I ran across an article titled Why Attorneys Hate Marketing and What You Can Do About It. It’s written for law firm marketers, to help explain why those who encourage lawyers to work on marketing can expect resistance, and how to help lawyers help themselves. Marketers and marketing-averse lawyers need to work on understanding one […]
You’ve put in your dues. You’ve worked hard to become the accomplished professional you are now, and you have all manner of credentials that demonstrate your expertise. You’ve worked with (and probably even held leadership roles with) a variety of organizations, you’ve written articles and book chapters, and you may even have served a turn […]
In the absence of clearly-defined goals, we become strangely loyal to performing daily trivia until ultimately we become enslaved by it. — Robert Heinlein You may be wondering how this relates to the law. Practice keeps you busy. Really busy. Aside from the rare (and, frankly, frightening) slow times that crop up occasionally, there’s always […]
I don’t encourage failure… Mostly. It’s helpful to assess and mitigate the risks of failure when you’re stepping out with a new activity. There’s no glory in the “ready, fire, aim” approach when you have the time and the ability to do some (but not too much) preparatory work that increases the odds of success. […]
Life has a way of throwing curve-balls. Sometimes they come in the form of emergencies that demand attention, sometimes they’re staff departures (planned or otherwise), and sometimes they’re opportunities that you just can’t pass up, even though jumping in will eat every bit of time and energy you have. How do you cope with those […]
In recent weeks, this newsletter has asked how committed you are to business development and how being busy does and should affect your business development activity. Both important questions, but… What if your brain is working against you? Prompting you to focus on urgent but less important tasks while shelving important but not urgent tasks — those […]
Have you ever complained about business development activity because you just don’t have the time? Might as well admit it: this is one of the top objections I hear and observe. I’ve even had this complaint myself. But here’s the sad truth: it doesn’t matter. You know that already. If you don’t have time to […]
Be committed. What’s the first thing you think when you think of commitment in the context of your business? Without commitment in three particular areas of business, success is unlikely. Commitment to succeeding in the business. What’s your backup plan if your business doesn’t prosper? Some professionals (especially the risk-averse, like lawyers) need to have […]
How do you ask for business? We all know intuitively (or through training) that those who don’t ask typically don’t get business. However, many lawyers are reluctant to ask explicitly for business, and rightly so. A flat request can disrupt a relationship if the answer is “no,” and, under some circumstances, asking can even be […]
My clients often tell me that they don’t need to track rainmaking results, that they just know what’s working and what isn’t. Keeping records may seem inconvenient and unnecessary. In reality, though, simple tracking will help you to get better results in business development. If you’re getting new business, you know something is working, but […]