A colleague once told me that a partner she worked with regularly referred to marketing as ‘the dark arts’. We kind of loved the idea of being witches among the suits and toyed with the idea of installing cauldrons or at least burning incense in our fabulous glassed in, city view offices.
And we laughed, with some bitterness, at just how much marketing – the way we did it anyway – was the opposite of ‘art’. Sure, we got a little creative sometimes with the word-smithing, but mostly we often felt like the only ones banging on about facts, and numbers and rationality. Not much smoke and mirrors in that. You can’t be much of a mystic when you have corporate style to adhere to.
But I digress. Fee earner training is arranged and implemented in a lot of ways. And marketing people in firms have generally speaking, not much to do with it except for the obligatory marketing session. So wrong! Just sets up marketing and business development as a sideline to the ‘real’ game, when the real game won’t exist without work coming in the door.
This is an area where marketing directors and managers can use their power for good (and not all on those evil tenders… surely the work of Voldemort or some overpaid type in an ivory tower… Do they REALLY need to have the exact dollar amount of insurance coverage???).
As professionals who want to be regarded as ‘senior’ (how many more presentations and articles can one person sit through about ‘does marketing have a seat at the table’ etc etc) we like to rub shoulders with the big guns. But I say aim for the young crew.
They’re bright. They’re impressionable. They need your help. Mostly they don’t mind that your degree is not in law/accounting etc. And if you take the long view, about a third of them will stay in the profession and end up in senior positions and you just could be their ‘trusted advisor’.
There are a couple of good reasons to exercise influence when it comes to fee earner training – one is about self preservation. If you are in front of fee earners and showcasing your expertise, then you are getting to know them.
The second is that here is a chance to make a real difference and set up your firm with some well trained marketers who can become self sufficient sooner. It’s easier for them to learn when the pressure isn’t on them and the stakes aren’t so high.
Training sessions need to be regular, conducted at least some of the time by you directly, and cover some practical and usable areas – including:
- Networking (aka ‘how to get over it and not feel a twit’)
- Biog writing (even when you ‘haven’t done anything’)
- Your role in client relationship development / what clients like about this firm and how to help keep it that way
- Managing expectations (internal and external)
- How this firm uses marketing to get work in – and which methods actually work for us / what marketing does / how to work with us.
‘Course, there’s nothing stopping you from being creative WITHIN your training delivery. It doesn’t hurt to maintain a little mystery – and add a little flair. Lord knows that at the pointy end of a tender submission we all know what an out-of-body experience feels like. So bring on the crystal balls and tarot cards, I say. Wear a cloak. Marketing as a dark art is much more interesting than marketing in reality – make it practical, but do it early when there is room for fun.
If you want assistance to review and better use your firm’s training program and striking the balance of internal and external presenters to get your fee earners up to scratch, House can help with delivering training, and reviewing your existing program and outcomes, and how well they align with firm strategy.
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