Legal Grounds | Conversations on Life, Leadership & Law
After over three decades in the legal-trenches, Mike Bassett has learned to appreciate two things: good conversation & good coffee.
Legal Grounds is an ongoing series of interviews with the people who are shaping our world - legal or otherwise. Witty, irreverent, & always thoughtful, these brief discussions fall somewhere between “Night Court” & Hopper’s “Nighthawks At The Diner”.
With that in mind, we promise your coffee will still be warm when the podcast is done.
(Legal Grounds was written, recorded, and produced by Dust Devil Press)
Episodes
183 episodes
Legal Grounds | Renée Pardo On the Next Generation of Female Attorneys, Stepping Away from an Established Career, & Anxious Advocacy
Walking away from this week’s conversation I have a new theory:If time-machines existed, a lot of attorneys would still be trying their first case. We’ve talked before about how perfectionism runs deep i...
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51:01
Legal Grounds | Darl Champion On Holding the Right People Accountable, Winning vs. Problem Solving, and the Importance of Civility in Leadership
The line between zealous representation and being an obstinate ass is often said to be a fine-line to walk as attorneys. After all, if the OTHER side is playing hardball, the temptation to fight fire with MORE fire can al...
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1:05:42
Legal Grounds | Dr. Christina Marinakis On Evaluating Juries, the Changing Expectations for Evidence, and Why Diversity Is More Than Demographics
There are few things more stressful as a trial attorney than the jury selection process. Even if you’re confident in your case, your arguments have been tested and refined, and every piece of evidence is on your side, picking jurors...
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53:32
Legal Grounds | Emily Stedman on Navigating the Billable-Hour, Developing the Next Generation, and Self-Worth Outside of the Law
For as ever present as it is, the Billable-Hour is still one of those topics on the Defense side of the Bar that is deemed somewhat taboo. Some of this, I believe, comes from a natural - though not at all helpful - competitive menta...
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50:06
Legal Grounds | Matt Cianflone On the Origins of the Doom-Loop, How Miscommunication is Mistaken for Malice, and the Benefits of Self-Talk
Of the many many books I used to read to my sons, there are only a few that I could confidently recall, but a family favorite was (and remains) “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.”No matter what age, ...
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50:33
Legal Grounds | Karl Seelbach on the Future of Depositions, SKRIBE AI, & Why Law Needs to Overcome Its Tech Aversion
Jokes about lawyers and technology are one of those things that tend to write themselves, but in my conversation this week with Karl Seelbach I walked away thinking about how the days of bei...
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1:04:49
Legal Grounds | Anne Redcross Beehler on Building Relationships in Trial, Not Buying Into Bullies, and the Benefits of Being Underestimated
When it comes to watching any sort of legal drama, be it television or film, most - if not all - of the scenes that take place inside the courtroom focus on either the lawyers, the judge, or the witness. But when it comes...
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45:18
Legal Grounds | Joe Bogdan On Relinquishing & Relearning Leadership, Why Better has No Finish-Line, and Using Small Transitions to Help Us Adapt to Larger Changes
While I know there isn’t any science to back it up, somewhere in my 30’s I remember hearing the “Fact” that if you could do something for 30 days straight then - BOOM - it’s a habit. A sort of accelerated version of ‘prac...
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47:25
Legal Grounds | Star Hansen on the Psychology of Clutter, Replacing Shame with Curiosity, and Why Boxes are Only the Beginning
One of the questions we ask every potential new hire at our firm is when your laundry comes out of the dryer, how long does it take you to put it away?There is no right or wrong answer to the question, but the responses - I hope ...
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53:46
Legal Grounds | Denise Hamilton on Laying Down Old Stories, Creating New Social Frameworks, and Why Malice Isn’t a Requirement for Harm
This week's episode is a conversation about what it takes to keep having tough conversations. What was once the poster-child for corporate and social responsibility, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion efforts are now either...
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1:06:44
Legal Grounds | Waldo Waldman on Passion Overcoming Fear, the Importance of Contingency Plans, and Why You Never Fly Solo
Fear of flying is one of the most common phobias in the U.S., but my guest today knew he wanted to spend his life in the air the moment his dad let him climb into a cockpit. But, a fear of heights and claustrophobia are p...
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50:16
Legal Grounds | Susan Hawk on Learning to Accept Help, Struggling in the Spotlight, and Building Empathy into the Law
One of, if not THE most insidious aspects of depression is how it convinces you that reaching out for help is a fool's errand. The stories we tell ourselves in those moments are often as dark as they are wrong, but thankfully very few o...
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54:40
Legal Grounds | Natalie Armstrong-Motin on Growing an ADR Practice, the Emotional Toll of Litigation, & Asking Authentic Questions
If I had to boil down this week’s episode to one word it would be Control. Like we talked about in last week’s episode, when it comes to mediators, too often the job is perceived as “controlling” two diametrically opposed parties; t...
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57:11
Legal Grounds | Jeff Kichaven on the Psychology of Mediation, Advocating vs. Facilitating, and a Life in the Law
The obligation that attorneys have to zealously represent their clients is, as my guest today puts it, “like walking a razor’s edge between perfection and disaster.”For the first 15 years of his career it was a job that
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1:02:23
Legal Grounds | Sophia Laurenzi on Seeing the Whole Person, the Nature of Death, and Advocating for the Voiceless
While both are unavoidable, when it comes to Death and Taxes a majority of us never have to navigate bureaucracies when it comes to the former. For me, Capital Punishment has always been an interesting choice of language i...
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48:59
Legal Grounds | Sherry Buckley-Brown on Growing Alongside our Pain, the Non-Linear Nature of Healing, and the Art of Letting Go
This week my guest is author, coach, and corporate veteran, Sherry Buckley-Brown.Having just released her memoir, "
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42:18
Legal Grounds | Nicole Black on Generative A.I., Retaining Humanity, and the Legal-Tech Ecosphere
My guest today has been preaching about the potential power of tech in the legal sphere since the earliest days of social media. Nicole Black began her legal career as a Public ...
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50:05
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Legal Grounds | Courtney Redman on Legal Support Systems, Bridging the Trust/Delegation-Gap, and the Difference Between Keeping Up & Adapting
In 2021, the Bloomberg Law Survey reached a sobering milestone. For the first time, attorneys reported feeling stressed about their workload more than HALF of the time. Setting aside the very serious and very real consequ...
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43:45
Legal Grounds | Dr. Eugene K. Choi on the Illusion of Accomplishment, Strategizing v. Execution, & Being the Common Denominator
If you’ve ever found yourself pulling into your driveway only to realize you meant to stop at the grocery store on the way home, you know how easy it is for the brain to run on autopilotAnd while forgetting you neede...
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50:58
Legal Grounds | Serban Mare on Burnout, the Difference Between Efficiency & Overwork, and Learning to Appreciate the Slow Times
This week we welcome Serban Mare back to the program. Last time we spoke, Serban and I discussed his life story and really focused on how trust is the foundation to any wor...
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42:38
Legal Grounds | Dave Obrand on Consistency, the Power of Mentorship, and the Joys of Public Service
My guest this week is Dave Obrand, a fellow attorney and Deputy County Counsel out of Orange County. What attracted me to Dave was not simply the work he does helping to reuni...
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48:29
Legal Grounds | Victor Li on the Impacts of A.I., the Next Generation of Lawyers, and the ‘Performance’ of Law
For this week’s episode I was lucky enough to sit down with the Assistant Managing Editor of the ABA Journal, Victor Li, for one of ...
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55:30
Legal Grounds | Joshua Becker on the Nature of Minimalism, the More of Less, & Intentionality in a Cluttered World
Twelve Wooden Stirring Spoons. Twelve. That’s the number Liz and I unearthed the first time we decided to give Minimalism a try. We had both just read the book, “
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51:16
Legal Grounds | Sam Mollaei - Incorporating A.I., The Business of Law, and the Future of Legal System in the Digital Realm
In last week's episode we looked back on the “standard practices” that the pandemic shifted from in-person to virtual spaces.So for this week's episode it only seems appropriate that we look forward with someone who has been moving the ...
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48:01