025: Kalpana Srinivasan on hip-hop dancing, making career gut decisions, and business development strategy

Kalpana is known as one of the top trial lawyers in the country. She’s also co-chair of one of the leading trial firms in the country, Susman Godfrey. That’s a rare combination. I took this opportunity to explore themes in Kalpana’s career and professional decisions, there’s a ton of great principles covered in this conversation.  In this episode, we talk hip-hop dancing, the role of gut decisions in career, how she approaches business development, and more. 

• (00:00) - why Kalpana practices hip hop dancing
• (10:27) - the role gut decisions have played in her career
• (15:27) - how to benefit from gut decisions
• (18:57) - how should lawyers think about joining a growing office
• (26:47) - what Kalpana is willing to sacrifice for success
• (31:27) - how Kalpana allocates her time and effort to new cases
• (36:17) - how the firm gets new ideas
• (45:07) - a firm Kalpana admires
• (51:57) - how a trial practice helps with running a firm and vice versa
• (01:00:47) - how Kalpana balances the history of the firm and its future
• (01:04:47) - the most impactful tip she picked up in her training
• (01:12:07) - how Kalpana litigates differently from Steve Susman
• (01:13:47) - Kalpana’s favorite phase of litigation
• (01:22:27) - my take on Kalpana’s superpower
• (01:26:17) - how Kalpana approaches business development
• (01:36:37) - “show, don’t tell”
• (01:40:27) - what Kalpana is most excited about in her career
• (01:45:37) - why she believes in doing both plaintiff and defense work
• (01:50:47) - Kalpana’s advice for lawyers