Jonathan Breeden: [00:00:00] On this week's episode of the Best in Johnson County podcast, we have a special edition episode called Ask Jonathan Breeden Anything. And in this episode, Raina Birch asked me about the attorney client relationship, things that are important in that relationship, things that are not as important in that relationship, things that the client should do to make that relationship stronger, things the attorney should do to make that relationship stronger.
So listen in and learn more about how you can work better with your attorney and how your attorney can help serve you better as well.
Narrator: Welcome to another episode of Best of Johnston County, brought to you by Breeden Law Office. Our host, Jonathan Breeden, an experienced family lawyer with a deep connection to the community, is ready to take you on a journey through the area that he has called home for over 20 years. Whether it's a deep dive into the love locals have for the county or unraveling the complexities of family law, Best of Johnston County presents an authentic slice of this unique [00:01:00] community.
Jonathan Breeden: Hello and welcome to another edition of the best of Johnson County podcast. I'm your host, Jonathan Breeden. And on the day's episode, we're going to do a special edition and what we call ask Jonathan Breeden anything. And in these special edition episodes, our social media coordinator Raena Burch asked me, Jonathan Breeden questions about family law.
life, business, just whatever she likes to ask me questions about. And I do my best to try to answer those questions. And today's questions are going to be about the attorney client relationship. But before we get to that, we would like you to like, follow, subscribe to this podcast, wherever you see it, whether it be on Apple.
Spotify, YouTube, LinkedIn, TikTok, Instagram, or any of the other social media channels of the Best Johnson County Podcast. The Best Johnson County Podcast comes out every single Monday and has now for well over a year, and we've had a lot of great guests. So go back and listen to some of the previous guests like Butch Lawter, Johnson County Commissioner Chris Johnson, Johnson County Economic Development Director Donna White.
State House member then [00:02:00] candidate Brad Knott, now Congressman Brad Knott, about what he thought we needed to do in Washington if he got elected, which he ultimately did. I think you will find all of those fascinating and educational. And like I said, we do this to promote Johnston County, and you'll see why they love Johnston County as much as we love Johnston County, and we continue.
To do this podcast. And in most episodes, we interview interesting people like we just talked about, but in the special edition episodes I, Jonathan Breeden, ultimately get interviewed and I try to answer the questions. So we'll get to it. We're ready. Right.
Raena Burch: All right. I'm ready if you are. All right. So obviously with, you know, we're, we're filming this right after the holidays, the holidays are usually a pretty big catalyst for kind of people being done and looking for attorneys and wanting to start that divorce process.
So when this episode airs, they've probably already started that divorce process in all likelihood, if they're going to do it after the holidays. So I would like to talk about the attorney client relationship. So after they've hired [00:03:00] their attorney. What can a client do to better facilitate the relationship with their attorney?
Jonathan Breeden: Well, I would say, you know, you want to start after they get hired, I think in I mean, the relationship starts from the moment you start looking for an attorney, even you start building a type of relationship by visiting the attorney's website, reading their reviews you know, reading their bio page, where are they from, you know, what kind of things they'd like to do, right?
Like, you know, so the relationship starts there and then you go and you meet with them and they do a. You know, most everybody starts with console of some sort. And the key thing, you know, in deciding on who to hire and then what you do after you hire them is. Are you comfortable with the person? Right?
I mean, I think that is the most important thing. Are you comfortable with the person you're meeting with or with the information they're giving you about the law firm? You know, in our office, it's not always the person doing the consults can be handling the case. We've got lots of people here. We sort of [00:04:00] work in a team environment.
But, you know, are you comfortable? with the environment, with the person you're meeting with, what they're talking about, whatever advice they may give in helping make a decision. And then of course, once you've made the decision to hire a law firm, then the relationship You know, you'll get with the actual attorneys to be handling the case a lot of times, it is the attorney you met with at some, a lot of firms, there's, there are not other attorneys, there are a lot of solos, particularly in Johnston County and it starts to move forward from there.
So, I mean, I think that the relationship is important. And, you know, one of the things that you need to do is figure out how much you can. Well, not figure out. You need to be able to trust the person you hire.
Raena Burch: Yes.
Jonathan Breeden: Okay. I mean, I think that's the key. You need to be able to trust that they know what they're doing, that they have your best interests at heart, and they can communicate with you in a way that you would like to be communicated with.
And that you can sort of get on the same [00:05:00] page and have a little bit of synergy as you go through what is inherently a difficult process.
Raena Burch: Yes. And as a client, you know, Best policy, I would say, would be, Be honest with your lawyer up front, like they, as all the stories, you know, you've heard it all.
Jonathan Breeden: Right. Right. No, I mean, no, I mean, and being honest with your attorney, I think is important. They don't want to have stuff come flying at them in the middle of a hearing that they didn't know about. Exactly. And that does happen more than it should. Yeah. And it makes it difficult for the attorney. In the live fire of a hearing to have to react to evidence they didn't know was coming, a text they didn't know had gotten sent, a behavior that had happened that they were unaware of, because if they know about it, they can prepare to prepare a defense, that's one thing, have a witness to contradict it if it's not true or figure out a way to spin it to where it may [00:06:00] not be as bad as it appears by giving context.
None of that is going to be able to happen if they're just sitting in a hearing. Well, I mean it can, but it's not going to be very good if they're sitting in a hearing and a witness says something that they're completely blindsided by. You know, I mean one example that I can think of that wasn't that long ago was we're in a hearing and the other side said the other side puts a family member.
to testify that they were smoking dope with our client within the last two years with the children in the home. We didn't know our client did drugs.
Raena Burch: That's a pretty big thing you need to probably need to tell your lawyer.
Jonathan Breeden: Correct. Much less that they were going to have a witness saying, Oh yeah, we smoked dope together with the kids.
Right. And so, I mean, we're, I mean, we were, we were blindsided and it was true. But you know, I think we could have been a little bit more prepared to deal with [00:07:00] it. We could have possibly come with some drug testing to show that this person was on their own clean now that we could have had them maybe go and get some drug counseling if they needed that, stuff like that.
But. We didn't have that information. And, and that makes it difficult. So you definitely need to be honest. You know, your lawyer's not here to judge you or whatever. And lawyers don't change the facts. They present the facts they are, but they do a much better job if they know what the facts are and that you're being honest about the good and the bad, as you go into.
Particularly if it's going to be a contested litigation case, a high conflict type situation maybe not as big a deal if you're trying to work something out amicably in a separation agreement, stuff like that, where one side's not trying to one up the other and that kind of stuff.
Raena Burch: Yeah, so yeah, be honest, don't be embarrassed, you know, just be forthcoming.
Jonathan Breeden: Right, right. The other thing is, you know, the most important thing that a lawyer can do for their client, and we emphasize this here at the [00:08:00] Briefing Law Offices, is to communicate with them, right? That is the number one thing, and I tell everybody that works for me. You know, we should prioritize communication, that communication be proactive.
We should be trying to answer questions before they're asked. We now have a a new client welcome packet. It sort of lays out the steps and procedures of most cases and how long they take. I think people can be surprised at how long some of these things take. You know, we, we try to create a welcoming video for each individual client.
And we do try to communicate. Proactively, which I think is important. If you've hired an attorney and they're not responding to your emails and they're not returning your phone calls. Within 24 or 48 hours. That's not good. No. And unfortunately I think that is more common than not in the legal profession, which is extremely unfortunate.
That is not how I've ever practiced law. That is not how I'm practicing law now. But that is. It's not uncommon and that doesn't [00:09:00] help anything, right? If you have a question, you should be able to get an answer from your attorney fairly quickly. Be able to schedule a time to meet a 15 minute call with them within just a few days.
So that you can get those questions answered because, you know, those questions are going to help you make better decisions. And ultimately the goal is to try to get the case over with, right? Like, I mean, to me. Speed to resolution is extremely important. You know, communication is most important. How quickly we can get out of these people's lives is the second most important thing.
They didn't want to hire us. They don't want to be in court. They don't want to be fighting over divorce. They want to move on in their new life, whatever that looks like. And so we need to be trying to proactively move the case along. And part of doing that is By communicating with the client, figure out what the client's needs, wants are, you know, telling the client what we need to be able to move it to the next stage, that kind of stuff.
But if you've hired an attorney and you're not getting return phone calls and you're not getting your emails answered and you don't know what the next steps are, you don't have a timeline, you don't have a [00:10:00] realistic outcome of what it might be or what you're trying to get, then that's not going to be good.
And maybe you need to start looking for a new attorney.
Raena Burch: Different. Yeah. A different attorney. And absolutely. And especially, you know, in high conflict cases, which. We see a lot of because, you know, any the people who get who agree usually don't can usually come to an agreement between themselves But when we see the high conflict cases if you know, if somebody's got a question about all that my co parent did this What should I do or how should I respond or you know?
And if you're not hearing back for a week or two, you know that That situation's done. It's, it's time sensitive,
Jonathan Breeden: right? Right. Well, the other thing, you know, you can do as the client to save yourself money and to make your lawyer's job easier, you know, lawyers are busy. They've got lots of cases.
You're not the only client is to get them the information that they need. So. In a timely fashion. Fill out your financial affidavit and do it to the best of your ability. Make sure you go back and look and [00:11:00] see how much you really are spending on rent and power and food and water and those types of things.
Your financial affidavit does accurately reflect your bills. Yeah. At the time you're filling it out. Go ahead and. Work on your, if you're doing a property distribution case and a divorce, go ahead and do your equitable distribution inventory affidavit where you list all the property and who has it in the, in the net value of the property and who you propose was going to get it and get those account numbers and get those data separation values and get the current values of the things that you have, whether it be the mortgage statement, the car payment, the 401k, the IRAs, you know, go ahead and start putting those.
Documents together. You know, we tell everybody maybe 12 months of every financial document prior to the date of separation. Every bank statement, every 401k statement, every IRA statement. As many pesos as they can get. Tax returns, W 2s all of that information so that we can get a good runway of what the [00:12:00] financial situation of the marriage was leading up to the date of separation, and then we need all of those documents for the date of separation to current, so that we can see what happened after the party separated.
But, the more of those things you can put together, and the quicker you can put them together, and upload them in a file that's very easy for your, for your, that's labeled correctly what it is. And it's very easy for your attorney to access. It will make it easier for them to do the case, make it easier on their paralegals, but also save you some money.
Because you know, somebody's got to put all this stuff together and if they're charging you two, three, 400 an hour for some work you could have done if you'd have just worked a little hard on it yourself.
Raena Burch: Yes, exactly. Well, yeah. And, and. You know, so we talked about, you know, what clients can do. Is there anything like anything?
Oh, my gosh, anything clients. Shouldn't do. Obviously, we already said, don't lie to your lawyer.
Jonathan Breeden: Yeah, I mean, you know, most attorneys charge for the communication. Now, the communication, as we just [00:13:00] talked about, is the most important part of the relationship. But most attorneys are going to charge for every single communication.
You know, we're going to charge you for every email we send you. We're going to charge you for every phone call we have with you. You know, that's what we sell. We don't sell widgets. We don't sell shoes here. We sell time. And so we do have to charge for our time. But if you, it would be important for clients.
to make a list of questions and not one email or make a list of questions for 1 15 minute phone call with the attorney versus sending 1234 emails a day or calling and asking for a call back. You know, which is hard. You need to get on the schedule. It's, you know, it's, it's almost impossible to call and actually get an attorney.
They're, they're booked up, you know, and they have to schedule their phone calls, but you know, consolidate the communication, get four or five, six questions in an email, set up a 15 minute phone call where you can go through [00:14:00] four or five, six questions, but it gets very expensive and very time consuming for the attorney to answer each individual email.
With each individual question, if you start just sending them sort of stream of consciousness, like, oh, I have this question, let me email them. Right? Like, what I would say is write that down and have a list of questions for my attorney and maybe every three days or every four days, put all those questions in a single email.
It'll save you money and make it easier on your attorney.
Raena Burch: Oh, yeah, absolutely.
Have family law questions? Need guidance to navigate legal challenges? The compassionate team at Breeden Law Office is here to help. Visit us at www. breedenfirm. com for practical advice, resources, or to book a consultation. Remember, when life gets messy, you don't have to face it alone.
Raena Burch: And so. I know we talked about this on, or you talked about this, I believe, with Carly on one of the episodes where [00:15:00] they sell cars and, and they talk about the informed consumer, the informed customer. I know that, like, all the doctors will tell you, like, don't go, don't go WebMD your symptoms.
Like, come in and just talk to us. So how does that work with, with law? Do you, is it better to have the informed customer or do you guys kind of tell them, like, Don't, don't, don't, don't try to figure it out. Like just come in and talk to us.
Jonathan Breeden: I think it's important for the customer to have a general idea of what we're trying to do and what the law is.
It is not helpful for them to come in and tell you about. their cousin's divorce or their sister's divorce and what happened there, right? Those facts are different, could be in a different county, could be in a different state, you know what I mean? But I do think it is important for clients of this law firm or any law firm to have a general idea Of the law what has to be proven for whatever success they're [00:16:00] trying to have The odds that they will be successful in what they're trying to get.
I do think that that is important, which is why I Wrote the book divorce law and work carolina what you need to know That you can download for free from my website or call our office be happy to mail you a paperback copy for free which talks sort of at a Very 10, 000 foot view, you know, gives you an overview of North Carolina divorce law.
It is not specific to your case. It talks about different types of custodial schedules. It talks about the distribution of property. It talks a little bit about alimony, how you get it, where it's from. You know, all of those types of things you know, I think is important. I think that all of the clients of this law firm should read the book.
You know, we have, you know, this is on YouTube. You might be watching this on YouTube. We have probably. 150 YouTube videos of me answering questions. In two and three minutes segments that people have come in and asked me. I think the answers to those questions are important and you can [00:17:00] educate yourself by watching those videos and stuff.
Now they're not going to be your specific fact pattern, but they're going to be, there are a lot of generalities here, you know, and so, but I do think that that's important. So you start to educate yourself. My website, I believe has over 400 pages. Now I've written on that website for. Years and years and years and years and years.
And so, you know, we have blogs and all this stuff. So there's information out there. I'm having out there. I want people. To consume it the way they want to consume it. So I do think it is important that you educate yourself on what the law is, your position in the, under the law, you know what, what your rights are.
And then, you know, you talk to your attorney about. Specifically about what you want to see happen and whether the law is going to apply the way you think it's going to apply, what strategies you want to take. I do think that that's, I do think that's important. So I never discourage anybody from educating themselves about the law and the process.
Yes. I [00:18:00] do discourage you from talking to your cousin or your sister or somebody else. Because that's probably not going to be helpful because your case is not their case. Yeah. And the facts aren't going to line up.
Raena Burch: Exactly. and, you know, the more people like, you know, when the more that they consume, especially the more videos that they watch that you've done where you're answering those questions, a lot less questions they have to ask their lawyer.
A lot less time they have to pay for if they're already knowledgeable about at least the baseline.
Jonathan Breeden: Correct.
Raena Burch: They can, they can spend their time actually delving into their case and not trying to explain the generalities first and then going deeper than that.
Jonathan Breeden: Well, and if they're familiar with the terminology, you know, I mean.
you know, when we were, my wife and I were having our first baby and you go to the, the birthing classes and they, there was a textbook and they didn't really go through the textbook, the classes, but he being a lawyer, I read the whole book, right? And so they didn't go through everything, but like, I became very familiar with the terminologies of what was going to happen.
We were going to have this [00:19:00] baby. And you know, things didn't quite go as smoothly as we'd hoped. And when they started talking. I knew because I had read the book what they were talking about and what was a likely next step. Yeah. And everything worked out great, but it calmed my nerves to know what they were talking about.
Well, if I hadn't read that book, they didn't cover This particular situation in the burping class, but it was in the book. This is fairly common. So that's the way I like to tell people like read my book, read the website, watch some of the videos, you know, become familiar with the terminology, like primary custodian.
Secondary custodian, joint custodian, sole legal custody, joint legal custody. You know, there's no such thing as sole physical custody, you know, that kind of stuff will help you. So when your lawyer starts saying, okay, well we're going to try for primary physical and joint legal. Well, so there's no, this thing is so physical, right?
And you got to have certain things to [00:20:00] even get so legal and it's very hard to get. And you may not have those in your case, even though you really may just like the other person that doesn't want their opinion on anything. So, you know, that kind of stuff I do think is important. I do think that most consumers now, Are reading and doing their homework.
You know, reading the reviews, people come in here. We have lots of five star reviews. We have lots and lots of five star reviews. We've done a, you know, I'm very happy to have all those. They've come in, they've read the reviews. They, they know, tell me the reviews, what we're good at and what we're good at is communication, which I think is the most important thing.
that we provide to the clients. And I think that's what lawyers do. And I do think it's the number one complaint that the state bar gets when it comes to disciplining clients is that their lawyer is not communicating with them. and it's the number one complaint has been, it was number one complaint when I was in law school, it's still the number one complaint 25 years later.
Raena Burch: Well, and, and that's crazy because communication has only gotten easier as time has gone on.
Jonathan Breeden: Correct.
Raena Burch: So it's it's it's a little insane that it's that's still the number one complaint. That's when you know, it's it's [00:21:00] more on the user end and not the technology end.
Jonathan Breeden: Well, right. And, and, you know, I, you know, I referred somebody that we could not help to another attorney you know, not too long ago.
And I reached out to that person and was like, so what's going on with your case? And they were like, I hired them seven weeks ago and I've not heard a word. I don't know what's going on with my case. So I reached back out to the attorney that I made the referral to. They answered my email, I then communicated it to their client that
Raena Burch: should not happen.
You didn't have to do, but you know, when you care, like as much as you do, that that person needs communication. If they're not getting it, you're going to try to facilitate it. Or, you know, because it's
Jonathan Breeden: important. Right. And that's the thing. I mean, you know, this entire office, all 23 of us that work here.
Really, it's about, you know, providing as good a client service as we can and communicating the best we can [00:22:00] because that's, that's important. Right? I know that's the most important thing. And so I want to be able to do that to help calm people's nerves and help lower their anxieties and stuff like that.
And so that's really kind of what we prioritize here. But, you know, in general, law firms. Just in North Carolina, around the country, the bar for customer service is laying on the ground. they just, they don't have enough staff. Yeah, they've got more work than they can do. They, they don't have systems in place to get the work done and it ends up being a bad, they end up providing a bad service.
And that's,
Raena Burch: and you're already going through a bad experience. Right. You don't want another one on top of it. Right, and
Jonathan Breeden: that's unfortunate. That is truly, truly unfortunate. and it's not that those lawyers or law firms They're not trying to provide a bad experience. They just are because they don't have the systems to allow them to provide a better experience.
Where I sit around here all the time trying to think of how to make the client experience better [00:23:00] because the outcome We don't have a ton of control over, that's the big secret. Lawyers do all this great lawyering and arguing, but in family law, the facts control and we don't control the facts. But we do control.
Whether you're communicated with your rights are defended that, you're, we're fighting for you. If you need to be fought with, we're giving you reasonable advice. We're telling you what would be a reasonable settlement. We're building that relationship. We're building trust and we're trying to get the case over.
as possible. You know, that's the things that we can do and that we work very hard on here to do for people that I don't know that all the other law firms are trying to do.
Raena Burch: And I think something that you guys do here that's really innovative and important is you make all of them take a personality test to make sure that they are empathetic.
And you know, these clients, like you said, everybody, every lawyer has multiple clients, but I feel like, you know, when we're talking and when you guys are [00:24:00] doing your team thing and you're communicating and brainstorming and helping each other out, it's not just a number, it's not just a client, it's a name, it's a person.
Like, you guys genuinely care for your clients and their outcomes, what they want, what they're looking for. to be heard. All of that.
Jonathan Breeden: Correct. Right. And we all do. I mean, that's one of our core values is, is empathy. And we work very hard to hire people who are empathetic, that, that do have compassion for the people they represent.
And you know, and it's, and these are not easy cases, you know, and, and sometimes our clients are you know, they're difficult. I mean, they're going through a lot and, and that, that a lot can come out. Yeah, we're trying to help, but we have to, we have to understand that and work with it and empathize and realize where they're coming through and see if we can't still help them.
Yeah. and that's important, you know, because if you, You really can't do family law and, and really stand up for the, really the kids. That's what we're focused on here is the children more [00:25:00] than anything else. If you don't truly care about your fellow man and how that goes and their future, you know, whatever that future may be.
And it may not be the future you would want for yourself, but it is going to be their future. And you need to care about what that future is going to be, what they want it to be and helping them get there as best you can.
Raena Burch: Yeah, yeah, and that's something that I see on a daily basis with everyone here is to, you know, make sure that clients feel heard, the children are, you know, put, always put first and like you said, understanding that this is a rough experience, this is a rough time for anybody going through it, and stress levels are high, anxiety levels are through the roof, and you know, we all have those bad days.
But you know working with them Understanding that pushing through still getting them or at least trying to get them the results that they want,
Jonathan Breeden: right? Right, and then that's what we that's what we try to do And I think we have you know, pretty pretty good success with that
Raena Burch: Well, I would say with all of Google [00:26:00] with all the five star reviews on Google.
I'd say pretty good pretty good success Well, we
Jonathan Breeden: try that's what I say about that. So anyways,
Raena Burch: I think we're done I didn't really have any other questions unless you have something that you want to share that a lawyer Like I think you already said if they're not communicating is that the number one thing like people should look out for with their attorney client relationship?
Jonathan Breeden: Yeah, I think I do think that if you're not being communicated with, if your questions aren't being answered if you're still, if you're more confused after your lawyer answers your question,
Raena Burch: that's
Jonathan Breeden: usually not a good sign either. As far as that's concerned. And you know, I, and, and also if you're being pushed into something that you don't, with, you know, that's, that's not a good situation either, but I do think the attorneys can, you know, I think most attorneys are trying to do a good job, you know what I mean?
Can educate you so that you can feel more comfortable about whatever decision you're going to make. I think that's important. Well, and that goes back to the beginning relationship about establishing that rapport, building that trust, [00:27:00] communicating proactively, all of that stuff. So that when it comes to the time.
to make a decision as to what might be a fair settlement when your attorney says, okay, I think it's a fair settlement. You trust them that it is a fair settlement. And I think sometimes they're not
Raena Burch: just trying to get you out the door. Like it. Right. Right.
Jonathan Breeden: And I think when they don't build that relationship it can be difficult.
Yeah. You know what I mean? And so I think that's, we work real hard at trying to build those relationships here at the brief law office. Well, that'll do it for this episode of the best of Johnson County podcast, a special edition episode, ask Jonathan Breeden anything. As we mentioned earlier, please like follow, subscribe to this podcast, whether you're, wherever you're seeing it, whether it be on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, LinkedIn, Tik TOK, or any of the other social media channels, the best Johnson County podcast, share this podcast on your Instagram search stories and tag us at the best of Johnson County.
We look forward to bringing you the next episode next week. Give us a five star review as well. Until next time, I'm your host, Jonathan Breeden.
Narrator: That's the end of today's episode of Best of Johnston County, a show brought to you by the trusted team at Breeden Law Office. [00:28:00] We thank you for joining us today and we look forward to sharing more interesting facets of this community next week. Every story, every viewpoint adds another thread to the rich tapestry of Johnston County.
If the legal aspects highlighted raised some questions, help is just around the corner at www. breedenfirm. com.
