Listen to me explain why putting people at ease is the best way to elicit information from them. I don’t have a badge or a subpoena, so the key is to be nice to them and be interested in what they do, think, and feel. Get the podcast chat on Ernie Sander’s “You Said What?”
Five Questions to Ask an Investigator Before Hiring
Where do you start in deciding which investigator to hire for a sensitive job?
It should be a business of trust, just as it is when choosing someone to come up with an estate plan, to sue a former business partner, or to handle a complex tax situation. Despite the
Angel Investor Due Diligence: The Key Trait You Want
I’ve done a lot of interviews about people over the years, but you can always get better.
A fascinating conversation last week with an angel investor about what he looks for in a candidate to run a new company gave me a question I will always ask from now on, but not just about people
Can Your Investigator Interview Your Opponent’s Ex-Employees? A Good Test for Your Investigator Before You Hire
Any litigator tasking interviews of potential witnesses needs to know about the no-contact rule (ABA Model Rule 4.2)[1], which forbids talking to represented people on the other side of a case. This also goes for most current employees of the other side — certainly any employee senior enough to make critical decisions or
President’s Day Thoughts on Interviewing
In honor of President’s Day (still officially known as Washington’s Birthday) a few thoughts about interviewing.
There are so many more facts about ourselves that are in our heads (or the heads of people we know) than there are in databases and court cases. Many times, to get as much as the truth as we
College Admissions Scandal: More Indictments Coming?
Get ready for college admissions scandals phase II, and maybe III, IV and V.
The reason I think so? Because of the way it was discovered.
Prosecutors didn’t break up the ring of bribing college coaches and exam proctors by using vast computing power, databases and algorithms, but by interviewing somebody. According to multiple reports,
Lessons from the Kardashian Stickup
This blog may be one of the few publications in the Western world that has never written the word “Kardashian,” but that has now changed. In the stories about the robbery in Paris of Kim Kardashian we found numerous issues that touch on the work we do.
After my recent book The Art of Fact
Sealed Court Documents During Due Diligence
Over the past few days we’ve dealt with two cases where our clients were deeply invested in the question of whether or not the contents of sealed court documents could be made public. And our answer to both of them was the same: If someone knows about the documents, some of the information might
The Key to a Good Interview is Silence
We wrote in our pieces “What Greg Smith and Goldman Sachs Tell Us About Investigations” and “Hiring Due Diligence Should Include an Attitude Check” about how indispensable it is to talk to people during an investigation. No matter how thorough a database may be, no matter how savvy your search terms
The Investigation Starts With the Client Interview
We have written extensively about the importance of good interview skills, in our blog entries “What Greg Smith and Goldman Sachs Tell Us About Investigations” and “Hiring Due Diligence Should Include an Attitude Check.” Professionals whose work depends on their ability to interview well—investigators, journalists, lawyers, doctors—know that it’s an art, honed