EW 065 – How A Dedicated Legal Team Won A Precedent Setting Case And A Significant Financial Reward For Their Client – Winning with Inderjit Dhiman, Lawyer at Prowse Barrette

Gordon Sheppard (00:00.941)
Inder, welcome to the show.

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (00:04.376)
Thank you for having me, I'm excited to be a part of this.

Gordon Sheppard (00:07.195)
Well, I'm really excited because I got lucky to meet you at a prestigious networking event. And fortunately, you took the extra minute or two to say hello and tell me about a really profound win that occurred in your legal career where you were part of a team that got something really interesting done that affects us all, which is remarkable. And I'm so pleased that you're going to be sharing that win here with us here today. But there's a lot of people that haven't met you yet. So if you had to introduce yourself, what would you say?

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (00:37.198)
So my name is Inderjit Dhiman. I'm a lawyer at Prowse Barrette LLP. I primarily work within surface rights, expropriation, general litigation, and we also work with tech companies, startups, and IP. So those are my niches. I'm working a little bit more towards the tech and IP side of things. I've been a lawyer for almost two years now.

and been able to work with some amazing, amazing people at this firm and learning from some very, very good leaders in terms of areas of law, complex litigation and complex issues. So that's kind of me in a nutshell.

Gordon Sheppard (01:27.983)
Interesting, so we've got sort of a young sponge in a sense where you're in those early days in your career, but you're getting a chance to be, I'm gonna say mentored, get a chance to observe. You know, that's fun. This is a podcast for leaders. When you say you're working with good leaders, you know, if you had to say, if you had to make a comment on the leadership that you're getting to experience there at the firm, what would you say about the leadership at the firm?

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (01:52.302)
Alright.

The leadership is really, really enthusiastic in terms of mentoring young lawyers, young professionals, as well as giving them the opportunity to work in some really, really interesting cases. the leadership style here is a lot of you get a ton, a ton of responsibility and you get some guidance, but mostly it's learn with your head down, hands on the files, and really, really understand

the legal process from the ground up. So as a first year associate, I was able to participate in trials. was able to...

participate in international arbitrations with my hands on rather than just being in the background. And I think that's the style of leadership that really does produce really, really good results in terms of a young professional because I get that good experience, I become competent a little bit faster, and I can actually start producing and being a part of this larger team in a meaningful way. And it allows me to...

use my passion, hard work, and see the dividends back from me. So instead of just being in the background, I get to see the results and I get to partake in the results and get that recognition as well, which is huge as a young professional.

Gordon Sheppard (03:22.769)
Fantastic to hear, right? Learn by doing. And when we think about the leaders that listen to this podcast, that's a really good sort of a witness statement in a sense for observing the leaders in your group and their style for, know, they wouldn't, I'm sure they'd have enough guardrails on there that you would never get out of bounds in a sense, but they would allow you to go as far as you can to grow as quickly as you can to become a really vibrant participant in the entire group. That's really exciting to hear and what a nice place for you to be in.

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (03:41.091)
Yeah.

Gordon Sheppard (03:52.171)
at this time. And what's great is when we spoke at the networking event and I said, you know, maybe I'll just start off with this phrase. If you had to describe your biggest win in the work that you've been involved with so far, what would that win be and how would you describe it?

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (04:08.258)
So my biggest win currently is being involved in a precedent-setting decision. in February March, we were in a week-long trial regarding an employment file. So a wrongful dismissal of a shareholder in a company. What happened was the employee was there for their entire career.

had helped build this business and was terminated when he was about 60, 62. What occurred from this decision was that the bonuses resulting from shareholdings was considered unemployment damage and we also received

over 24 months, so in this file we received 26 months of reasonable notice, which is the largest in Alberta history. So prior to this there was a rough upper limit of 24 months, so regardless of how long you worked there, the maximum you would usually get is 24 months, but given the facts and given the advocacy from Philip Prowse, who is the partner that was running the file, I was there as a

helping him out and doing some of the background work, dealing with the client. But due to our teamwork and his amazing advocacy skills, we were able to breach that upper limit, receive 26 months, have him be entitled to these bonus damages, which were upwards of almost 1.5 million dollars.

The unique thing about this case, regardless of the result, was this was a 12-year process and the client was willing to do the hard work with us.

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (06:11.102)
and continue all the way to trial. There was multiple, multiple procedural issues going forward, lots and lots of court action, and then it culminated in this amazing, amazing victory for our client. So it was honestly the craziest thing I've done in the legal profession and...

Having had that experience so early in my legal career is invaluable. Like usually you don't get these kind of files until you're like six, seven years in. I got it during articling and it really informed the way that I think about legal work and how to kind of continuously put in effort regardless of how long it takes.

Gordon Sheppard (06:59.609)
Interesting. So we've got sort of a legal scenario here where you get to do the right thing. There's something about that in here. I can hear the pride in your voice in the way that you're describing it. And thank you for getting into some details that I need to sort of clarify a little bit and then also sort of help the audience to kind of catch up. A precedent setting case. So the 12 years that it took in a sense to get this, you would have caught up with the last couple of years of this process, you know, in terms of, cause the firm would have been carrying this case.

We can hear this fella, you know, with the wrongful or the dismissal issue occurred and then it took a long time to kind of get to that fruition. But when we say precedent setting, the influence that it had in terms of the win, this case, what influence did it actually have on the law?

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (07:44.684)
So this is another nod to towards longer.

reasonable notice periods. So previously, regardless of how long you worked there, so if it's 30 years, 40 years, 50 years, you would be stuck at 24 months. Now, it's more contextual and we've actually breached that rough upper limit. So if you are an employee who has been working at an employer for a very, long time, you're thinking you want to retire there, and then suddenly you're dismissed for whatever reason, you may have a larger

claim and the unique thing about this was the company would bonus out at the end of each year so having this 26 months entitled him to that last bonus and I just want to qualify before we get even further into this precedent-setting case is this is subject to appeal so

It isn't finalized yet. However, just having this decision and this reasoning within case law is huge for employees. It really shows that they are going to be protected if something wrongful does occur.

Gordon Sheppard (09:02.565)
Interesting, so I'm just gonna pick up on that. have what was wrongful, proven wrongful to a certain degree. We have upper limits of the current law in labor, in a sense, said, wait a second, if you were there for a long time, 24 months was the max, but you said within the context of what you were able to present over this dozen year period, it was able then to get to trial and then move through to say, nope, the context shows that we need to expand.

to 26 months, expand the opportunity here based on what was brought forward. I'm going to say there's something in there about service, service duration, service impact. There would have been all kinds of arguments, I'm sure, that allowed this to occur. then we're looking at, when we say precedent setting case, this is a chance to change the law in the future, depending on, like you said, what the outcome is down the road. But that's sort of where it's headed. That's how big this is. Is that fair?

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (09:52.93)
Yeah, that is totally fair, now...

the court has this ability to breach that 24 months before this, lots of judges and lots of decisions were timid in terms of going past that 24 months because it was convention. There's a rough upper limit unless there's ex-tranuating circumstances, we're not going to breach that. And in Alberta, they never did. In Ontario, it's happened before, but in Alberta, it was never breached until this decision was made. And that is the biggest impact

that has happened within this case. There were some other issues that are novel and that did work in our favour. However, the precedent setting is that 26 months.

Gordon Sheppard (10:39.087)
Interesting, and so, and over a dozen years, because this is not an easy ride in terms of what we're doing. Great, so now we know the win is you were involved with a precedent setting case, working with the leadership that you described in your firm, and they were at it dozen years, you pick up on those last couple years, you get to dig in there and really kind of help, in a sense, get it over the finish line to a certain degree, in terms of how far you were able to be participating in it. So we know what the win is. When we talk about a win in this interview, we then get into what I call the anatomy of a win. So we look at the strategy, the work,

plan, the people, operations, and results behind the win. Strategically, when we talk about strategy, say, well, what's the vision, mission, values, goals in a sense? Because if I'm a lawyer and it's year two, why don't I just go with status quo and collect my fees and get out the door? There's something about the value visions, something of this firm, of these leaders that you're working with in the firm that wanted to stick.

with this, how would you describe the strategic highlights or values or something in there that made it so persistent over such a long time?

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (11:42.188)
Yeah, so there was multiple, multiple offers regarding settlement. However, at our firm, we believe in being innovative, pushing the boundaries, and really advocating for our clients, regardless of whether it's a novel issue or not. So if, in our opinion, he is entitled, and he wants to do this, and it is proper,

The leadership has shown that they will fight tooth and nail until then, right? So in terms of values going forward there were definitely issues. were definitely some doubt regarding the outcome of this file. However, it's

what the client is entitled to and what they actually want to see coming out of this. And one of the things that really, really did help the file and our...

almost confidence going into this trial was there were some small decisions that just came out maybe a year before that that really alluded to some of the issues that we were dealing with in this file and having that backing we kind of knew this was arguable and we knew that our client had the right facts that we had a shot.

And having that shot, I think, really showed the leadership in terms of we need to do this properly and we need to give it our full vigor, right? Regardless of whether it's complex, unsure, the whole mindset of everyone that I deal with at Prowse Barrette has been we're going to be thorough, we're going to put our 110 % in, and we're going to try to do what's best for our client.

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (13:37.486)
What happened was the best thing for our client was to go forward and go to trial and have our day there and really try to hit every single issue that we could. And it ended up being really, really good for our clients.

Gordon Sheppard (13:52.199)
Amazing and a good outcome for everybody. Isn't that nice that we can look into your values as part of the strategy in a sense and say, you know what, this is a firm that does the right thing. And that's got to be a fun place to work, I think, for the right type of person in your situation. And also how nice for, I'm going to say your partners to sleep well at night when they know they're doing right by whatever's happening. Because there's a lot of tough conversations in there along the way. You know, it's year five.

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (14:02.691)
Yeah.

Gordon Sheppard (14:20.199)
It's year eight, it's this happened. There was this delay. There's that kind of thing. And yet here you were sort of being persistent along the way. I'm sure we could crack that open a lot more, but I just mean to move on and say, anytime we have a strategy, we need a work plan. And we've already heard sort of the timeline. There's a moment 12 years ago, 13 years ago, whatever that is, where this case walks in the door. And we start that ride in a sense. And can you describe some of the highlights in a sense along that timeline for this case?

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (14:46.878)
Yeah, so the partner that ran the trial, he actually received this, believe it was either in his first year or his articling year. So he's had this file for his entire career, which is crazy. And there were some discussions regarding, we had an arbitration, how do we deal with that? There were some blockades.

in terms of procedural issues where the court was signaling, hey, we don't know what's going to happen, but we're going to allow you to do it anyways. And the thing behind this was the belief that he is entitled to this compensation and this is what's legally right.

And that's what kind of drove the file forward. And as we got along and as our client continued to get older, right, there are some definitely doubts regarding should we compensate, should we just come to a settlement and not get everything that he's entitled to? And the driving force, especially for us, was what's in the best interest of the client?

And that's kind of how we moved forward. And just to touch on the partner sleeping at night and myself as well, one of the nice things that I think for me working at this firm is we don't take on every single case if we don't think you're entitled to something or we don't think that something is proper.

We won't take it, we can refer you out, right? We only take cases that we believe that you're legally entitled to. So we get cold calls, we get calls from potential clients and we do our due diligence first and...

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (16:50.374)
And our duty to the law society as well as to our clients is to advise them whether they should pursue this or not. We're not going to just take on files, take on clients where we think, hey, you're probably not entitled to this and it's not going to work out. And that helps us in terms of our ability to continuously put in that effort throughout the years. And yeah.

Gordon Sheppard (17:15.867)
Yeah, even when there's doubt, right? Because if we're doing a 12 year process, there's doubt along the way, of course, and someone's getting older and who knows, health becomes an issue. And then, well, yeah, should we just get out of here and get the best that we can? But you said you were protecting, you said you were doing your best for your client. There's also doing your best for society. Like if this is one of those labor, know, precedent setting cases in Alberta, and we imagine our, just our aging population alone, there's gonna be more out there where there are...

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (17:22.584)
Yeah.

Gordon Sheppard (17:44.775)
potentially wrongful dismissals at other places where somebody has made a significant contribution and that ceiling that was there before at the 24 months and the limits on compensation that were there before now get an opportunity to say, a second, we have to, you know, we can look at this case and see what that is. And you folks have done a lot of the heavy lifting along the way to make the arguments to allow this to occur. Wow, interesting. So we know the win, we know the strategy, we've got to feel for kind of that work plan. There's always people involved in a win.

And if, you know, let's just take you for fun and pick up on your part along the way. How would you describe your attitude when you first heard about the case? Was it easy sailing? You get in there and just do it along the way? Or was it peaks and valleys for you along the way in terms of your participation? How would you describe your attitude through the whole process?

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (18:28.216)
Well, when I first got wind of the ability to help on this case, it was a lot of doubt, honestly. It's like, this is going to be a ton of work. We're right before trial and there does require a significant, significant amount of man hours. And when it first came to me, it was like, am I the right person to even do this? And the nice thing was,

the partner of Phil Pro's.

He came into my office and he reassured me saying, no, there's a reason why you're being chosen. I believe you can do it and I believe we can be a good team together. And with that in mind, I set foot forward and tried my best in terms of finding out the legal issues, doing the research and helping as much as I can under his guidance and leadership.

terms of my role in this, was mostly understanding what the partner needed in terms of research, organization, evidence, note taking, and preparing the client and just helping him along the way because this is such a... A lot of people don't understand how much work...

simply going to RU for three hours actually takes. And it takes a full team with Phil. So he was an art student. So he had guidance from some of older lawyers. And then as he became more senior, he started guiding younger lawyers in that same sense, right? So I was one of the younger lawyers that got the opportunity to do this. But

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (20:21.004)
It was definitely a team effort, especially from Phil's perspective, right?

Gordon Sheppard (20:26.267)
And I like what you're describing in there, which was there was a moment where he came in and said, no, you can do this. I mean, that's pretty, that's really shows again, the type of person that you're dealing with, you know, for the leader that you're sort of reporting into in a sense. It also sort of shows a sense of your own grit and tenacity. Like you didn't quit and go to another firm. You kind of hung in there and you stayed with it in terms of your own stick-to-itiveness getting through that process. Any other kind of key people that you would note in this win? Are there people in the...

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (20:31.532)
Yeah.

Gordon Sheppard (20:55.339)
that came along for the ride or is it mainly the people in the firm that you can sort of speak to? don't know, like who are the other sort of key players and how would you describe their attitudes through this thing?

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (21:04.92)
Yeah, so I can talk about the firm and there is definitely a key player in terms of opposing counsel as well. Jeff Hope was the opposing counsel at Field Law. Very, very courteous and he was very, very professional throughout. So having someone like that as opposing counsel really helps the workflow regarding progressing the file and ensuring that everybody has the right information before the court and both

clients get something.

that they're entitled to. So whether it's good or bad for my client, it's what does the law say and what are these two people actually entitled to. So Jeff Hope was very, very professional in terms of his willingness to deal with us and coming to compromises and coming to agreements along the way. We also have some very, very amazing support staff who do definitely help so much in terms of organization, ensuring that all the documents

together ensuring we have all the information at our fingertips such that the lawyer can actually do their job. And it's a very understated piece of work that doesn't really get highlighted very much, but definitely the support staff were huge. And I got in here at the

at the end so I only know the one support staff that was helping out primarily Megan Gursky and she was amazing. she ensured that whenever I needed something in terms of the file she would look and find it and have it at my fingertips in an email. She ensured that everything was printed out, organized, labeled and ensured that everything was

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (22:55.712)
in place for us to be successful.

Gordon Sheppard (22:56.377)
It's really fun to hear you talking about, if you know, it takes a village, right? Really to get this sort of, if you want to build a precedent and you want to do it right, and all I'm hearing at each step, by the way, is do it right, do it right, do it right. Your partner's advising you to do it right. Do the right thing. Do the right thing values-wise. Do the right thing by the law. Thankfully you had opposing counsel that didn't sound adversarial. They were simply following the law in a sense, doing, I'm sure they're best on their end to.

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (23:01.282)
Yeah.

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (23:09.58)
Yeah.

Gordon Sheppard (23:22.947)
advocate for on behalf of their client, but you said it created a respectful context where the law was held up in a sense. And then of course you got these great support people all through those dozen years. I'm sure there's a whole bunch more that we could describe and how lucky that you've got that team in behind you. so strategy work plan people operationally is sort of the fourth step to explore here. If we're going to change the law in a sense, or get this done operationally, we've heard we've got to go through what a lot of old case law in a sense.

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (23:26.168)
you

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (23:39.672)
you

Gordon Sheppard (23:49.595)
bring things forward. We have to bring in the best of our arguments on the innovative side, because you mentioned the innovation side. Anything operationally that are highlights in getting this win to occur that you think you're worth mentioning?

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (24:00.588)
Yeah, it's just being precise. would characterize it as being precise. So understanding what pieces of evidence you actually have before you, what you need in terms of oral evidence and things that people are going to say. So there was some aspects of experts, so business valuators, things like that. What are they going to say? Who's going to be more credible to the court and who are they going to believe? And then when we did...

the arguments so there's direct evidence so when we talk to our clients and there's cross examination and the biggest thing in terms of cross examination was

understanding the evidence and understanding and predicting what the opposing client is going to say such that we can craft our arguments in that manner. And the nice thing was when we doing that cross-examination practice and preparation, I was actually there helping, going through mock cross.

highlighting different sort of pieces of evidence and even just specific wording in that evidence and putting it towards the opposing client and really getting the precise facts out that were required for the law.

Gordon Sheppard (25:24.891)
You can see how much care is involved, right? In terms of just the operational steps, plus there's just being organized. There's gathering all the evidence. There's, I heard oral versus written evidence in terms of what we're doing going forward. There's so many different things involved there. And anything else you want to add in operationally?

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (25:41.536)
No, I think you've got it. It's more like operationally just being there consistently, organized, and just having everything ready to go that is precise because...

Gordon Sheppard (25:53.799)
Well, and I'll just tie that, I'll roll that back up to your original piece in the strategy, which is like, it's a, you have a values based approach to your legal practice, which then means that when you get organized, there's going to be a high level of standard that you're bringing to that level as well. Strategy, work plan, people, operations. Finally, there's results, quantitative results and qualitative results. Quantitatively, I don't know if the books have changed yet in the law, but there, you know what mean? Quantitatively, there was a decision. You know what I mean? That was made, there was an award of a number, whatever that is.

There's any highlights on the quantitative results that you would describe in this win?

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (26:28.846)
I think you've got it. It's just the precedent. Like you see so many different blog posts talking about this and different think leaders weighing in on their opinions on the decision and what it means to the legal profession overall in terms of employment law. it's massive. Like I didn't think I'd be involved in a case like this so early in my career. So...

I think you've got it. Quantitatively, it's a case and people are relying upon it.

Gordon Sheppard (27:00.273)
it

Gordon Sheppard (27:03.643)
And people will rely on it. So to actually be involved in a case, a precedent setting case, is a once in a, possibly a once in a career type thing. I can't, no one, it'd be interesting to see when you guys get called about the movie rights to actually make this occur or whatever as we go along the way. Anytime we have results, we have quantitative results, but we also have qualitative results. How does it feel to be involved in this?

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (27:16.194)
Yes.

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (27:25.614)
immense pride is the way that I would describe it. Just having that, I guess, circular around solutions from going from hard work, not knowing what's going to happen, to seeing your hard work actually play out and come to a good solution is an immense sense of pride.

especially for me. know everybody at the firm was proud about the decision. I know Phil is proud.

For me, that is the singular emotion that I feel whenever I talk about this decision and my work and my role within it. Regardless of how many hours you put in, the sacrifices, it always feels worth it after you've gotten something like this, especially with our client being so happy with the decision, being grateful. It's just an all around proud feeling.

Gordon Sheppard (28:23.013)
all around proud feeling and it really kind of puts a bow on describing this win and thank you for sharing that sort of story along the way. It's interesting, a lot of times when I'm just at the end here, because it's leaders that are listening to this podcast, what did you learn about leadership that you would pass along here? Just a couple sentences as we're getting out the door here at the end of the interview, but what do you, what'd you learn about leadership in this process?

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (28:49.326)
I think trusting others to do good quality work while also encouraging them at the same time is important. So whenever I late in the office or early in the morning, on the weekends,

the partners would still be here too, the one that was working on it. And he was there with me throughout this, encouraging me, as well as putting in those hours too. It wasn't a, hey, you do this and I'm gonna go enjoy my evenings. It was, we're in this together. And I think that's so important in terms of leadership, because if I'm someone that's young and in your team and I see you just flaking things off, it builds that sort of...

mentality within your juniors. And here I'm gaining that experience that, sometimes it is a long haul. And if you can do it, it'll pay off in the end.

Gordon Sheppard (29:52.571)
Massive pride in the win, massive leadership opportunity in terms of walking side by side and being in the office together as you kind of go through all this together. What a lucky opportunity to meet someone in a legal precedent setting case and that you've shared it here today with the audience. I just feel so grateful. Thank you so much for being on the show.

Inderjit Singh Dhiman (30:12.93)
no problem. Thank you for having me. It was honestly so much fun to meet you and be a part of this podcast. I'm gonna enjoy tuning in in the future as well.

Gordon Sheppard (30:29.383)
Painless!