Speaker 1: Hello YouTube, I'm Vince White. I'm an employment attorney and on this channel we answer publicly posted questions from YouTube users getting folks the answers they need from an employment attorney. We have a question here from YouTube user In HD Films. Very cool. Who asks us hey, contacting you from Memphis, Tennessee. I've always heard Memphis is pretty awesome. Like what do we think about Memphis? Is it gonna live up to the hype? Is it really good? I've heard a lot about the food scene in Memphis being really, really awesome. Never been. Gotta say I went to Austin, Texas, which I know is not Memphis or even really that close. But like Austin's food scene was like super hyped. I could take it or leave it like it's all right. It's fine. Best barbecue in the world. It's all right. I've heard good things about Memphis in terms of that kind of topic. So is it worth it? Should I go? But I digress. Hey, contacting you from Memphis, Tennessee. Love your show. My question is, let me say this first. My evidence was done in a text, not just any text, but a word group text. My question is, if they hit me with a low offer off the top, is it a good play for me to paint them a picture what they're up against by reading a little of the best part of my evidence? Is that a good idea? Okay, so like where your head's at, like everything you're doing here. I need to know how low is low. And we'll talk hypotheticals so we don't have to go back and forth. Like if you open it like 500,000, I'm just assuming people say text message in my field. A lot of times it's like pictures of genitalia or racial slurs or like wildly inflammatory ableist language or, you know, like really stuff that gets wild in text messages. So it depends on what we're talking about here, right? But if you like open it half a mil, like 500k and they open at 5,000, at that point, I would urge you to potentially, depending on how many highlights from the text depending on how many highlights from the text messages you have, with every counter offer, include a screenshot of like one piece of the text message from their, you know, from their, hopefully from some manager or supervisor in their organization, right? Ideally, listen, could be from a co-worker. That's, you can work with that, but you know, ideally from a supervisor or manager. And kind of piecemeal it a little bit during the negotiation to just kind of gently keep the pressure on, keep your foot on the gas type of situation. Had a lot of success with that over the years. Now, not all lowball offers are created equal, right? Like if you're at 500k and they open at 50, you might be like, that's a very low offer. But I would think, actually, they're signaling they want to pay quite a bit, right? They're starting quite high in this negotiation. You're at 500, they're at 50. They're clearly looking to pay six figures. Probably, probably they're aiming for north of 200. That's my read of that situation. Now, north of 200 might not do it for you. I'm not saying it should or shouldn't. I don't know what you have. I don't know your case, right? But when somebody opens up at 50 and they're signaling, yeah, I want to give you six figures on this one. Well, you probably don't have to beat them around the head quite so much as you would otherwise, in my opinion, right? So I would almost say keep things a little bit more cordial at that point and just try to structure your counter demands in light of the text messages, right? So like you open at 500, 500,000, they go at 50k. My response might sound something like, listen, I respect where you're opening here. I understand this is a negotiation. I do, I understand, right? But in light of the text messages, we both know this case is probably going to have to settle. I can't see you going forward on this case. So listen, you move to 50 and I appreciate that. I will come down from 500. I will come down to 480, 475, right? And you didn't have to stick a screenshot in there for that to be a little bit of a, right? But you're just like, I appreciate where you're going and I appreciate what you're signaling. And we're having a nice civil discussion about righting some wrongs. And I understand the attorneys involved here, the defense counsel, aren't the ones who said the things or whatever happened in those text messages. Those are different human beings. It doesn't mean the defense counsel are great human beings. They might be, they often are, but you know, I'm just saying they're not the ones who did the thing. So you can keep it real nicey nice, real civil. I want to say gentlemanly, but that really doesn't serve the interests of at least half of our audience, probably more than that, frankly. So that might be the way I would go with a very high end of the lowball offers. And listen, 50K is never insulting in our field. Even if you're like, listen, this case is probably worth 2.5 mil. 50K is probably all that defense attorney could get in that moment and they're trying to get more. They might agree with you it's a seven figure case, right? But it's hard to shake seven figures out of a CFO who doesn't really understand the law or understand how bad this could get in front of a jury, right? And that can take time. So a lot of times you'll get apologetic versions of the 50K like, hey, this is what I have authorization for today. I'm working on it. I'm working on it. This is not our last best final. I'm working on it. But today I have 50K for you. And I heard your demand. I'm not going to say I fully agree with your demand. I don't think that's the correct number, but I do agree with what I believe is your sentiment that 50K is not the number either. And so I'm going to try to get you more. And that's a defense attorney who's being, I think, negotiating a good fit, right? I mean, listen, they could be lying. They're often lying. But odds are, statistically speaking, I think that person's probably going to try to get you more money. It might not be the amount of money you're looking for. And that's a different story. But, you know, they're going to try to get you a little bit higher before you got to start turning those screws on them to really get the money that you're looking for in this settlement. So in HD films, I hope this helps. If it does, if it does, like, subscribe, comment down below. You don't mention here if you have representation. Always a big factor. Often not having representation. And this is not a pitch. I'm not trying to get you to hire me. Hire local attorneys in Memphis, okay? There happens to be a couple of good ones that I've heard of. But if you're representing yourself, you will get lowball offers. And some defense counsel won't be able to see past the lowball offer. They, like, will not be able to engage in fair dealings, frank discussions with a pro se litigant. It's not even that they're unwilling. It's often that they're incapable of dealing with you in the way that they would deal with an attorney. And that's not a statement on your abilities. You seem like you're really on top of this. You seem like you really understand this industry. You seem like you got some good things going on. But if you didn't, if you weren't so busy, I'd probably be encouraging you to go to law school and become an employment attorney, right? Because you got the instincts. Now, I raise this because no matter how good your claims are, no matter how good your evidence is, sometimes if you don't have an attorney, they're just never going to make you the offer you're looking for. And part of that comes down to they don't believe you can try the case. And odds are they might be right, because you haven't tried a case yet. Probably haven't taken a seminar on how to trial a case. You probably haven't taken the coursework. You don't really know the procedures. So, in a world where they fundamentally do not have fear in their hearts for this trial yet, no matter how good your claims are, no matter how good your evidence is, they don't fear the trial because there's no one to do it. You may need to get counsel. Just realistically speaking, you may need to get counsel to have a big money case. And I hate that for you because it sounds like you're handling it very well. And you're going to end up giving like somewhere between 25 and 50% of your case valuation away if you hire an attorney, hopefully lower, right? Remember, if you had a really good case, you're going to negotiate a little bit with these attorneys, you know? Not with our firm, but with local firms, you're going to say, listen, this is a sick case. Like, you know you're going to make money on this case. So, I hear you that you want 40%, but I'm not going to do it. If you want to take this case at a third or 35%, we can talk about that. And listen, more power to you, right? Let's all make some money. Let's go. But, you know, if you have the really strong text message evidence, that is a source of leverage, even in your negotiation with the firm you're going to hire. I think you got this. I feel silly giving you advice because I think you got this. Like, subscribe, comment down below, share the channel so it can grow, all the good things. Take care.