Follow Up to Optimize Networking

• Pages: 16-17
• Date: 01 July 2022
• Subject Matter: Civil Law

Follow Up

to Optimize

Networking

Following up after a networking activity is

just as important to relationship building

as the activity itself. Zen and the Art of

Legal Networking’s Lindsay Griths

oers tips for meaningful follow-up.

(1) Connect on LinkedIn—using an

attendee list or business cards, send

an invite to connect. Personalizing it

with something you learned during your conversation will help your connec-

tion remember you and continue the conversation. (2) Send photos—if you took a photo

of or with someone, send that person a copy of it with a nice note as a visual reminder.

(3) Follow up—if you discussed something during the event that merits follow-up, make

some notes right away and schedule the follow-up to keep conversations and connections

going. (4) Thank your host—pen a personalized thank you to the person or organization

hosting the event. (5) Review your calendar—if you have travel that will take you to a new

connection’s city, reach out about meeting again one-on-one. (6) Remind yourself to con-

nect—it is easy to get busy and lose the momentum following a networking event, so set a

calendar reminder to reach out to your new connections.

http://bit.ly/LN474-pn1

Conf‌identiality in Credit

Card Disputes

There are cert ain circumstanc es

where it may seem unf air that

a lawyer must uph old his or her

duty of client con f‌identiality,

including whe n a dissatisf‌ied cli-

ent initiates a charg eback with

a credit card comp any for work

performed . While Model Rule

of Professional Co nduct 1.6 contains some exce ptions al-

lowing lawyers to disc lose otherwise co nf‌idential infor ma-

tion, Faughnan o n Ethics’s Brian Faughnan explain s those

exceptions are limited . Because a credit card dispute is a

not a “proceedin g” and responding to the dispute is n ot

a “claim or defens e” under the rule , a lawyer cannot rely

on the client ’s initiation of the charge back as a waiver of

the lawyer’s ethic al obligation of con f‌identiality. How ca n

the lawyer provide the i nformation necessary to the cre dit

© Getty Image s

card company for it s investigation

and determination? Forethought in

the engagem ent contract may pre -

vent this conundrum. Contractual

language that th e client will not

dispute payment or i nitiate a

chargeback wo uld be unenforce -

able, but lawye rs can include p ro-

visions in enga gement contrac ts

allowing them to make ce rtain

disclosures. I n exchange for the law yer agreeing to ac-

cept credit card paym ents, Faughnan suggests l anguage

making clear th at in the event of a payment dispute, the

lawyer may disclose to th e credit card company any in-

formation he or sh e reasonably believes is necessa ry to

demonstrate the va lidity of the services provided .

http://bit.ly/LN474-pn2

16 | LITIGATION SECTI ON

Published in Litigation News Volume 47, Number 4, Summer 2022. © 2022 b y the American Bar Ass ociation. Reproduc ed with permission. A ll rights reserv ed. This information or an y portion there of may not be copied or dis seminated in any

form or by any means or sto red in an electronic da tabase or retrieval sy stem without the ex press writt en consent of the Amer ican Bar Associatio n.

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