Women’s History Month: A Conversation with the Next Generation of Trial Lawyers

In recognition of Women’s History Month, this episode of Keep It Legal features a conversation with four associate attorneys from Burns Charest — Hannah Crowe, Natalie Earles, Claire Bosarge Curwick and Laura Soundy Seggerman.

Together, they discuss their paths into litigation, the realities of practicing law early in their careers, and the responsibility of representing clients in complex, high-stakes cases. The conversation also explores what it means to advocate for women in the courtroom, from preparing witnesses to presenting deeply personal stories to a jury.

The group reflects on mentorship, firm culture and the evolving role of women in the legal profession, along with the challenges and opportunities that come with building a career in trial law.

https://burnscharest.com/

Transcript

0:00

Sexism today in the legal field is much less overt. So you're not going to have someone saying, "Oh, you're a woman, you shouldn't be doing this." But you're going to be looking around and seeing not other women doing it. When you're in a deposition and you're facing a big law partner, I mean, the perceived power dynamic that is there is a lot different and that's just another kind of layer that we have to deal with. We're always going to be underestimated, but I think we all do a good job of using that to our advantage. It is an advantage to be different because successful advocacy takes many different forms and having compassion, leading with empathy, those are advantages. Thanks for tuning into Keep It Legal, the show where we break down concepts, litigation, and current events with our legal experts. I'm your host, Mark Anick. Today's episode is a special conversation in honor of Women's History Month. Joining us today are four associate attorneys from Natalie Earls, Claire Kerwick, and Laura Segerman. Ladies, thank you very much for taking time out of your day for this. And Natalie and Claire, thank you for flying in from the firm's offices in New Orleans, because I know it takes a little extra effort, so I appreciate it. Thanks for having us. Yeah. So I want to start out with a compliment that I don't know. I'm hoping that you heard this yourselves already, but we're here for a couple of reasons. I just mentioned Women's History Month. But also when we were talking to Warren Burns and Daniel Chires, the founders of the firm, and we were trying to explore an angle, they said,"You should talk to some of the young women at this firm because the young women lawyers that we have are outstanding." And I just wanted to pass that along. I think sometimes that's a nice thing to hear. Surprise, no surprise. I'm assuming you've heard those things around here? No surprise. None. So just a little exercise before we get into what we do and how much we love the law and all of that. I want to ask you to talk about one of two things, your first job or your worst job. And I want you to tell me how it impacts what you do today. Okay? I'll go first just to get us started so you can all think about, "Oh my God, what am I going to say when he comes to me? " All right. So my first job was I was a newspaper boy for the Boston Globe and running a newspaper route, it teaches you things about money and accounting and collecting because you have to go to your clients and collect from them. It also taught you about being reliable because you had to get up every morning

at 5: 2:41

30 in the morning and go deliver newspapers. And it taught you about client service, right? If your client, if my people didn't get my people. If the people on the newspaper route didn't get their newspaper, they weren't too happy. So who wants to go first? What's a first job story or a worst job story and how does it influence you today? I can go first. My first job, I worked in a toy store over the holidays. I was like a holiday rush worker wrapping packages, wrapping presents for kids. So it was very hectic. It was a lot of fun. I say it was like my best job just because it was a lot of fun. You had to be very organized and move quickly and that's what I try to do today. I can go next. My first job and probably my worst job was a lifeguard. I would say worst job because I quickly learned I am not the strongest at treading water, which is very important and just like generally not like a physically strong person, which is who you want rescuing you. Don't they make you pass a test for. That? You do, you do. And I'm not going to say how bamboozled the trainer, but anyways, neither you nor there Laura. But it did teach me a lot about responsibility and especially whenever you're responsible for other people's lives, men, women, children in a very popular, crowded pool. So teach you to be attentive and take responsibility even if you doubt yourselves. And luckily I never had to rescue anyone. Oh, that was my next question. No. No. It's. Probably for the best. Okay. I guess my first real job, aside from like the babysitting, the first thing I probably had to pay taxes on was I was a server and a hostess at a restaurant in college. And what I learned from that, honestly, I think it just taught me a lot of work ethic. I think it's good for anyone to have done a service job at some point in their life. And then also how to deal with people and how to make mistakes and move on. I have definitely dropped a whole tray of drinks on a table before. And I will tell y'all a little bit about my first job, which I also think was probably my best job. And it may be one of the reasons why I'm here today because I was a babysitter. I babysat three little kids and their grandmother ended up being a federal judge, Judge Jay and Trish Malazo at the Eastern District of Louisiana. And that's who I ended up clerking for. And she honestly shaped the type of law I wanted to practice and kind of is the reason I'm here today. So babysitting. I don't think I paid taxes on it though. Well, we won't go after the judge for that. So babysitting-. Recording. Yeah. So babysitting actually, had you thought about being a lawyer prior to that? I did. Yeah, I did because my dad is another big reason why I'm a lawyer. He is a trial lawyer, farmer turned trial lawyer. Yeah, we're from a small town in Louisiana and he's such a good storyteller. So I think that I always saw him telling stories and I kind of just wanted to be that way too. And then I had this one experience where we went to visit one of his clients in the hospital and I just remember feeling like so struck by the thought of my dad fighting for other people. And so I thought that was cool. And so since I was little, I wanted to be a lawyer. Yeah. Okay. Was your dad a personal injury lawyer? Yes. Yeah. And he made the transition from farming to law. Yeah. Wow, there's a story there. I. Think it's that bad on the farm. What about the rest of you? What brought you to the law? Well, very similar to Natalie, we've bonded over this. My dad is also a plaintiff's attorney, also a trial attorney. So saw him doing this work from a young age. And when you're like a little kid, whatever your parents do, you're like,"This is what you do as your job." And so I just always assumed that's what I would do and that's what I'm doing. Hannah, did you know that there was law outside of litigation, outside of what our dads did? Because I think I didn't even know about M&A or transactional stuff. I was just like, "Oh, this is it." Not at all. Yeah. Not. At all. And did either of you, you mentioned MNA, transactional, et cetera. Did either of you ever think of any other discipline other than what you do now? No, I pretty much wanted ... I mean, I wanted to go to law school to be a plaintiff's attorney. That's. What I did. All right. Laura, what about you? Yeah. Well, on the theme of what parents do, both my parents are in medicine, so I was convinced I was going to go into that field in some capacity, but learned pretty quickly that I cannot handle blood or gore. So that kind of edged me out of that potential profession. But I think the first thing that got me thinking about going into law was actually my high school anatomy and physiology teacher, he suggested I look into it because I would argue with him on test questions and how they were graded and everything. So he told me I should look down that road and here I am. Did you ever prevail with your teacher? Oh. All the time. Obviously. Obviously. Claire, what about you? In terms of what made me choose to go to law school, like Laura was pursuing pre-med and made it to my junior year of college, took a medical mission trip and quickly learned that I cannot ... The sight of blood will bring me to my knees. So quickly decided I needed to pivot and I was getting my mechanical engineering degree and was going to do prosthetics, but one of my engineering professors suggested I look into patent law, and so I did and went to Tulane, ended up pursuing that. I do have my patent law license, but I do not practice patent law. Regardless, I was trying to think what drove me to pursue plaintiff's side work. And it's hard to think of one thing in particular, but I will say one thing that keeps me here and so passionate about it and probably all of us is just the constant opportunities to make a real difference in someone's life or keep a business's doors open. That is not something that any type of practice or any type of attorney can really say. And I feel like we're so fortunate to be in this position and fight for people who can't fight for themselves. I'm sure we'll touch on that a lot more. Yeah. To kind of add on that, this was after I'd actually gone to law school, so I guess didn't influence going into the profession, but I remember hearing on the first day of law school orientation, someone speaking and saying as a lawyer, you're with someone on ... As an attorney, you are with your client when they are going through the worst of the worst. And that probably, that can apply to both sides of litigation, but just getting to walk with someone and be not only their advocate, but just someone who walks through the worst time of someone's life. I think that's a really cool ... I mean, it's awful that they have to go through that, but it's an honor to be someone that can be in that position to be by someone's side. When I hear you say that, I think, okay, that means empathy, right? When we talk about lawyers or plaintiff lawyers, do you think people default to,"Well, they must have empathy"? Or are you asking me specifically? I'm. Asking you for your opinion. I mean, because clearly you do. If you're looking at somebody on the worst day of their life and you want to walk them through, as you just said, that takes a certain amount of that, right? Yeah. I mean, that's what I hope. I hope that's what people would see in plaintiff's attorneys. I do think that, and I know a couple of us here have talked about this. I do feel like in law school there is a big push to kind of go defense side just because that's what a lot of larger law firms are doing, but I think it's a less explored avenue of practice and I think it's something that is really, really special and impactful. So these are interesting stories. Each of them, when they happen, I'm going to assume if your dads were lawyers, they didn't try to talk you out of that, correct or incorrect? Incorrect. Incorrect. Oh, really? Oh, do tell. Oh, okay. Yeah. So you went to mom and dad and you said, "I'm thinking about this." And tell me that story. Yeah. I went to dad and said,"I'm thinking about going to law school." And he said, "Don't do it." And I said, "Well, you did it. " And he said, "Well, do as I say, not as I do." That's just so typical of him to say. I think part of me maybe took that response as him not knowing if I could do it or if I was built for it. And then I was like, "Okay, let's see if I can do it. " But looking back, I think it was more because it's just hard. It's a hard profession and it can be really difficult. Hannah? Yeah. Similarly, I think my dad ... I mean, one of the things I admire most about him is just how seriously he takes his obligation to his clients. He's still a practicing lawyer and how much he brings home with him and how emotionally invested he gets. And I think he knew I would be the same way and I am. And I think it's what makes me succeed in this profession, but it's also, it's hard on you. And so I don't know that he necessarily wanted me to go through that, but now, I mean, we love being lawyers together, not practicing together, but talking about it all the time and even working on cases together and it's great. But yeah, I don't know that any dad attorney is wanting that for their little girl maybe, but they get it anyways. Did anyone ever try to talk any of you women out of this profession due to gender? Were there any hints along the way or anything. Like that? I think it was probably the opposite. Really? More of like encouraging. My mom, she was a physical therapist. She's retired now, but she had always been interested in the legal field and still is to this day. She loves coming up with case ideas actually, but she was a huge inspiration and really encouraged me to at least give it a try. On a personal level, I mean, everyone's always been super encouraging to me, so nothing with like family or friends, but I feel like I had heard, and I can't give any specific examples, but along the way, people saying,"Oh, to be successful in law, you have to choose between being a committed mother or going on a partner track or something in law," that those two aren't compatible. So I feel like that is something I've heard before. Like I said, not personally, but I think that is something that a lot of women that are thinking about entering the legal field, an idea that kind of gets put in their head a little bit. I completely agree with that. And I think, and I really want to hear about Natalie's experiences because she is the mother of the table, literally and figuratively. Wow. That's a title. Go ahead. I think, and hopefully we'll talk about this more, but I think sexism today in the legal field is much less overt. So you're not going to have someone saying, "Oh, you're a woman, you shouldn't be doing this." But you're going to be looking around and seeing not other women doing it, or you're going to have people behave in a certain way towards you, not overtly saying, "Oh, you're a woman, you don't know what you're talking about." But they might think you don't know what you're talking about because you're a woman. So it's just a little bit different. And I think the family versus work thing is something that is huge. And I think it's a problem and something that we all are struggling with in our own ways. Yeah, I totally agree. Hannah teased that you're a mom. So tell us about your being a mom. You have how many kids? I have one, one daughter. And she is how old? She's one and a half. God bless her. Go ahead. So I had been practicing law here at Burnstress for about a year when I found out I was expecting. And at first I was like, "Oh, here we go. ". Oh my. Oh my. Because like we heard just now from Laura and Hannah, all I had ever heard before was, "Well, do you want a family or do you want to practice law?" Critical implication being you have to choose, you can't have both. And that was scary. That was scary personally because having a baby is scary for obvious reasons, but also professionally because this was something I really cared about. I think ultimately I at that point didn't have a choice, right? When he's coming, she's on the way. So I decided that I thought I could make it all work and I was going to at least try. I definitely wasn't going to back out without trying. So is it easy? No, but I think it's really gratifying because it showed me that I am much stronger than I think I am in a given moment. So as a veteran mom now of 18 months, what would you tell other women in the profession? Is it doable? Is it something you would recommend? It's absolutely doable and I would recommend it. Like I said, it's hard. It is hard. It's demanding and it's not just physically demanding. It's also emotionally draining because you have mom guilt, your priorities shift a little bit when you have a baby. Fortunately, mine shifted for the better in a way that really kind of locked me in on what matters at work. And I feel like I'm a better lawyer because of Winnie. So I think it's absolutely doable and despite hearing our whole lives that it's not, people should do it anyway if that's what they want. What do you think of the fact that that's still a thing? So I have two little girls, they're in their 20s now, but they will always be that, right? No one ever said to me,"Oh Mark, you can't do news or be a ... I was a reporter then, right?" And have a family, right? But we say that to women and we're still saying that to women a quarter of a century into this newest century. What do you all think about that? It makes us want to prove them wrong. I mean, Natalie has been an amazing role model for all of us. Just like Amanda Cleavorn in New Orleans, she had her baby girl around the same time, her same year as Natalie. And I think that they have both really shown me at least that building a family and building a career, it doesn't have to be mutually exclusive. You can totally do both and excel in both. Hannah, you mentioned something about the notion of subtle bias, and I wanted to probe on that if I may. I used to work in news. I worked in North Carolina and then I was working in New England. Sitting across the desk from me was a gentleman who was a reporter who was African American and I thought racial prejudice was bad in the South and he looked at me and he said,"Oh, it's just as bad up here. Only it's hidden. They won't say it to my face." And that was kind of an eye-opening moment for me. When you talk about the notion of subtle bias against women, can you tell us, are there examples where you see that and you feel it? Yes, unfortunately. I mean, I'm confident we've all experienced it. I think it can manifest in a lot of different ways. I think, like I said, today, you're not going to have someone saying, "Oh, a woman shouldn't be in the law," or, "Oh, you're not good at this because you're a woman." But I think the expectations on you are a little bit different. I think at least from what I've seen, for male attorneys, it's ... Well, one, as plaintiff's attorneys, we need to be aggressive, right? That's how we get good results for our clients. That looks one way for men, and it has to look differently for women to appeal to a jury, to appeal to your colleagues, to appeal to everybody. So I think that's something that we all have to sort of struggle to find our own style, to be aggressive, but still be palatable, which is not something that men really ever have to think about. And then I think we also ... There's just a different expectation. It's not enough as a woman that you're a really excellent attorney. You also need to make sure everyone around you is very comfortable and be everybody's friend and that sort of thing. And I think, again, no one would ever say, "Oh, this is an expectation we only have for women," but it is felt, I think, by everyone, certainly by me. Alyssa, I work with a lawyer who's a woman, well known in town, and she very famously has said, "I can't get ticked off. I need to get the jury mad first, and then I can get mad." If I get mad first as a woman- I think I know. Are you talking about Charlotte? Charla Aldis, right? Yes. She's amazing. Yeah. Yeah. And Charla has said that more than once, and I've seen her in court and I've seen her do it, right? Do you think that standard applies across the board? I totally do. I mean, the amount of sexism that I have put up with from male attorneys on the other side saying things to me ... I remember one time I was defending my expert in a deposition and I was trying to call a break. We'd been going on the record for over an hour and I was like,"We need a break." And he's like,"No, we're not going to take a break. We'll take a break when I say we're going to take a break." And I was like,"Okay, well, we're going to take a break now." And he's like, "Oh, you don't even know how depositions work, blah, blah, blah, getting all angry." And I'm like, "Okay, we're just going to take a break now. We're going to take a break now." And then sure enough, we took a break and the expert I was producing, he was like,"You just stayed so calm." And I was like, "Yeah, I have to, because even though he's the one being crazy, if I respond at all, I'm the lunatic.". And do you think, by the way, I love the head waggle that you do while you're doing. It. Do you think that lawyer would do the same thing to you if you were a guy? I know he would not do the same thing to me as a guy. So what do you do with that? I think you just do your best. I mean, you adjust and you get mad, but you try to have righteous anger and be better at your profession because of it. What about the rest of you? Anybody else have moments such as that? Well, one thing I'll add on is one thing that's been really a cool opportunity at our firm specifically is that we're all pretty relatively early on in our career and we've had excellent opportunities in that to be doing specific things as young attorneys. So I mean, Hannah just talked about defending an expert in deposition across just the variety of experience that the women at this table have done is pretty incredible for our stage in our career. And so I think it adds another layer when we're women, but then we're also young. And I think that's another just kind of hurdle to kind of get over. And I don't think people, when you're in a deposition and you're facing a big law partner, I mean, the perceived power dynamic that is there is a lot different and that's just another kind of layer that we have to deal with. We're always going to be underestimated, but I think we all do a good job of using that to our advantage because I do think that it is an advantage to be underestimated. They're not going to prepare the same way. And like I said earlier, it just gives you a chance to disprove them and show them what you're made of. But I do feel like we're lucky to have the opportunities and be given the responsibilities at such an early point in our career here at Bridge Rest. And I feel like I would have handled it just like Hannah did, and I think that that is the best way to handle it. You can't give in and standing your ground, showing them that not only you're not a pushover, but like every woman that gives into that kind of conduct is just going to perpetuate the problem. So I'm proud of you for doing that. But just once, it'd be nice to go across the table, wouldn't it? Ride hook. That's what they. Want. Right. That would be success for them. I will say this particular attorney got fired by his client and I went on to win a $10 million plaintiff's verdict. Insert footnote here. All is well that's well. Yeah, absolutely. Alyssa and I did a podcast a couple of years ago with a woman who said that a trial lawyer, criminal defense attorney, who said that she's been in court before and has been mistaken for the court reporter, a legal secretary, a legal assistant. Has any of that ever happened? Not to me personally, but I've heard stories from friends that it's happened to them. I think society tends to view a successful trial lawyer and successful advocacy as like a dude, really. And as women, it's sometimes hard not to absorb that. And we have to just remind ourselves that, like Claire said, it is an advantage to be different because successful advocacy takes many different forms and having compassion, leading with empathy, those are advantages that not everybody has. Yeah, totally agree. I feel like as women, we can empathize and it's not only invaluable to a case, but especially to a trial, having that level of empathy, the jury sees it, the client sees it, and it really just results in better outcomes when you can empathize with your client, they feel comfortable, they feel like their stories being heard that they're seen. Like I said, I think it gives us an advantage. Let me flip it around. Are there lessons that male trial attorneys could You've mentioned empathy a couple of times. You're smiling, Natalie. Are there things that they could learn watching women in court in trial? I have a little bit of a different answer to your question, not to spin it. And I'm curious to hear y'all's thoughts. I know Hannah and I've talked about experiences before, but I feel like women attorneys, as they get older, sometimes try to lean more into that. Instead of embracing what advantages a woman can bring as an attorney, they try to turn more into acting like the male attorneys. And I know that at least Hannah and I have experienced almost more harshness sometimes from older female attorneys, which is kind of a weird ... You wouldn't expect that, but I think maybe it's because they kind of had to go through the ringer, but that is kind of something that I know that Hannah and I have at least talked about, but instead of trying to be more like this persona of the male attorney, that's kind of probably more of the status quo just because that was more common the past how many decades is really kind of leading into the angle of what a female attorney is like and kind of building and playing into that. Yeah. I wonder if any of that has to do with the era that they were ... When they were developing as an attorney just because I hope, and I do think that we're progressing and things are getting better and you don't have to put on this facade and take on almost like this male dominant role to be successful in the law anymore as a woman. So I do wonder if part of that is due to like their developmental years as an attorney. And I'll be clear too, that's not the rule. No, I've totally seen that. We've had so many also older female attorneys that have been fantastic, but that is kind of something interesting that I've also seen on the other side is sometimes you get that from older female attorneys, I would think that would be kind of shocking if I were Oh yeah. I remember the first time for me, I was very shocked. I was like, oh, that felt like I came out of nowhere, but-. Now that you bring it up, yeah, it's a thing. Hannah, when we were talking about this before the podcast, you said that women often do the pain and suffering, the emotional stuff in a trial, that it's helpful to have a female attorney do that. Why is that? Well. Actually, I want to push back on that a little bit. So I have seen women often be put into that role and I think they're great at that, but the most successful trials that I have seen women are not necessarily kept to that box. I tried a case this past fall and we got a plaintiff's verdict. The other side, there was a male trial attorney and a female trial attorney on both sides, plaintiff and defense. On the other side, the defense, they split their witnesses, all the liability witnesses the male attorney took and all the damages, like the soft damages witnesses the female attorney took. I tried the case, I was on the other side with Darren and we did not split it that way. We pretty much alternated doing the witnesses the way that we wanted. And I think we were so much more effective because it allowed me and Darren to be involved in all aspects of the case versus on the other side, it's like, okay, you have this guy getting up, he's always going to talk about liability and then okay, here comes the woman to try to tug at your heartstrings. So I think people can overplay that dynamic a little bit. I think obviously women, we do have a lot of empathy, but male attorneys do too. And so I think everyone can contribute and it doesn't need to be stratified like that. Absolutely. I like that a lot, Hannah. And I'm curious if you were able to gauge how that impacted the jury in that trial. The two different strategies were you able to tell. From my perception, I think they could just tell what type of witness they were going to get based on which attorney was standing up to take the testimony. And that was not the case for the way that Darren and I did it. And I think that it kept them more engaged for us. And yeah, I think it was a strength for us for sure. And we won. You keep following up your comments with and we won. And. We won. It's kind of a good squelch for anything that happened. I want to talk about some stats. I've got something from the American Bar Association from 2024. And it talks about all the progress women have made in law. So 2016, women became a majority of law school students. That's 10 years ago. 2020, women became a majority of general lawyers in the federal government. 23 women became a majority of law firm associates. In 24 or 25, women will likely become a majority of full-time law school faculty members. Do you feel that kind of progress in your own worlds, in your own careers? I think our particular field is a little bit unique being trial lawyers and being on the plaintiff's side. It's much more male dominated. So at least speaking for myself, I mean, the people I work with are men for the most part and the people I see doing the tasks that I'm doing are men. I think an interesting stat that of course is not on that list is female partners. Equity partners. Or just partners. In general. And so I do think we still see a huge gap there and ultimately that is what is needed to really feel like we're making true progress. And roughly the stats I read say women partners are about a third, 35%, somewhere in there, but equity partners are 20%, below 20%. I would think it would be even lower, to. Be honest. That sounds high to me. Okay. Do you see that changing? I think it should change for sure. Okay. Negative stats or not quite so negative stats. Male and female lawyers see things differently. Go figure. Men thought their law firms treated women fairly, but women disagreed. Vast majority of men, 88% said gender diversity is widely acknowledged as a firm priority. Barely half of women, 54% agreed. Three out of four men, 74% said their law firms successfully retained experienced women, less than half of women agreed. Any thoughts on that? Retention of women in the ... Somebody mentioned before, women having children and having to make that choice of leaving, staying in the profession. I think that could certainly be a contributing factor one thing that's really important if you do choose to have a family and practice law is choosing a good firm that's going to support that and actually give you space and understand, be understanding. I receive that here, thankfully, but I know not everyone does. So stats aren't shocking, but I think that overall we're headed in a good direction. Can you give me an example of understanding and how that worked well? Understanding as in? Well, you said you need to be at a firm where people are going to be understanding. Practically speaking, what does that equate to? For example, before I took maternity leave, my boss in New Orleans, Corey Nelson, pulled me aside and he said,"I don't want you touching the phone. Don't answer the phone. Delete the Outlook app." And that struck me because he was frank, but I felt so supported and I felt so okay actually turning off the phone. I knew I needed to and would want to do. That's kind of nice. Yeah. Oh yeah. It was wonderful. Yeah, absolutely. All right. And it's funny because I bet before Corey made that comment and that assurance, you might've been a little bit worried because a couple months prior and we were talking about this on the way here, Amanda Cleavern in the New Orleans office who was a partner, she had her baby girl. And one of my favorite stories, she was in her third trimester and we had a deadline on a Friday afternoon deadline to serve discovery and she served it that afternoon. I didn't really think much of it until I find out on the following Monday that she was actually in labor on Friday and served discovery from her hospital bed. And not that that is the expectation at all, but it did show me just the superpowers of women and you can do both. You can have your career. She's a female partner and bring life into this world. It almost brought back El Woods. What does the guy say? "Oh, you went to Harvard Law?" And she's like, "What? It's hard except it's Amanda. What? It's hard to be a girl boss attorney and bring a life into this world." So it was inspiring, but it's also good to hear that that is not the expectation and take your time and truly unplug and have those really formative moments. But Claire, a couple of times you've used the term super women. Do we expect all of you to be superwomen and do we expect the same of the guys? I mean, I think that-. I'm seeing an answer in somebody's eyes across the table. That is not. The expectation. I think we just naturally are. And I don't feel like ... I kind of hate the word expectations. And no, I wouldn't say that ... And we should not be just expected to be super women. So no. Laura, I feel like you're ready to chime in. Oh no, I don't really have an answer. I just thought that was a good point. Your question in itself was a good point. I had a good question. Can we write that down? Can we talk about cases that impact women? Some of you, if not all of you, work on talc litigation. Can you talk about what that is and how that impacts women who are victims in those cases? I feel like Natalie's your go- to girl for that. Sure. Yeah. I'm happy to talk about talc. It is an honor to work on talc because it is one of the only mass litigations in the country that is ... It's all women in this MDL. There are about 67,000 women that have pending cases in the MDL right now. They all suffer from ovarian cancer associated with Johnson & Johnson's talcum powder products like baby powder and shower to shower that so many of us used our entire lives and saw our moms and everyone using ... It's been a decade since that MDL has begun. There has yet to be a trial and sadly, many women are passing away. We're losing them during this time while they wait for their day in court. So I think all of these factors kind of combined is what makes working on the talc MDL really, really special and personal, honestly, to an extent. Is it different being a woman who's approaching that litigation than it might be if it were a guy? Oh, perhaps. Yeah. I suppose just the way we approach writing maybe a background section in a brief could be different because we're just seeing the litigation through a different lens, if that's the case. I really liked the point Hannah made earlier that we're kind of saying men and women and empathy and not. And that's so not the case because I know so many men that have the same qualities and capabilities. But I do think, yeah, to a certain degree, this is something that only women can relate to ovarian cancer. So yeah, we're going to view it a different way. Men are not at risk for ovarian cancer. In other words. Thank you for that. Brilliant conclusion. Thank you. It's why I'm here now. It's why I'm here. What advice would any of you, all of you give for young women who are thinking about the law as a career? I would say to do it. I mean, I would go into it with all the confidence that they should have. I would not wait to see a woman in front of you necessarily doing it because you might not see that. You don't need to have the path all the way paid for you. I mean, I think sitting here at this table, we're all hoping to pave the path for women, but just because you don't see another woman doing something doesn't mean you can't be the first. So definitely don't let the absence of women discourage you from pursuing what you're passionate about. And also, I will just say men make fabulous mentors too. I think we've been talking a little bit about men, women, and acting like there's this divide, but I mean, my mentors at this firm are all men. The attorneys that I have learned my skills from and my style from are various men, and I'm very grateful to them. So I don't think ... Of course, we are female attorneys, but whenever people try to say lady lawyers, I'm like, no, we're just lawyers. We are all just attorneys and we can all share the same skills and styles. Are there moments where people look at you and they understand that you're a lawyer, not a lady lawyer? Or is the distinction always there? I think there have been times, I think in trial when ... I mean, we joke when you're in your flow state with a witness and I mean, you're doing it. You are the lawyer commanding that courtroom. And I don't think there's any question that you're the lawyer, this is your witness, and the jury's paying attention to you. So I think yes, but I think it's a distinction that we have to all try to fight against pretty much all the time. You mentioned the jury. How did juries react to you? Any difference? Why do you laugh? I laugh because Laura and I just tried a case together and before the trial, we did a focus group with a huge group of mock jurors and we got feedback afterwards, much of which was about our pleasing appearance and dress, which was expected, I suppose. And. The fact that we look like each other. And the fact that we look like each other. But one of the mock jurors said to me in my feedback that I appeared numb and dead to the issues, which was- Ouch. Ouch. I was laughing. I was glad to get that feedback because I actually got the feedback before I tried two different cases. So I was like, let me not appear numb and dead to the issues. But I also thought it was so funny because part of why as a woman I might appear numb and dead to the issues is because we have to put up this barrier to not appear overly emotional. So it is just funny as a woman, you kind of have to act one way to opposing counsel and another way to the jury because at the end of the day, they want to see what they think a woman should be. And it's a little bit different than ... I don't know. It's all fun. It's all learning. It's a bit of a catch 22, right? It is. We want you this way, this way, and that way. Hannah and I both had the opportunity at that trial to take the testimony of two different women who had worked either in the women's health space or neonatal care. I was glad that I got to sit there as a woman and talk to this woman about women's health and specifically babies. And I just think that we were able to just kind of build this connection. It's almost unspoken a little bit. And I'm not saying a man couldn't do that. Like we said, I think we made a really good point here that we shouldn't make distinctions between who can be empathetic and not, but it did really ... I think that it really did resonate with the jury to just kind of set up that whole testimony in a way where you could just be real with this woman and talk to her and they could talk about some really difficult stuff. I think both your witness in mind both had some emotional things to talk about with the experience that they'd had with babies who were suffering from NAS or neonatal abstinence syndrome and other kind of complications that go with that. But I think that was a unique space, especially for a woman attorney to fit in. Is this the Florida trial opioids? This is the Florida. Trial. Yeah. Okay. And just teeing off of that, another set of witnesses that Laura and I took, I took the testimony of a female ex DEA agent, and she took the testimony of a female epidemiologist, and both of those women were so inspiring to us as witnesses because they were very unique in their fields. And I mean, Ruth Carter, who's this badass drug busting DEA woman, I can only imagine the amount of sexism she's faced trying to go through her career and same with Dr. Krawcheck, your witness. And so it was very cool to be like, "Okay, we're women here together and we're all doing our jobs at this elite level and we're here to support each other." And it was very cool to see. Anybody else on young women and advice you would give them about the law? I forgot that was the question. I think do it, do it. I would say maybe plaintiff's work and kind of the high stakes litigation that we do isn't for everyone, but I would never want a woman to feel like that wasn't for them because I think Hannah mentioned it earlier, the specific type of work that we do can sometimes be characterized as like a boys club, especially at the leadership level, but I do think that we are slowly but surely changing the narrative and at least like here at BC, this really is a place where you can grow in your career as a woman. You will be given meaningful work very early on and have awesome opportunities to show what you're made of. And so I can't really speak for other firms in our space, but at least here, I think if you're a woman and you're considering plaintiff's work, this would be like a great place to really grow as an attorney and to know that you won't be sidelined and be given doc review. And you won't have an associate class of 500. You'll have hands-on mentoring, whether it's from a man or a woman, but your gender will not play a role in the work that you're given or opportunities. It occurs to me as you all are speaking that there's a point here we should talk about in the age of the vanishing jury trial, you all are trial lawyers and you are in court trying cases, right? That's not something that lawyers run into, not an opportunity that they have at every firm as you point out at your age. Yes? No? Yeah. Yes. Yes. I mean, I can speak to ... So in the past six months, I've tried two cases, two jury trials. Laura tried the second one with me. I mean, in the past, I spent like five months of, no exaggeration, five which was exhausting, but wonderful. And honestly, I think more time in trial than most lawyers have in their whole career. So yeah, I mean, that's what I wanted to do and I can say I'm doing it. And I'll say too, just because like you said, the age of trial, trial is getting more and more rare, certainly than it was even a decade or two ago, but there's so much substantive work that leads up to trial as well in terms of, even in things as mundane and boring as discovery, you have motions to compel and those are opportunities to be in court and to really kind of get those portions of practice that you more think about when you're in law school and thinking of one day being an attorney. So it comes also in depositions and there's a lot of other avenues than the trial itself, I think, to get really substantive experience. Thank you all four of you again for joining us today. Again, that was Hannah Crow, Natalie Earls, Claire Kerwick and Laura Segerman from Burns Charrest. For more information about the firm, you can visit burnstress.com, B-U-R-N-S-C-H-A-R-E-S-T.com. Make sure to like us on Facebook, subscribe to us on YouTube, and tune in next time to keep it legal. I'm your host, Mark Anick. We'll see you then.