occasionally the lawyers say, I know as much as an expert, and I can try this case without an expert. And then they discover that the other side is going to have an expert, and they get panicked and they decide to hire an expert. Um, I think all of those reasons go into it. And I very frequently uh lawyers, good lawyers, but uh not experts in the field, but good uh trial lawyers will have hired me and they'll start talking and I'll say, What about this issue? What about that issue? What about the third issue? And and they are like, Oh, hadn't thought of that. Oh, let me go see what we can do about that. And so um, and that of course gets aggravated if it's sh late in time, um, close to trial.
SPEAKER_01:Sure, absolutely, those unknown unknowns. One of the things that you had mentioned is that you live in a location that there's not necessarily lots of great or perhaps qualified expert witnesses in some particular niche. And so sometimes an attorney will hire them just to prevent them from being hired by the other side. From an expert witness perspective, how should they be billing for something like that? In other words, is that something that should come out of a non-refundable retainer? Is that something that attorneys even disclose to the expert witness? Can you tell me a little bit about the calculus of that?
SPEAKER_02:I have it's happened to me two or three times and it was never told to me at the time, obviously, because then I wouldn't talk to the lawyer. Um and uh uh that was one. Two, in terms of finances, it doesn't take much information. It doesn't take a lot of information to be conveyed to the expert to disqualify that expert from being hired by the other side. And and most expert, well, I shouldn't speak for most, I'll speak for myself as an expert. It's you know, it's gratifying from an ego point of view that this lawyer wants to hire me as an expert. And so that's usually it's a one-hour conversation after conflicts have cleared, of course. It's a one-hour conversation or less about the case, and that's enough to disqualify the lawyer and and or the expert, and the expert often will do that as a goodwill kind of um so uh it's happened to me and it's happened to other uh experts where they've been disqualified and they haven't gotten paid for it. So the finances that that's um which is why I had because um adopted a rigid discipline of clearing all conflicts, and that includes the lawyers on the other side, because I once was hired by a very prominent law firm to be an expert, and in the course of that representation, a lawyer from a different law firm hired me in a different case, in a different geographic area to be an expert in that other case. And lo and behold, the same law firm, a different partner in the same law firm of the original law firm, was the opposing lawyer in the case in which I had just been hired. So I found myself, so of course, the lawyer, the second lawyer that hired me was ecstatic because he he the that law firm could not say I wasn't an expert since he had hired me as an expert. But it was a very awkward situation because that second lawyer was berating the lawyer from his firm that who had hired me originally, and it was all very difficult. So now when I do conflicts, I make sure that I know everybody down to the second degree so that the um the likelihood of being disqualified for that reason is uh remote. And and when I also I have when I make the the lawyer pay me a retainer of a substantial amount, um, they're not so inclined to disqualify me. I mean, to to do that technique of just let's disqualify this expert. So it has not happened to me in the last, I would say, eight or nine years.
SPEAKER_01:Let's talk a little bit. I want to back up to something that you mentioned about inconsistencies. This is something that comes up where especially somebody who has had a long career may have written a lot of articles, they may have written books, they may have given lectures, and so they've said a lot of things uh publicly. And in this day and age, once you've said so anything publicly, there's a record of it somewhere on the internet. So, how should a well-published expert go about cataloging all of that to maintain, to make sure that they're not conflicting uh something that they may have said at one time? And in situations where they do change their mind or opinion or new facts become available, how should they contend with those sorts of things in, say, a Dober hearing or uh just even in cross-examination when they're uh confronted with something that might be contrary that they once said 25 years ago?
SPEAKER_02:Well, you you you must have uh read all the depositions I've ever given over the last 25 years. Uh that's a real problem. Well, it's not a real problem. I take that back. It is often done, especially for someone like me who has written a fair amount, uh, because uh I can think of a story. I was testifying at trial in a very prominent case. It was a multimillion dollar trust, and there were lots of issues uh going on, but I had written um an article about an issue, and I was opining differently, not inconsistently, but differently than what I had written about. And I had two answers for that. One was that when I write articles, I'm I'm expressing personal opinions about issues of law that I think are important and don't necessarily reflect how uh don't affect the way I advocate for a client or or an opinion in a particular fact circumstance. And in that case, I was able to say, and you're misquoting me because you're reading from the second paragraph and you ignored the first paragraph in which I said something, my caveat, as it were. So that I have also had uh, because I've written a couple of several books, I've had people read, um, I remember a case in which I was uh the expert, a standard of care expert for a lawyer accused of uh accused that the allegations were uh professional negligence, malpractice in in estate planning. And the other lawyer was writing uh reading from the books I had written, and I kept saying, that's best practice. Uh what I wrote in my book was or this article is best practice. This is what we should all aspire to. It's not the standard of care, because standard of care is obviously what the community does. Sure. And that the cross-examining lawyer didn't like that. And finally, it I was I was told later that in his closing argument, he said to the judge that Mr. Hartog's book is not best practice, it is the standard of care, which I was uh chuckled to hear because I don't think anyone wants to have the best practice or what we aspire to to be the standard of care. So though they usually that's that's how I deal with it. I I and it is often a couple of times, uh not that long ago, actually, a lawyer asked me to render an opinion about a particular issue in trust administration. And I said, you know, I I really can't because I've spent my whole career writing about uh exactly the opposite. He wanted me to take a position which was direct and contrary to what I've always said in on this particular issue. And he said, I can't do that. I'm not, you're not gonna get me to make an opinion about something that in fact I have expressed repeatedly the opposite side. So that that's how I deal with it, which is why coming back to preparation, it's good to know what the lawyer wants before it's too late.
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely. Let's talk a little bit about setting up communications with expert witnesses, and this is as an attorney, we're uh dealing with confidentiality and we're dealing with privilege. How do you work with your experts so they know how best to communicate with you, you know, keeping discovery in mind? And how do you make sure that the expert knows exactly what you need and when that work product is due?
SPEAKER_02:The telephone is a wonderful instrument. Um and and that's that that's the short answer, is that right, especially in in my jurisdiction of California, where everything in a c expert, a testifying expert's file is discoverable. I tell the expert, and as an expert, I try to keep the writings in my file um deliberate so that I mean I always take notes on the first substantial conversation. So those I'm always interrogated, cross-examined on my notes, and I always can say, well, that's the first telephone conference. I had to gain an understanding of the facts of a case. Of course, I'm you know that that I wrote this, I wrote that. I have an example once in the first case, the the it was involved in a marital dissolution, and the wife had a man's name, and the husband had a woman's name. And so it was, I mean, obviously it was there, they were uh what's the word that could be used by either androgynous. Androgynous, thank you very much. Um, so it wasn't that, but I mean it was and they both started with the same consonant. So and they both were four letters long. It was, it drove everybody in the case I learned, but it drove them crazy because it was so confusing. But in the very first uh um comp uh telephone conference with the lawyer that hired me, I was writing names down and I got the the parties confused. And I said that you know, one party had done something and the other party had done the other thing, which was was 100% wrong. I was 180 degrees off. And I was, and the lawyer said to me, the cross-examining lawyer said to me, Well, you know, your notes say X and Y. And and I said, Well, I got the parties wrong. And this lawyer had the very good grace to say, Well, I've been in this case for two years and I still can't keep them straight. So that was uh, but but that's an example of where my notes were I'm always cross-examined on the notes of my first hearing. So the first telephone conference, I take extensive notes because I'm learning the case. After that, I get very uh as an expert, I'm very careful. Uh, usually my emails are please send me this document or please confirm that meeting. And if I want to talk to, if if there is something substantive to be addressed, either as a lawyer or as the expert, I say, please call me. Let's have, you know, can we schedule a telephone conference? And when there is material that we want to go over in the age of Zoom, uh screen sharing is a wonderful way to accomplish uh the I as an expert, I get to write my opinions and then we put it on screen share, and then the uh the the lawyer can look at them or we can discuss them without any record of what the conversation was. Now that I've said this on this podcast, I'm sure that in the future when I get cross-examined, someone will ask me that question. But uh nevertheless, uh there it is. I um I think it in federal practice, of course, draft reports are not discoverable. So uh it's a lot easier to uh write a draft report, talk about it on the phone, and then prepare the final report that gets filed went to court and served on the other side. In state courts, depending on the state, it in California again, it's different. The whole file is discoverable. So if there are multiple drafts of a report, that will all be uh grisked for the mill. And that's why oral communications are preferred.
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely. Uh let's talk a little bit about preparation. What methods do you as an attorney use? And what methods do you as an expert witness prefer to prepare for depositions and for trials? What works?
SPEAKER_02:A lot of preparation. You know, in the best lawyers are those who are the best prepared. And uh that's the secret to the to good to being a good lawyer is being well prepared. And as an expert, as being a lawyer for an expert, I want to have that expert feel comfortable in their possession, their knowledge of the facts, so that um, and especially the adverse facts, because cross-examine cross-examining lawyers have a uh a tendency to do a couple of things. One is um to to to bring up the adverse facts, the second is to make up facts, um, to to try to trip up the expert to see how well that the expert knows the facts. So I want my expert to know the the salient facts as thoroughly as as the lawyer does. Because then if the cross-examining lawyer gives you a false fact, then you're uh you're equipped, you're ready for it. And I think also um as an expert, that's exactly what I want. Uh the best experiences I've had as an expert have been when the lawyer has worked with me just as if I were the primary percipient witness. Um, because then um my opinions, my command of the facts makes my opinions that much more credible.
SPEAKER_01:Speaking of of depositions, one of the things that I've been asked about are deposition designations. Have you been through this process of des of deposition designations where you mark specific parts of a of a deposition that you're going to use? As evidence, and then that becomes part of the record, that becomes discoverable, and that can go back and forth so that once once the trial happens, uh the specific pieces of the deposition that are going to be used in specific manners are known by both parties to kind of make it more efficient. Is that something that you've come across?
SPEAKER_02:I will designate portions of deposition transcripts to make my case, as it were. So that if if I if I'm the expert, I will my general rule is not to make any markings on a deposition transcript because that becomes discoverable, and then I get quizzed on that. But if there is a a section, a portion of the transcript that in fact demonstrates as factual support for my opinion, I will highlight that area, and then um that'll be uh go into the record, as you say, and that'll be useful for my opinion. One thing I going back to preparation and depositions, I think is really important why that the preparation be thorough is because I've had it often enough happen to me that I've expressed an opinion in deposition, and then I'm testifying at trial, and the cross-examining lawyer seeks to impeach my testimony by what's something I said at deposition. That happened not so long ago in a trial. And the the lawyer who was trying to impeach me had trouble keeping the distance from his case throughout, and and that came back to hurt haunt him in the trial because he said, Here, let's here's for purposes of impeachment. And the objection was it's not impeachment, and the judge said it's not impeachment, so that the lawyer had you know thought he was so caught up in his own case, which of course no lawyer should be, but he was so caught up in his own case that he was unable to keep a distance, and he thought I was making comments that I I could be impeached with that I couldn't be.
SPEAKER_01:Sure. Uh let's let's move on to a venue for a moment. Have you worked in a variety of different venues as an attorney and as an expert witness? In other words, we have different local, state levels, different states, different types of courts. And if so, how do these variations change any aspect about expert witnesses or expert witnessing?
SPEAKER_02:I've been pro hocke VK in a in a couple of states, uh, but that's rare because California I practice in California. And since it's such a large state, so populous with that I don't need to practice law elsewhere for the most part, I have testified as an expert in a variety of jurisdictions. Uh so that I can speak for that experience. And certainly I've been an expert in a case in the Cayman Islands where it was very interesting. I was able to opine on questions of law, which of course an expert is not supposed to be able to do, but the Cayman court wanted an opinion of California law, and I got I got to provide it. I have testified in Hawaii, and the same thing. It was a uh California document, and um they wanted to the court wanted to know what California was said about it, and I I got to be a know-it-all, as my wife says. And uh talk about California law. And then in federal court, uh, you know, doing the reports, it's it's been a similar kind of experience. Whereas in um most I testified in other states where I just could not do that. I was testifying as an expert on the facts of the casey, you know, I was comfortable doing that. And and in California too. So when testifying as an expert on uh a legal expert, uh foreign jurisdictions are much more accommodating and comfortable with having, in this case, a California lawyer opinion on California law than obviously in domestic cases where the where the courts are quite opposite and won't let the California lawyer talk at all about the California law because that's the judge's job. Uh in federal court, it's it again, it it the report is written, and and the reports I have written tend to be a little bit, let's say, more um expansive than they would be uh in a state court for the for similar reasons.
SPEAKER_01:Is there any special preparation that attorneys do or should be doing with expert witnesses when they're for the very first time going into a new venue? Hire a local lawyer.
SPEAKER_02:Uh oh I mean but you mean you're but but if we're assuming the local lawyer hiring a foreign if I were to go to a foreign state and and be an expert on a question there, I I would very much want the lawyer to tell me how how do we do it in I've been to Alaska and I that was very interesting because in Alaska the things that I thought I could do, I was told I couldn't do, and the things I thought I couldn't do, I was told I could do. So I mean that those are the kinds of points that when an expert comes into a foreign jurisdiction for whatever reason, the local lawyer really needs to educate that that expert on this is what is okay and this is what's not okay, and sort of these are your guardrails and try to stick within it.
SPEAKER_01:I'm gonna ask you a very general question. What do attorneys want from expert witnesses? Put another way, how do experts and attorneys get off on the right foot, maintain a solid, productive, and efficient engagement throughout the process?
SPEAKER_02:I think the lawyer needs to understand that the expert will not win the case for the for the lawyer. And I think the expert needs to understand that the lawyer is hiring the expert for a particular purpose, and that the lawyer's that the excuse me, the expert's credibility is one of the two or three most valuable aspects of the expert's testimony. So the the expert needs to keep in mind credibility and a solid basis of the opinion. The lawyer needs to remember that this is only one witness that'll help the case but will not decide it. And that with every uh as with every other witness preparation.
SPEAKER_01:Before we wrap up, do you have any last advice for expert witnesses or attorneys working with experts?
SPEAKER_02:Don't be afraid to disagree.
SPEAKER_01:And I assume that's uh that's a two-way street, both the attorney and the expert.
SPEAKER_02:Yes, I think the expert's opinion gets honed by the lawyer challenging it because that's doing sort of a cross-examination in advance. And the lawyer's case gets sharper with the expert pointing out the flaws or the weaknesses in particular areas.
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely. Sage advice. Mr. Hartog, thank you so much for joining me here today. My pleasure. I enjoyed our conversation, Milo. And thank you as always to our listeners for joining us for another edition of Engaging Experts. Cheers.
SPEAKER_00:Thank you for listening to our podcast, Engaging Experts. Our show notes are available on our website, roundtable group.com.