Practice Management

Litigation: Overstatements are bad.

By Dan Hull

Being Irish is a gift. But overstatements are bad. They can be hilarious. With them, we can drive home a point using hyperbole. Overstatements can impress your date. They even feel good to make. But we should keep them out of pleadings and remarks to arbitrators, mediators and judges. We have all made them. But overstatements are bad.

When you overstate, readers will be instantly on guard, and everything that has preceded your overstatement as well as everything that follows it will be suspect in their minds because they have lost confidence in your judgment or your poise.

Do see "The Only Writing Tip That Really Matters", quoting The Elements of Style, by William Strunk, Jr. and E.B. White, at Evan Schaeffer's The Trial Practice Tips Weblog.

Blarney Castle, near Cork, Ireland

Full post as published by What About Clients? on June 16, 2010 (boomark / email).