Law
We customize each of the workshops below after asking about your practice and goals and analyzing your documents. The curriculum is not generic—it’s made up of practical tools your lawyers can apply immediately. The exercises, manual, PowerPoint, and even instructing style are tailored for the type of law and group that will attend.
Effective Legal Writing
This workshop refreshes important elements of legal writing and presents new material not taught in law school. We analyze legal writing at its best and worst and illustrate the principles that are essential for strong, clear documents. What we cover is not remedial and is useful even for strong writers. We deliver the session through either:
a live webinar divided into three, three‐hour modules
an in‐person session over one‐and‐a‐half days
We can also offer any module as a standalone session. The content is practical and immediately applicable. More.
Module One: Write stronger legal documents more quickly
This session looks at common problems that plague legal writing:
documents that are too long, overly complex, and not effective for clients
confusing structure
underdeveloped analysis
hide‐and‐seek messages
a writing and review process that takes too much time
We give legal drafters tools to deliver clear messages without overwriting or wasting readers’ time. We also teach people how to draft more quickly with much less stress. Participants say they were able to cut as much as 50% from their drafting time after the training. If you plan to book only one module, we recommend this one.
What Module One covers:
Adapting to the needs of different audiences and purposes
Structuring documents for readability
Avoiding common problem patterns in legal writing
Building strong analysis
A new process for writing
Drafting faster (and making the reviewers’ job faster too)
Measuring the success of a document
Creating usable documents
Module Two: Create clear text
This module teaches the clear, efficient style that’s effective in a legal context (and which many writers struggle to develop). This is practical guidance about conciseness, clear sentence structure, effective word choice, and avoiding common problems that make writing confusing. These are not obscure principles of English—they’re practical tips that create an impressive improvement in clarity.
What Module Two covers:
How style choices determine readability
Communicating legal content to non-legal readers without sacrificing precision
Writing concisely on three levels
Using verbs effectively, including active voice
Structuring sentences for precision and power
Perfecting tone in a document
Module Three: Review and edit effectively (for yourself and other writers)
Many legal writers exert superhuman effort to get a document “right.” Despite this, the editing and review process is long and often happens in after-hours time, with a high time and frustration cost. This session gives writers and editors tools to work faster, more systematically, and more effectively. It also suggests a model for dividing tasks between writers and reviewers to make collaboration smoother.
What Module Three covers:
A repeatable formula for editing more quickly and with less stress (for both writers and reviewers)
All the best editing tips and checklists
Effective proofreading
Using peer review to give and receive constructive feedback, why it matters, and a chance to see it work
Formatting documents to be clear and appealing
A quick refresher of key grammar and punctuation rules
General notes on all the modules
All modules include:
customized content that’s based on your input and documents
team teaching with two instructors to keep the pace lively
interactive rather than passive learning
exercises, before-and-after examples, rich visual content, conversation, and individual and small-group work
a printed manual and desk reminder card
Workshops for:
From participants:
Presentation was succinct and organized. The content was relevant to our own practice. The materials were well put together.
Very practical and tailored to our group. The one-on-one [feedback] is excellent.
I would definitely recommend [this] for other groups within our organization and externally.
Very useful overall—frankly, far better than expected. Perhaps the best aspect was the practical, thoughtful and tailored approach.
I was slightly skeptical going in but came away convinced it was worth 1.5 days of my time.
The practice [redrafting] was particularly helpful. I was also impressed by the amount of content.
Effective Legal Writing Refresher
This half-day workshop follows up with writers who have been through Effective Legal Writing. It reinforces, deepens, and applies concepts to real documents. More.
Organizations use this half-day practical workshop to follow up and deepen the content in the Effective Legal Writing workshop. This is a working session in which attendees redraft key internal documents to refresh and apply skills learned in our core workshop. The workshop is structured to cover the common writing and editing problems writers run across in their work. The workshop will:
reinforce and apply skills you learned in the core workshop
fill in gaps from the first workshop
resolve questions that came up after the core workshop
From participants:
Useful and informative. Definitely recommend the course.
Great to look back and see where I improved and where I still need improvement.
I thought I didn’t need this course. I am happy to admit I was wrong.
Document-specific workshops
We also deliver workshops on specific types of legal writing, including advocacy, decision writing, and legal opinions. We customize curriculum based on your documents and goals. Workshop length varies depending on your needs. More.
These workshops include:
written advocacy
legal opinions
briefing notes for legal decision makers
From participants:
Excellent review of problems and deficiencies in written work. Brought out many concepts that I had not previously thought about.
This was a useful presentation for any litigator – including those with many years of experience.
It [the workshop] exceeded my expectations. Would recommend to others.
This was a useful presentation for any litigator – including those with many years of experience.
Before-and-after writing samples were useful illustrations.
I appreciated the examples drawn from our area of expertise. I plan to use many of the tips and methods immediately.
I found it very helpful. I now look forward to my next writing project.
This was a useful presentation for any litigator – including those with many years of experience.
Very helpful content, especially on the process of writing.