In recognition of the changing times and the need for lawyers to be more than just legal technicians, law firms are becoming more proactive about providing resources and support to help their lawyers become better business people. Talent management is the new priority, and business-development training tops the list of things law firms are focusing on.
As law firms continue to explore and experiment with how best to train their lawyers in this critical area, it is becoming increasingly apparent that the most effective approach to business-development training is through one-on-one coaching.
Almost all firms offer their lawyers group business-development training, which can provide a platform to develop marketing skills and a business-development orientation. However, group training can only take things so far. The new wisdom when it comes to business-development training is that “one size fits one,” and for any real progress to be made, it is critical that the training be made relevant and specific to the individual lawyer in question. Here’s why one-on-one coaching is so effective.
> Objectivity and Perspective
Lawyers, like all people, develop deeply entrenched ways of thinking about things and doing things, and when it comes to business development, habitual perspectives and habitual ways of behaving keep most lawyers stuck repeating things that are not serving them well.
A coach who works closely with a lawyer is able to observe those ingrained perspectives, attitudes, beliefs and behaviours, and assess them with a kind of objectivity that most people simply don’t have. Understanding what is holding a lawyer back, and offering alternative ideas and approaches, is exactly what is needed to move lawyers beyond their habitual behavioural patterns and the associated marketing ruts that they tend to get stuck in.
> Immediacy and Accountability
Despite the acknowledged importance of business development, it’s somehow always the first thing to get pushed aside when there are other things to do — even if those other things are not as important. This happens because, importance notwithstanding, there is no inherent immediacy or urgency to business development.
There’s also a lack of short-term accountability: in terms of business development, the only person that a lawyer is accountable to is himself or herself. Over the long term, of course, a firm has ways of holding lawyers accountable for marketing, but even with policies that measure business development, the success metrics are still all about all open files and billable hours — not the marketing effort that eventually leads to those things. The problem is that, over the short run, business-development efforts and activity tend not to provide a concrete or readily measurable return.
The commitment that goes along with participating in a coaching program and being monitored by a coach – who will regularly assess what is happening, and who will give objective, real-time feedback – provides immediacy and accountability that are otherwise missing.
> Change and New Habits
Moving forward with business development is all about change, and about establishing new habits. That is difficult work for most people, and even more so for lawyers (who tend to be change-resistant). Regular coaching can be critical in helping a lawyer develop new habits, and ensuring that new behaviours are implemented consistently enough to turn into deeply ingrained ways of doing things.
> Moving Beyond Analysis
Another thing that lawyers struggle with is being over-analytical. In-depth analysis serves us well in some regards, but over-analysis can impede marketing progress. Coaching moves lawyers beyond thinking about marketing: it ensures that decisions will be made regarding what will be done, and that those decisions will be acted on.
> Guidance, Not Instruction
Generally speaking, lawyers have difficulty acknowledging any kind of weakness. As a result, they tend not to respond well to criticism. Coaching, however, is not about criticism. Coaches observe — but they don’t judge. They encourage, offer ideas and support, and make suggestions — rather than issuing instructions regarding what has to be done.