lose your eyes. Imagine an attorney. What do you see? More than likely it’s two suited professionals arguing passionately, perhaps dramatically, in a courtroom on behalf of their client.

Turns out that image is far from reality.

“The exact opposite is true,” says Lee Baxter, a civil litigator and shareholder at Schwabe’s Anchorage office. “Most attorneys never go into a courtroom. There are far more non-litigation attorneys in Alaska than there are litigation attorneys.”

Exactly how many more is unclear. The Alaska Bar Association doesn’t maintain statistics on its members’ practice areas, but the American Bar Association (ABA) counts 1.32 million active attorney members nationwide, and just 2.3 percent of them are members of its litigation section. However, membership in the ABA and its sections is voluntary, so the accuracy of that figure is questionable. In a 2022 ABA Legal Technology survey of private practices, 46 percent of respondents identified as primarily litigators; however, the survey was not meant to quantify how many attorneys identify as litigators, nor did it differentiate between civil and criminal attorneys.

Bonnie Paskvan—a partner at Dorsey & Whitney, head of its Anchorage office, and co-chair of the firmwide Indian and Alaska Native Law practice group—thinks the number falls somewhere in between.

“Only 25 percent of attorneys self-identify as litigators,” says Paskvan, who is herself among the majority who do not. She references an estimate by lawyer and legal blogger Dennis Kennedy after he examined the (admittedly limited) available statistics on the subject, which included asking AI platforms. “So it’s a myth that all lawyers are litigators. The statistics show they are the minority,” Paskvan observes.

Among attorneys who do identify as litigators, very few of their cases make it to trial. The Alaska Court System Statistical Report FY 2024 shows that just 0.7 percent of general civil cases disposed of in Superior Court were resolved following either a bench or jury trial. District Court numbers were nearly identical, with just 0.8 percent resolved following a bench or jury trial.

“Trials are extremely rare because they’re expensive and you can’t control the result,” Baxter explains. “So the vast, vast majority of cases are settled because the parties to the dispute choose to take less than what they’d get on their best day in court to avoid the risk of getting a result that is very unfavorable.”

Even though most lawyers rarely, if ever, see the inside of a courtroom, they still have plenty of work to do.

“On the civil side, there are will and estates attorneys, tax specialist attorneys, corporate governance attorneys,” Baxter says, naming just some of the specializations. “It’s extremely rare for them to go into court and argue anything. Most of the civil cases that make their way to the Alaska court system are family law, child in need of aid cases, torts, contracts, and some business litigation.”

Transactional attorneys provide legal services that don’t initially involve a dispute between parties. Drafting business formation documents or contracts, creating estate plans, advising corporate clients, writing letters on a client’s behalf—none of these issues require the court’s involvement. A civil litigator steps in only when the parties’ attempts to resolve their dispute outside the court system have failed.

“A litigator overall, I think, is someone who practices across substantive areas,” says Whitney Brown, an associate with Stoel Rives. “Their skill set is [one] that specializes in going to court, handling motions, appearing before a court, and trying to resolve a dispute between their client and another entity with the court’s assistance.”

Though non-attorneys may equate litigation with the actual trial, it is instead a process that begins when the plaintiff files their complaint with the court. That makes the litigator akin to a guide who utilizes their expertise not only to achieve a favorable outcome—whether getting the case dismissed, settling, resolving the case through mediation or arbitration, or a verdict—but to help the client understand the process along the way.

“When you hand a case to a litigator, one of the main things that they can offer is understanding the system, the kind of filings that a court would want to see and the arguments it would expect at a hearing or in a briefing,” says Danika Watson, a litigation associate in Dorsey & Whitney’s trial group. “They’re really that contact point between a historic system and the people who have legal issues. There’s so much legacy behind those rules and those procedures, and a litigator is a navigator for all of that.”

“You’re preparing your case. That’s most of your time,” he says. “What you see on TV, Suits or Boston Legal, is absolutely nonsense. An actual presentation of civil litigation would not be TV worthy.”

That preparation—issuing and responding to discovery requests, filing and responding to motions, and deposing witnesses—comes with a court-imposed timeline to keep the process on track. Litigators, Baxter says, must be able to manage that timeline and the deadlines that come with it, or else they risk negatively affecting their client’s case.

“It’s been really eye-opening to see the breadth of legal work that is done outside of the courtroom, and where the courtroom is not thought of as where disputes get resolved, but a risk to be aware of,” she says.

Even when litigators do appear in court, Brown says it’s often not with the legal fireworks people imagine.

“People have this opinion that attorneys are constantly in court, but the bulk of our work, the lion’s share, is certainly not—at least for civil litigators,” she explains. “I work with a team of five litigators in our Anchorage office, and I would say one of us is in court every week. But that might just be for a short status conference or a motion that’s being argued.”

With so much of a litigator’s work happening outside the courtroom and so few cases going to trial, specializing as a litigator requires more than just oral advocacy skills. The ability to write clearly, persuasively, and accurately is equally important, if not more so. Exactly how much of litigation practice involves writing, Baxter says, might come as a surprise.

“You’re writing so much more than you’re speaking, which is something that is discounted by the general layperson who is not in the business,” he says. “They think, ‘Oh, attorneys just need to be able to talk on their feet and in court.’ Every case involves so many motions and letters. It’s a 99:1 ratio—99 percent writing, 1 percent arguing.”

Non-attorneys may also be surprised to learn that, despite the adversarial nature of litigation, interpersonal skills are also hugely important. The ability to understand the client’s needs and desires, to be a skillful negotiator and be able to find common ground with the opposing party, and “know when to stand up for what’s really important and give on what’s less important” are all important skills a litigator should have in their toolbelt, Brown adds.

“Some might call them soft skills, but I think they’re pretty important,” she says. “There’s a lot of that that comes into play.”

“If you have a dispute in a specific subject matter, it would be better to go to a subject matter expert first, and then worry about if it’s going to litigation,” Baxter says.

If the issue does seem headed toward litigation, then a litigator either from within the firm or outside counsel can be brought in later.

“Our advice would be to find someone that you respect and trust their advice,” Paskvan says. “If it comes to litigation and that person can’t help you, they could refer you to someone who can.”