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Sam Levine is the Commissioner of the NYC Department of Consumer and Worker Protection. We discuss Sam's bottom-up lawyering, which both describes his approach to defending the most vulnerable citizens and his technique for developing the enforcement priorities for the agency. This episode reflects evolution of thought on Sam's practice - he suggested in his last episode that working for a city government may be underrated, and we explore how Sam has applied his own advice. Some key ideas from the episode: - the importance of feedback loops in enforcement - identifying the gap in laws and enforcement - measuring compliance using data - sidestepping prestige to focus on impact - building enforcement consensus with multiple stakeholders

Paven Malhotra is leading headline-making AI disputes for OpenAI and other tech companies. We discuss how an early bet on 3D-printing as a frontier dispute didn’t pan out, but laid the foundation for his early bet on AI.  This episode breaks down the business development skills Paven began honing as a teenager cold-calling for roofing services to understand how lawyers should think about building a practice at the bleeding edge of technology disputes.  Paven shares the principles he’s learned in successive cycles of technology disputes for the playbook for how frontier technology disputes unfold in courts. We discuss how to litigate tech disputes when the tech and industry is rapidly being formed. This episode explores how to build a practice and litigate disputes under uncertainty, and find meaning by taking action first and getting clarity later.

Willy Jay leads the Supreme Court & Appellate Practice at Paul, Weiss. His story is about practicing the art of the possible: using technical legal expertise to understand judicial constraints of a case and find the best path to the client’s objective. After leading hundreds of appellate matters, Willy shares principles of appellate advocacy, including: Thinking in expected value: choosing between a high probability of an A– outcome and a much smaller probability of an A+ outcome.Adapting for new audiences: even when defending a trial-court victory, the argument that worked below may not be best suited to appellate judges.Writing for an unknown panel: constructing arguments that can persuade across different judicial philosophies and concerns.Understanding judicial constraints: focusing not merely on what a court could do, but what it can realistically be persuaded to do. We also discuss Willy’s approach to business development through short-, medium-, and long-term strategies, and the skills he is still deliberately working to improve after decades at the highest levels of appellate practice.

Matt Turetzky leads litigation at Kraken after four years at Coinbase, where he helped direct two cases that reached the Supreme Court. His story is about finding asymmetric bets. Matt explains how a question about pausing district-court litigation led him to a circuit split, why a seemingly strong Supreme Court argument ended in a 9–0 loss, and what both experiences taught him about uncertainty. We also explore how Matt acts as an “apex consumer” of legal services: building trust with outside counsel before a crisis, using fixed fees to compare value, and giving trusted lawyers enough autonomy to do their best work. He shares a practical system for decision-ready writing, including why the first sentence deserves most of an editor’s attention. The same logic shapes Matt’s career. He left a safe BigLaw path to become the first associate at a new litigation boutique, asking a question that reframed the choice: “Have you considered the risk of me staying?” That move led to tech litigation, Coinbase, and Kraken. It also reinforced his deeper bet on becoming a generalist who can solve unfamiliar problems at the frontier. If you liked this episode, here are 3 others you might like - 043: Priyanka Timblo on the strategy behind a $101 million verdict, being underestimated, and the benefits of being all-in Priyanka makes the case for deep specialization, offering a sharp counterpoint to Matt’s belief that a generalist can keep winning at the frontier. - 041: Rakesh Kilaru on decision-making tools honed at the White House, trial strategy through subtraction, and what it takes to build a high-stakes trial boutique Rakesh shows how trust, fixed fees, and a generalist trial model can turn the same ideas Matt uses as a client into a law firm’s edge. - 039: Ambika Kumar on defending free speech, building a tech-speech practice from Seattle, and litigating the TikTok ban Ambika’s leap into frontier tech litigation shows how eagerness, concise advice, and smart career bets create opportunities that a safe path rarely does.

Gopi Panchapakesan is a first-chair trial lawyer and an introvert. He's developed an understated approach that is an effective antidote to the typical loud trial lawyer persona. After nine trials, five in the last three years, Gopi broke down the trial techniques he's developed. We cover specific and contrarian tactics for objections, admissions, void dire, impeachment, storytelling, demonstratives, and dismantling the other side’s story.  We also discuss the benefits of constraints at trial, especially in second-guessing the evidence. And we talk about his thoughtful periodic digests that he sends to his network on lessons learned from his trials. If you liked this episode, you'll like these: Ep 049: Louis Tompros on creating adjacent bets Great advocacy can feel less like persuasion and more like giving jurors the tools to decide for themselves.Ep 048: Neel Chatterjee on testing assumptions Juries are powerful credibility judges, and that should shape how lawyers present witnesses, facts, and themselves in court.Ep 045: Joe Ahmad on sincerity over polish, and empathy and risk in trials Honest, disciplined advocacy can be more persuasive than trying to win every point or oversell a case.

This episode is about chopping wood. While the headlines about litigation finance involve splashy deals and volatile policy, Adam Gill takes us to the backroom to show the work of litigation finance is risk management. This is a rare opportunity to examine the operations of litigation finance. Adam discusses how he considers the law firms, parties, budget, appellate risk, settlement posture. The work is aligning incentives for the stakeholders - dealmaking. I'm happy to bring Adam back - he was the first podcast guest and an early supporter in my entrepreneurship. If you liked this episode, you'll like: 001 Adam Gill: how trading stocks led to litigation finance. Adam’s first conversation gives the origin story behind this return episode: how patent-litigation curiosity, public-market analysis, and writing opened the door to litigation finance. 046 Mani Walia: the lunch that launched a fund a decade later - trust, focus, and alignment. Mani shows a different path from trial lawyer to funder, where old relationships and aligned downside become the foundation for a litigation fund. 049 Louis Tompros: what trial lawyers need to understand about winning — Louis gives the trial-lawyer version of a question Adam treats as underwriting: what actually counts as a win for the client?

Rohit Nath's story includes crafting a $1.5 billion settlement with Anthropic, which if approved would be the largest copyright class action settlement ever. But I think what's much more interesting is the process Rohit used to get here: following curiosity and overlooked opportunities. We discuss: What Rohit discovered by reading a Supreme Court decision 100 timesThe deliberative and iterative process to crafting a path to victory in a frontier disputeVisualizing arguments to guide whether to take on a challenging matterHow Rohit hones his craft by listening to Supreme Court argumentsThe advantages of following legal issues others find boring If you like this episode, here are three more you might like: 049 Louis Tompros: creating adjacent bets — how small, adjacent matters can become the training ground for a frontier practice.047 Tim Yoo: how to study elite performers to find an edge — turning preparation into a performance system when the stakes move from the brief to the courtroom.046 Mani Walia: the lunch that launched a fund a decade later - trust, focus, and alignment — how lawyer-to-lawyer trust becoming real business years later, this is the relationship-compounding companion episode.About the host: Khurram Naik is a partner at Freshwater Counsel, a boutique recruiting agency focused on patent litigators. Before founding the agency, he practiced patent litigation at Goodwin. Khurram hosts Khurram’s Quorum, a podcast with in-depth conversations with federal judges, first-chair trial lawyers, and chief legal officers on their career challenges and successes. Khurram also shares insights on LinkedIn.

Tim Saulsbury is an IP litigation partner at MoFo. Tim's story is about doing the up-front work. Whether it’s: commanding the technical record to make the most out of trial advocacy, looking for creative early wins, orbuilding a moat in Japan with relationship-driven client development Tim anticipates risks by taking a client-centric view of what success looks like and builds a responsive practice.  This is another episode that explores the relationship between being strategic and making the most out of opportunity, and the relationship between focus and diversification.  If you liked this episode, here are 3 others you might like: 047 Tim Yoo: how to study elite performers to find an edge - preparation, physiology, and treating trial work as a craft you can train for.048 Neel Chatterjee: testing assumptions - juries, credibility, and how great trial lawyers revise their assumptions after real-world feedback.049 Louis Tompros: creating adjacent bets - being ready for openings before they appear and building a career through smart adjacent opportunities. About the host: Khurram Naik is a partner at Freshwater Counsel, a boutique recruiting agency focused on patent litigators. Before founding the agency, he practiced patent litigation at Goodwin. Khurram hosts Khurram’s Quorum, a podcast with in-depth conversations with federal judges, first-chair trial lawyers, and chief legal officers on their career challenges and successes. Khurram also shares insights on LinkedIn.

Alamdar Hamdani is a former U.S. Attorney who now helps clients anticipate where enforcement priorities are forming before they are fully revealed. In this episode, we explore how Alamdar synthesizes executive orders, DOJ messaging, leadership signals, charging patterns, and institutional incentives to help clients see around the corner. This is a rare opportunity to learn how an experienced prosecutor builds a practice from the ground up. This episode demystifies how this new chapter gets written. If you liked this episode, here are 3 others you might like: 049 Louis Tompros: creating adjacent betsHow to find your edge and create opportunities before the market hands them to you. 047 Tim Yoo: how to study elite performers to find an edgeBuilding repeatable systems and using deliberate preparation to create real advantage. 046 Mani Walia: the lunch that launched a fund a decade later - trust, focus, and alignmentHow to compound relationships for years before they turn into visible business outcomes. About the host: Khurram Naik is a partner at Freshwater Counsel, a boutique recruiting agency focused on patent litigators. Before founding the agency, he practiced patent litigation at Goodwin. Khurram hosts Khurram’s Quorum, a podcast with in-depth conversations with federal judges, first-chair trial lawyers, and chief legal officers on their career challenges and successes. Khurram also shares insights on LinkedIn.

Shashi Kewalramani has built a nonlinear career across elite private practice, the U.S. Attorney’s Office, criminal defense, the bench, and now mediation. This episode is about how skills compound across those chapters. Some of the most valuable legal skills are not built in the most obvious places. In this episode, we explore: Nonlinearity openness to roles that do not look “on path” from the outside why the safe path is not always the path to the best skill development how varied experiences can clarify what you are actually good at CJA trust is built through time, transparency, and action indigent defense can be elite training in client counseling the hardest thing is often getting the truth from your own client Magistrate jurisprudence magistrate roles are underrated schools for writing, discovery, and case management repetition builds judicial pattern recognition Compounding advantage skills learned in one role transfer into the next deep listening, credibility, and clear explanation become differentiators later a nonlinear career can produce a more durable kind of expertise If you liked this episode, here are 3 others you might like: Judge Vince Chhabria for more on why process is substance, and how judges think about managing real cases in real time.Judge Matthew Kennelly for a deeper look at judicial decision-making, docket management, and what credibility looks like from the bench.Louis Tompros for another conversation about nonlinear legal careers, adjacent opportunities, and building something distinctive over time. About the host: Khurram Naik is a partner at Freshwater Counsel, a boutique recruiting agency focused on patent litigators. Before founding the agency, he practiced patent litigation at Goodwin. Khurram hosts Khurram’s Quorum, a podcast with in-depth conversations with federal judges, first-chair trial lawyers, and chief legal officers on their career challenges and successes. Khurram also shares insights on LinkedIn.

Judge Richard Linn first pointed me to Louis Tompros years ago, when he told me my entrepreneurial approach to breaking into patent litigation reminded him of one of his former clerks. The story he shared stayed with me: Louis created his own chance to argue at the Federal Circuit by stepping into a pro bono inventor appeal. In this episode, we explore how Louis has built durable edge through high-agency adjacent bets: Agency create your own reps instead of waiting for permissiontake manageable risks to accelerate learninguse pro bono work, teaching, and relationship-building to create career-accelerating opportunities Adjacency bounded adjacent bets strengthen the core rather than distract from ittrial and appellate work sharpen each otherpatent, copyright, and trademark work inform each otherplaintiff and defense work reveal the other side’s blind spots Teaching teaching forces you back to first principlesit makes you more creative as a practitionerin a mistrust-heavy courtroom, the best advocates help the audience feel capable of deciding Client perspective the client is the fourth audienceyou can win the case and still miss what matters most to the client Gift-giving long-term business development starts with doing useful things for people before there is any immediate returnrelationships compound on an uneven timelinedoing good work and doing the right thing are not separate strategies The throughline is simple: create your own reps, make bounded adjacent bets, and let the learning compound. About the host: Khurram Naik is a partner at Freshwater Counsel, a boutique recruiting agency focused on patent litigators. Before founding the agency, he practiced patent litigation at Goodwin. Khurram hosts Khurram’s Quorum, a podcast with in-depth conversations with federal judges, first-chair trial lawyers, and chief legal officers on their career challenges and successes. Khurram also shares insights on LinkedIn.

Neel Chatterjee has been testing some assumptions. In Neel's return to the podcast, we discuss what's changed in how he works. The recurring theme of this episode was testing assumptions. That includes: testing what jurors really think about "big tech companies"building consensus through a new model of a professional association of lawyers, Law Firm Partners Unitedchanging his belief of how to go to trial based on what he learned from fifth-graders.We also talk about specific techniques to use to invest in your network, like looking for the "twofer". About the host: Khurram Naik is a partner at Freshwater Counsel, a boutique recruiting agency focused on patent litigators. Before founding the agency, he practiced patent litigation at Goodwin. Khurram hosts Khurram’s Quorum, a podcast with in-depth conversations with federal judges, first-chair trial lawyers, and chief legal officers on their career challenges and successes. Khurram also shares insights on LinkedIn.

Timothy Yoo is a first-chair trial lawyer who treats litigation like sport. Tim models his preparation and execution based on principles elite performers use: Prepare your physiology. Cortisol and adrenaline are part of the job; rehearsal is how you meet the moment.Pre-commit decisions. Use decision trees in outlines so you avoid reactivity under pressure.Credibility isn't just what, it's also how. Factfinders and clients read conviction, nuance, and authenticity through delivery.Be a reliable narrator. Your job is to help factfinders see the other side and draw their own conclusions.Adversaries are opportunities. Opposing counsel is your foil/dance partner, then you shake hands at the net.You'll use everything. Variety across matters compounds into mastery for the next big stage. About the host: Khurram Naik is a partner at Freshwater Counsel, a boutique recruiting agency focused on patent litigators. Before founding the agency, he practiced patent litigation at Goodwin. Khurram hosts Khurram’s Quorum, a podcast with in-depth conversations with federal judges, first-chair trial lawyers, and chief legal officers on their career challenges and successes. Khurram also shares insights on LinkedIn.

When Mani was an associate at Susman Godfrey, he took a new colleague out for lunch for a vulnerable conversation about the demands of elite practice. A decade later, Mani's lunch friend was now a rainmaker - and Mani was who he called for funding. In this episode, we explore how Mani has used principles of trust, focus, and alignment to go from trial lawyer to GC of a multi-strategy fund to launching a litigation fund: Trustbeing trusted as a peer trial lawyer created the relationships that led to the fundthe intangibles become the tangiblesFocusfocusing on Texas trial lawyers creates operational excellenceit also enables them to act faster on decaying assets using limited informationAlignmentaligning upside and downside with firms creates a flywheel for trust and repeatabilityit also allows them to take risks others shy from About the host: Khurram Naik is a partner at Freshwater Counsel, a boutique recruiting agency focused on patent litigators. Before founding the agency, he practiced patent litigation at Goodwin. Khurram hosts Khurram’s Quorum, a podcast with in-depth conversations with federal judges, first-chair trial lawyers, and chief legal officers on their career challenges and successes. Khurram also shares insights on LinkedIn.

Joe Ahmad is a trial lawyer who’s tried 100+ cases and built his entire approach around a simple premise: trials are a risk sport. If you need certainty, don’t go to trial.  In this conversation, Joe breaks down what separates persuasive advocates from “polished” advocates, and why the jury can sense the difference immediately. He shares specific stories (including a New Year’s Eve mistrial decision he’d never repeat) and practical techniques for dealing with bad facts, corporate narratives, and the emotional game of the courtroom. About the host: Khurram Naik is a partner at Freshwater Counsel, a boutique recruiting agency focused on patent litigators. Before founding the agency, he practiced patent litigation at Goodwin. Khurram hosts Khurram’s Quorum, a podcast with in-depth conversations with federal judges, first-chair trial lawyers, and chief legal officers on their career challenges and successes. Khurram also shares insights on LinkedIn.