Here are my most recent articles:
- Two New Justices. Two New FAA Opinions. Let the Kavanaugh v. Gorsuch Writing Face-Off Begin!
- Five Ways to Write Like Justice Kagan
- Five Ways to Write Like Warren Buffett
- A BigLaw Paragraph Meets BriefCatch: A Case Study
- A BriefCatch Case Study: A BigLaw Client Alert
Training
- 14 Great Books
- Chicago’s Best Tips on Great Summer Programs
- Former Summers Speak
- “Must Haves” in Associate Training
- Training Tips from an Am Law Superstar
Recruiting
Providing Feedback
- Five Resolutions for Supervisors: Better Mentoring
- How to Get Memos that Help, Not Hurt
- Ten Questions for Every Writing Project
- The Beloved Supervisor
- The Superb Supervisor (ABA’s Law Practice magazine)
- When Feedback Falls Flat
Legal Writing
- Absolute Power
- Advice Column: Procrastinating in the Big Apple
- Avoid These Clichés Like the Plague
- Books for Every Lawyer on Your Holiday Gift List
- Does Sotomayor Write Well?
- Can Computers Help You Write Better?
- Client Alert or Client Asleep?
- Five Resolutions for Litigators: Better Motions and Briefs
- Five Ways to Write Like Elena Kagan
- Five Ways to Write Like John Roberts
- Five Ways to Write Like Ted Olson and David Boies
- Five Ways to Write Like The Economist
- Forensic Linguistics and the “Obamacare” Mystery
- Free Martha? Not with these Headings!
- Just Say No: Five Words and Phrases to Avoid
- Kagan vs. Scalia: Who Won Round One?
- Lighten Up
- Lessons from The New Yorker
- LWP Opinion: Kagan’s Writing Makes Her a Perfect Fit
- Noah Messing on His New Book, The Art of Advocacy
- Not Fit to Print
- Opening Act: Do Your First Words Fall Flat?
- Sotomayor Revision: And the Winner Is . . .
- Still Saying No: Five More Words and Phrases to Avoid
- Talk to Yourself: The Rhetorical Question
- The Apple of Our Eye: Scoring the Apple v. Samsung Openings
- The Briefwriter’s Credo
- The Charlie Sheen Letter
- The State of the Union Dissected: Five Highs, Five Lows
- The Supreme Writer on the Court: The Case for Roberts
- The Supreme Writer on the Court: The Case for Kagan
- The Supremes Soar
- The Three Biggest Mistakes I See
- Three Great Cuts
- Warren Buffett, Writing Trainer?
- Watch Your Rhetoric
- What Makes for “Brilliant” Writing?
What Judges and Partners Want
- Four Motion Mistakes
- Judge Painter: The Most Common Errors I See
- Judges Gone Wild
- Little Things that Bug Judges
- Partner Survey Results
- Pennsylvania Judges Speak
- Ten Wounding Words and Phrases—With Alternatives
- The Flip Side of Associate Feedback
- The Perils of Advocacy
- Three Tips for Trial Filings
- Top Five Structure Swipes and One General Groan
- Watch Your Rhetoric
Usage and Mechanics
- Are You Passive-Aggressive?
- Avoid the Most Common Comma Crimes Committed by Counsel: Eight Commandments
- Capitalization Cheat Sheet
- Did Strunk & White Give “Stupid Advice”?
- Duke Lacrosse Challenge
- Eight Grammar Gripes—And How to Avoid Them
- Feeling Possessive?
- Five Grammar Myths
- Five Secret Typography Tips for Lawyers
- Four Usage Fights
- Formatting Motions and Briefs
- Hyphen Nation
- Just Between You and Me
- Million-Dollar Commas
- Parallel Universe
- Punctuating Quotations
- Resolved: Citations in Footnotes?
- The Power of Examples
- The Ricci Majority: Five Wrong Answers
- The Ricci Dissent: Five Wrong Answers
- Ricci: You Be the Grader
- Spelling in the Electronic Age
- Splitsville
- Stop Cutting “That”
- The Gun Case: Eight Misses
- The Gun Case: Eight Hits
- The Jury Is In: Shun “Instant,” “Implicate,” and “Absent”—But Keep “Chilling Effect”
- The Lowdown on Footnotes
- When Bad Grammar Happens to Good Candidates
- Would You Accept These Sentences?
Transactional Drafting
- All-Knowing
- Are “Indemnify” and “Hold Harmless” the Same?
- Drafting Traps
- Drafting Challenge
- Drafting Challenge Winners
- Just Between You and Me
- Reading Law or Reading Ourselves: How to Think About Posner v. Scalia
- Ten Questions for Every Agreement
- Transactional Nits
- When Are “Best Efforts” Enough?
Transatlantic Communications
New Associates
- Five Resolutions for New Attorneys: Better Memos
- Not the Time for an Opus (Legal Times, Oct. 2007)
- Ten Questions for Every Writing Project
- Ten Tips for New Attorneys
- The Flip Side of Associate Feedback
- Three Ways to Save Research Time and Costs
Summer Associates
- Chicago’s Best Tips on Great Summer Programs
- Former Summers Speak
- Ten Questions for Every Summer Associate Writing Project
- Ten Tips for Your Summer at the Screen
- Three Ways to Save Research and Time