Resonant conversations with jurors — those moments where you connect deeply on an emotional level — can be a game changer.
BUT.
Is there such a thing as too much connection?
Here’s what we’re diving into:
🗣️WHY creating resonance with jurors isn’t just about getting them to listen — it’s about making them care and act.
🗣️The BIG mistake many trial attorneys make when trying to create resonance, and how it might be costing you your strongest jurors.
🗣️The RIGHT balance between logic and emotion that gives you an edge in trial — and where most attorneys go wrong.
🗣️WHY the traditional “Can you be fair?” question might be the LEAST effective way to approach voir dire.
This episode is packed with actionable takeaways for your next trial.
Don’t miss this, tune in now!
Xo,
Sari
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"Your job in voir dire isn’t to get them to like you—it’s to help them feel safe enough to tell the truth. When jurors feel seen and safe, they’re more willing to lean your way, even before you present a single piece of evidence."
sari de la motte
264 TRANSCRIPTION
Well, hello, hello, welcome back to From Hostage to Hero. And I am here to talk to you today about, can a resonant conversation in voir dire be two resonant? So last week we had guest Amy Day, my CTI coach, Co-Active coach, and she was here talking with me about our Resonant Conversations Weekend. And we had a great conversation about resonant conversations in general. And the question has come up, even before Amy and I podcasted last week, about the concept of a conversation being too resonant. And so I wanted to do a podcast episode on this because I think that that is a very important point.
Now, if you missed last week's conversation about resonant conversations, we are talking about how resonant conversation is one that is heart-based versus head-based. Meaning that oftentimes we ask questions that are information gathering, that are easy for people to answer, and we don't really have a conversation that gets anywhere on the meaningful level. And so when you have a resonant conversation you can notice things like the person's face changes, they slow down, they may make a noise like mm-hmm that's a good question. And we know that we're getting closer to resonance because we've slowed everything down and now we're talking about something that's actually meaningful and resonant.
Now why is this important? What we've asked the jurors to do, or what we're hoping that they do is take action for us and our client. And so we need to motivate them to act. Because remember, the easiest thing to do is to just leave things as they are. So in order to motivate people to act, to do something, to take action they need to care. That's really something that is so important to understand about motivation is that they need to care in order to act. In most cases, not in all cases. But I've particularly seen this in jury selection or cases in general. We tend to think that we make decisions based on logic. What's true is that we make decisions based both on logic and emotion.
Now remember that to use your logical thinking brain, your prefrontal cortex, you need to be rested, and well-fed, and not under fight or flight. But that is exactly the scenario in which jurors find themselves in. They're a hostage, they're tired, they don't know what they're there to do. And so access to their logical brain is difficult, especially how long trials are and how boring and meaningless it is for jurors. So having these resonant conversations allows you to tap into that emotional part of the brain that makes decisions, getting them to care which will then help us access the prefrontal cortex because now that they care they're more likely to pay attention and tune into what you're saying. And now we've got both things happening and that's absolutely what we want. Now, contrast that with what happens most of the time in voir dire which is we're asking hobby questions, we're asking about bumper stickers, we're doing a exclusionary voir dire, we're trying to figure out which jurors are going to fuck us. We don't have these resonant conversations which is the primary place that we get jurors to care.
Now, the other way we get jurors to care is the piss off point, which you've heard me talk about before. That when people are angry about something, that often also motivates them to act. And so when we can have both you're in really good position. If you can have a resonant conversation in voir dire and you can have a piss off point, that you outline in opening, that's really the winning combination.
So I don't want those of you who either don't get voir dire in your states, or those of you who are in federal court to think well, all is lost. It's not. If you have a good piss off point, and there are, of course, other things, then you ... Obviously, we can still win at trial. And I also don't want you to think, like we talked about last week with Amy here, that resonant conversations are just for voir dire. They are absolutely applicable to many parts of your life. And I really want to make clear that even if you don't have voir dire in your state that it is important for you as a attorney understand how to have resonant conversations with your clients, with your colleagues, at home to better your life, so on and so forth.
What do we get from a resonant conversation in voir dire? Or at least an attempt at a resonant conversation. So what will normally happen is the attorney will ask, in an attempt to have a resonant conversation, "What is something that you value in your life," for example, which is part of our price versus value conversation? And the juror will say "Family." And then the attorney will say, "Great, thanks. What about you?" And even though we're attempting to have a resonant conversation we're not actually getting there because that's just information gathering. Even though we've asked a question that can get us to resonance, because we don't know how to have that conversation, we don't end up going there. And we talked a lot about that last week so I don't want to go into that now.
But for those of you who do know how to have resonant conversations ... And the reason I'm doing this whole podcast episode is because one of you particularly has said, "I am so good at resonant conversations." Well, that actually isn't what the person said but that was the gist, right? "I really know how to do this and I did it in trial." And what ended up happening is that the jurors would talk themselves off the jury. Meaning, I would get them to be so resonant talking about their experiences and the things that they value, that when I connected that back to the case, "Well, these are the very things that you would have to decide on in trial," they said, "Well, I probably shouldn't be a juror." And so then I ended up losing my best jurors.
So the question then was posed to me, "Is it possible to have a resonant conversation that's too resonant?" And my answer, of course, is "No." And so we've been looking at this question back in the H2H crew. In fact, we have, in the crew, a call called expanding the method. You have to have been in the H2H playground or a crew member, it's what we call you once you're in the playground, for at least a year to attend these calls. Unlike the book which covers voir dire opening and closing, we're looking at how to use the H2H method to expand into other areas of trial like direct, and cross, and depositions, and all the things.
And so we're bringing in topics to our legacy members and saying, "What do you all think about this?" One because we're lazy. And by we I mean me and Jody. I speak for myself, Jody's not lazy. Joking. Two, the reason we do it, the real reason, is because this group is so amazing and we want to source the wisdom from the group. Actual attorneys out in the field, how are you using these things? So we brought this question to our expanding the method call. And what we found in that call is it all really comes down to one particular question that you all are asking, which is not part of the resonant conversations thing that ... I'm sorry, the price versus value that we teach you. For some reason you're doing this anyway. So just saying this isn't my fault. But it all comes down to one question.
And before I tell you what that question is let me tell you what I mean. So I've got a whole way that I talk about economic versus non-economic damages. I may even have a podcast episode on it. It's the price versus value. If you're in the crew you know exactly what I'm talking about. I've got a nice workbook on it, it's very ... Out of all the things we do, it's the one semi-scripted thing that I've given my crew. And in that, we go back and forth between talking about things that come with a price tag, there's our economic damages, and things that have value but don't come with a price tag.
So before we talk about how and why the jury should ... What their job is to put a number on those non-economic things that have value but don't come with the price tag, we first go into the resonant conversations part which we say, "Now before we do that," and we talk about how you're going to do that, "Can we have a conversation about the things that you value in your life that have value but don't come with a price tag?" And that's where we start this resonant conversation. Now, what is supposed to happen is that after we have that conversation we go back to the discussion of non-economic damages and we say, "These are the very things that you as jurors would be tasked with and to be putting a price tag on these things that do not come with a price tag."
And here's where you asked the wrong question. The right question is, are you willing to try? Are you willing to try to do this very difficult thing which is putting a price tag on a thing that doesn't have a price tag? Are you willing to try? That is the question. And then we have other ways that we deal with inoculating our good jurors from the things that they just said. Let's say, for example, we have a case that had a profound loss. We know the minute we sit down that the other side's going to stand up and say, "You don't think you could be fair could you, blah, blah, blah?" We have a whole way that we deal with that. And I'm not going to share it on a public podcast, you have to join the crew to learn the way that we deal with that because I don't want that out there.
But what I'm saying is, is that you aren't even getting to that point because you're shooting yourself in the foot with this particular question that you ask. Instead of asking, after the resonant conversation, would you be willing ... Or who would be willing to try? You ask a different question. And the question you ask is, "Can you be fair?" So you have this great conversation and then you say, "You're exactly the kind of person we're looking for because you have either experienced profound loss, or you have been through a similar situation, or you seem to understand what this person is going through, or you have the life experience, or whatever." Instead of saying, "So are you willing to try doing this very hard thing?" Don't get me started on you guys lecturing me about how ... Don't tell the jury it's not hard. It is hard so I'm going to tell them that because that's important. Instead of asking that question you ask, "Can you be fair?"
And I rarely say never or always but here's what I'll say. Never ever, ever, ever ask a jury, a panel of juries ... Or panel of jurists ever, can you be fair? Never ask that question. I'll tell you a couple of reasons why. Because they want to be fair it's ... Let's pretend we don't have a resonant conversation. Let's pretend you're doing normal voir dire which is exclusionary, and you're going after people and you're like "Can you be fair?" The answer is always going to be yes. Because they're going to go to that brain space, not the heart space ... They're going to go to the brain space and they're going to be like "Yes, I can." Because everybody wants to be viewed as fair. Or they're going to say, "No, I can't" because they want to get out of jury selection, okay? Which, as we've seen, rarely plays well with the judge because they're going to rehabilitate them and then we've got that whole problem on our hands.
When you're asking the question outside of the resonant conversations part, which most people don't know how to do and don't do which is why we're having this whole thing in November to teach how to do it ... And then also have luxury out the wazoo so bonus, right? Learning stuff and having a good time. The brain space is just going to say yes or no and it's not going to mean shit. because everyone wants to think that they're fair and most people are not due to cognitive bias, due to confirmation bias, due to all of the things that they don't know ... They can't actually even answer that question fairly.
But let's say that we do have the resonant conversation, and they are talking about these things, and they are caring, and they are motivated, and then you say, "Can you be fair?" Now they're invested and now they really recognize what this case is about. And now they really recognize that this is a big deal. And now they're like "Oh my gosh. You know what? I don't know that I can. Thank you lawyer for sharing with me that I'm exactly the wrong person to be fair here because I do have all this life experience." I'm banging my head against the microphone if you can't see it. No, no, no, we're not going to ask that, we're not going to ask that. Because these are the very absolute jurors that we want are the people that do understand profound loss, the people that have an understanding of what this all means, the ones that are willing to try and put a number on that. By asking that one question we fuck the whole thing. All right.
Two, and this may surprise you although I've talked about it before. But if you're new here this may surprise you. The second thing is we're not looking for fair jurors. Let me say it again. We are not looking for fair jurors. I'm not saying we want unfair jurors, I'm saying people do not understand what we mean when we ask that, okay? Think about this. What we're asking is, "Are you leaning one way or the other before hearing the evidence," okay? That will always be the case if you do this right. Meaning, jurors will always be leaning toward you before they even hear about the case for one very simple reason, you stand on the side of the right, that's why. Somebody hurt somebody else, and they're not taking responsibility for it, and that is fucking why we're here.
You do not want jurors who don't believe in that fundamental principle that if you hurt someone you should be ... You should take responsibility. So we're not looking for fair jurors. And when we ask the question, "Are you leaning one way?" Of course they are, they should be. If they have any humanity they will be. So we're shooting ourselves in the foot when we ask that question because they will always be leaning over to us a little bit because we stand on the side of the right. So again, I don't want unfair jurors that can't listen to the evidence and hear both sides. But if we're asking, "Are you leaning one way or the other" and we're surprised when they say, "Yes, they're leaning toward us" then we shouldn't be because we stand for human values, we stand for responsibility, we stand for truth.
Third thing I'm going to say about this is do ... Does the other side ask this? Does the other side ask, "Can you be fair," right? And if they do let them fucking ask it. Why are you doing it? Why are you doing their job? We know that, again, you stand on the side of the right. That 99% of jurors are with you before they even hear a word out of your mouth because, again, you stand for principles, you stand for humanity, you stand for human values. If anybody wants to ask anybody else if they can be fair let the other side do it. Stop doing their job. Because what they want is to have people do exactly the thing you set up through the resonant conversation and talk themselves off the jury.
You're trying to play fair. Why? The other side's not playing fair. They haven't played fair since the moment that this injury happened. Why are you so concerned with playing fair? Again, I'm not saying that you need to play unfairly, I'm saying that's not your job. Your job is to advocate. The judge's job is to decide fairness, what's allowed in, what's not. We know that that's oftentimes against us too. That's the judge's job, let them decide what's fair and what's not fair. Your job is to be here and advocate your side. Stop trying to play the in-between.
I was just working with a client who delivered an opening for me and it was so neutral. It was like "You can believe this or you can believe that." I'm like "Oh, hell no. That's not what we're here for is to go both sides are equal." They're not. We wouldn't even have to be here if the other side had done what they were supposed to do. So stop asking the question, can you be fair? Stop concerning yourself with fairness. Make your voir dire about principles. Have a resonant conversation. And then instead of saying, "Can you be fair?" Ask, "Are you willing to try?" It's a different conversation. Now, how do you inoculate the jurors that you think the other side's going to kick off the minute we get there? That we talk about in the crew. You need to join us. Go to sariswears.com/play to get on the waitlist. Talk soon my friends.
And hey, have you ever wished you knew what the jury was thinking? Well, grab a pen and paper because I’m about to give you instant access to a free training I created for plaintiff trial attorneys. It’s called Three Powerful Strategies to Help You Read a Juror's Mind, and it will help you understand what the jury is thinking so you can feel confident and trust yourself in the courtroom. Ready? Head to sariswears.com/jury and enjoy!
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