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Civil Litigation

Professional Development Plan

STEP-BY-STEP GUIDANCE

This professional development plan takes you step by step through the most essential elements of civil litigation practice.

Usage note
Categories
Categories
Categories
  • Overview
  • Unit 1: Practicing in the Massachusetts District and Superior Courts
  • Unit 2: Drafting Pleadings
  • Unit 3: Written and Oral Advocacy
  • Unit 4: Obtaining Pretrial Security
  • Unit 5: Motion Practice
  • Unit 6: Preparing Discovery
  • Unit 7: Discovery Motions
  • Unit 8: Superior Court Business Litigation Session
  • Unit 9: Alternatives to Litigation
  • Unit 10: Issues Related to Settlement
  • Unit 11: Pretrial Preparation
  • Unit 12: Use of Experts
  • Unit 13: Presenting Evidence
  • Unit 14: Trying the Case – Trial Techniques
  • Unit 15: Proving Liability and Damages
  • Unit 16: Jury Issues
  • Unit 17: Judgment
  • Unit 18: Trial and Posttrial Motions
  • Unit 19: Appellate Advocacy
  • Unit 20: Chapter 93A Practice
  • Unit 21: Motor Vehicle Torts
  • Unit 22: Business Torts
  • Unit 23: Insurance Litigation
  • Unit 24: Medical Malpractice
  • Unit 25: Product Liability
  • Unit 26: Premises Liability
  • Unit 27: Federal Civil Litigation

Overview

New Lawyers: To help you get started on your professional development path, try your first Unit for FREE – a $50 value. Once you make your choice, choose the red "Select Free Unit" button. Please note: you will be asked to verify your Massachusetts Bar admission date and BBO number to complete your free selection.

This professional development plan takes you step by step through the most essential elements of civil litigation practice.


How to Use the Plan


Click on a unit to identify relevant online resources that have been selected from MCLE’s collection of programs and publications. Then click on any link to


  • view a recommended program or specific lecture,
  • read a relevant chapter,
  • select a sample form, or
  • choose a training module with a practical demonstration by MCLE's highly experienced faculty.

The resources identified represent only a small portion of what is available on MCLE’s website. To see what else is available on any given topic, click the “See All MCLE Resources” link at the bottom of each unit to conduct a search for other full programs, individual lectures, chapters and forms.


Ongoing Updates and Additions


We continue to work on this plan and are adding dynamic content to each of these topics on a regular basis, including new programs and lectures, information from our books, and demonstrations. Keep checking back for updates and new material. We also look forward to your suggestions on how we can make this plan the most effective tool for your professional development and training needs.


Other Available Resources


In addition to the resources available through the professional development plan, MCLE offers in-person programming for developing core competencies and providing opportunities to engage with the civil litigation practice community. MCLE’s signature BasicsPlus!® programs help you master the fundamental concepts, law, and skills to represent your clients successfully. These one- and two-day primers include Civil Trial Advocacy, Pretrial Litigation, Evaluating, Settling, & Trying Personal Injury Cases, Civil Deposition Practice, and Civil Discovery Practice. MCLE’s annual practice-area conferences provide cutting-edge analyses of the latest practice developments and opportunities to share ideas with attorneys in similar practices from around the state. They include: New England Civil Trial Advocacy Conference, New England ADR and the Law Conference, New England Personal Injury Law Conference, and Business Litigation Conference. If you are building a civil litigation practice, be sure to attend MCLE’s Trial Advocacy Workshop offered every summer for an intensive week-long, hands-on bootcamp to help you hone your skills and learn the techniques needed to advocate for your clients. And to enhance your deposition skills, MCLE offers its two-day, highly-acclaimed Taking Depositions Workshop twice each year, in the fall and spring.


Note to Firm Training Directors and Law School Librarians & Clinical Program Directors


MCLE’s professional development plans have been designed to complement in-house training and law school educational programs. Firms can tailor plans to the specific needs of their training programs—taking associates unit by unit through an entire practice area plan or targeting only the areas of greatest relevance. Law school faculty and clinical program directors can use professional development plans to identify lectures, demonstrations, articles and forms for use in the classroom, as a supplement to classroom presentations, or to support the student’s representation of clients in the school’s clinical program. If your firm or law school subscribes to the MCLE OnlinePass®, all the electronic resources included in MCLE’s professional development plans are instantly accessible to everyone in your firm or school.


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Usage Note

All of Massachusetts Continuing Legal Education, Inc.'s ("MCLE's") products, services, and communications ("MCLE Products") are offered solely as an aid to developing and maintaining professional competence. The statements and other content in MCLE Products may not apply to your circumstances and no legal, tax, accounting, or other professional advice is being rendered by MCLE or its trustees, officers, sponsors, or staff, or by its authors, speakers, or other contributors. No attorney-client relationship is formed by the purchase, receipt, custody, or use of MCLE Products. The statements and other content in MCLE Products do not reflect a position of and are not ratified, endorsed, or verified by MCLE or its trustees, officers, sponsors, or staff. Contributors of statements and other content in MCLE Products are third-party contributors and are not agents of MCLE. No agency relationship, either express, implied, inherent or apparent, exists between MCLE and any third-party contributor to MCLE Products.

Due to the rapidly changing nature of the law, the statements and other content in MCLE Products may become outdated. Attorneys using MCLE Products should research original and current sources of authority. Nonattorneys using MCLE Products are encouraged to seek the legal advice of a qualified attorney.

By using MCLE Products, the user thereof agrees to the terms and conditions set forth herein, which are severable in the event that any provision is deemed unlawful, unenforceable, or void. To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, MCLE Products are provided on an "As Is," "As Available" basis and no warranties or representations of any kind, express or implied, with respect to MCLE Products are made by MCLE or its trustees, officers, sponsors, or staff, individually or jointly. To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, neither MCLE nor its trustees, officers, sponsors, or staff are responsible for the statements and other content in MCLE Products or liable for any claim, loss, injury, or damages of any kind (including, without limitations, attorney fees and costs) arising from or involving the use of MCLE Products.

Failure to enforce any provision of these terms and conditions will not be deemed a waiver of that provision or any other provision. These terms and conditions will be governed by the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, notwithstanding any principles of conflicts of law. These terms and conditions may be changed from time to time without notice. Continued use of MCLE Products following any such change constitutes acceptance of the change.

IRS Circular 230 Notice: Any U.S. tax advice found to be included in MCLE Products (including any attachments) is not intended or written to be used, and cannot be used, for the purpose of avoiding U.S. tax penalties or for promoting, marketing, or recommending to another party any tax-related matter or any other transaction or matter addressed therein.

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