Welcome to the Blogosphere John DeGroote!

Please give a warm welcome to John DeGroote, a Dallas-based lawyer, who has just launched his new blog, Settlement Perspectives. John brings a wealth of experience to his perspective, including trying cases as a lawyer in private practice, settling cases worldwide as chief litigation counsel for the consulting arm of a Big Four accounting firm and training as a mediator.

One of the goals of John's blog is to teach young lawyers about negotiation:

"Today’s associates have to work harder than ever to develop their negotiation skills. When I began my career in 1990, the partners I worked for asked me to sit in on speakerphone-moderated settlement conferences, to attend face-to-face settlement meetings, and to participate in mediations (a relatively unproven concept at the time). I was lucky, even then. Today, younger lawyers — and their clients — live with the results of others’ settlement discussions, but their participation is second hand if they get to participate at all. Cell phone settlement talks and email “conversations” by definition exclude the rest of the team from real-time involvement in resolving disputes. While today’s motivated young lawyers have to learn how and why the discussions unfolded the way they did after the fact, I believe additional perspectives on the settlement process can only help."

John DeGroote is a colleague we can all learn from. I'm glad you've joined us in the blogosphere, John, I've added your blog to my Reader, and I look forward to reading your posts. Cheers!