First Things First is the kind of work that rewards practitioners who treat it as a multi-year investment rather than a one-week project.
Written for mediators considering First Things First as one of several possible practice directions, with limited time to evaluate which one is worth pursuing.
Mediation involving First Things First often benefits from explicit education for both parties on the substantive issues before negotiation begins. A mediator who spends 20 minutes walking both parties through the basics of First Things First levels the information asymmetry that often blocks productive discussion. This is education, not advocacy — and it’s a core mediator skill.
The first meeting
A useful intake habit: ask the client to articulate, in their own words, what they’re hoping the engagement will produce. The answer reveals where the client’s expectations align with what First Things First engagements actually deliver and where they don’t. Closing the gap before the engagement starts saves significant friction during the matter.
Document the intake. Either contemporaneous notes you keep in the file or a follow-up summary email to the client. First Things First engagements involve enough small decisions across long timelines that working from memory six months in produces errors.
What happens in the middle phase
The middle phase of a First Things First engagement is mostly about data gathering, analysis, and coordination. The data gathering involves requesting documents from the client and (often) from third parties through subpoenas or formal requests. The analysis involves working through what the documents reveal. The coordination involves keeping the attorney and other co-professionals informed.
Analytical work during the middle phase often produces interim findings that affect the engagement scope. A finding the client didn’t anticipate may open new questions; a finding consistent with expectations may close lines of inquiry. The engagement letter should anticipate these scope adjustments and provide a path for handling them without requiring full re-papering.
What gets produced
Most First Things First deliverables follow a consistent format that practitioners refine over multiple matters. An executive summary at the top. Background and scope. Methodology. Findings. Conclusions and recommendations. Appendices with supporting documentation. Practitioners who maintain a template they refine engagement by engagement produce stronger deliverables faster than those who reinvent the format each time.
Walk the client through the deliverable before they take it to the attorney or court. The presentation matters; the same report explained well lands differently than the same report dropped over email without context. The walk-through is also where the client’s last questions surface; addressing them in real time prevents follow-up cycles weeks later. For deeper reference, see ABA Model Standards of Conduct for Mediators.
Common variations across matters
High-conflict matters require different communication and documentation discipline than cooperative ones. In high-conflict First Things First engagements, every communication may eventually be reviewed by opposing counsel or a judge; the practitioner needs to write as if the matter will be litigated, even when it won’t be.
First Things First engagements vary along a few predictable dimensions: client sophistication (institutional client vs. unsophisticated individual), case complexity (single straightforward question vs. multiple intertwined issues), opposing-side cooperation (cooperative vs. adversarial), and timeline pressure (negotiated timeline vs. court-imposed deadlines). Each dimension affects how the standard engagement pattern needs to adjust.
Most practitioners who eventually own First Things First in their market started without a clear plan and built it engagement by engagement. The plan that emerges in retrospect rarely matches the one they would have written at the start.
How VennBoard fits in
Practitioners who handle First Things First repeatedly find that the back-office infrastructure is the difference between a practice that scales and one that absorbs the practitioner. VennBoard provides the structured workspace that lets you focus on the substantive work — the part that actually compounds.
For mediators ready to see how VennBoard supports First Things First engagements, visit VennBoard.com.