Social media is not just a place for people to share their holiday snaps or keep up with celebrity gossip. Business lawyers need to get chatting and tweeting or risk extinction.

I’m guilty. Guilty beyond reasonable doubt of having an addiction – of being a social media, social networking, social savvy junkie.

And I’m here to defend my case against the cynics who continually persecute and ridicule me and my fellow junkies in the misguided belief that social media is a fad, a trend – a charade even.

How many times have I and fellow travellers had to listen politely to the smug bluster of middle-aged know-alls pompously promulgating the argument that the beneficiaries of social media are limited to dysfunctional teenagers who have lost the ability to communicate by traditional human means, or fading ‘celebrities’ who are trying to generate some temporary public interest in their near-forgotten careers?

Countless times, is the answer. But I submit that we lawyers – and all those working in our law firms – mustn’t be prejudiced by the blinkered views of the frightened or lazy. Instead we should embrace the extraordinary benefits of social media. Why? Because of the simple and practical business phenomenon of the ‘survival of the savviest’.

Joining the dots

Let’s join these dots: global economic crisis, emerging economies, increased competition, population and employment time bombs, stretched resources (economic, physical, environmental), artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, genetics, social networking, the evolution of web 2.0 to 4.0, runaway technological acceleration, working patterns and lifestyle change, consumer sovereignty, spoilt-for-choice clients, too many ‘fat’ law firms, too many lawyers and increasing moves to dispense with lawyers at every level.

In the contemporary business environment, there are only three kinds of lawyer: unemployed, relatively low-paid assembly line workers and top-end super-lawyers. The third category is populated by those with the ability continually to generate income through attracting, relating to and serving clients in the space they occupy for play and work. In other words, cyber-space – social media and social networks.

At the beginning of the 21st century, the American inventor, scientist and futurist Ray Kurzweil predicted that by 2010 computers would ‘become essentially invisible – woven into our clothing, embedded in our furniture and environment’. He said they would tap into the ‘world-wide mesh’ and that we’d have wireless internet communication at all times. He was right, as the widespread adoption of smart ‘phones and tablets for both work and leisure demonstrates. And in 2010, Facebook wunderkind Mark Zuckerberg said ‘over the next five years or so, social networking will make it possible to pick any industry and rethink it’.

Playground and office

So let’s consider the legal profession. Because of the ubiquity of the worldwide web and the internet in business, not even the traditionally conservative legal sector has been able to ignore it. Social media has become an integral part of that environment – it is evolving into our 21st-century playground and office space; there are some 1.2 billion active users on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Google+ – totalling a sixth of the world’s population.

Law firm clients, prospective clients, competitors, friends and family use social media. If lawyers do not engage they are going to be excluded from the globally networked society and collaborative community. They will feel ostracised because they will be ignorant of the context in which the seven vices – wrath, greed, sloth, pride, lust, envy and gluttony – are now played out on line. As lawyers, if we hope to represent clients – whether in contentious or non-contentious matters – we’re going to have to understand and empathise with them in the space they frequent.

Social media is a medium through which we can interact on a more personal level with contacts, show-case our professional accomplishments, expand our knowledge, amplify our core messages, start and monitor conversations, find potential customers, carry out public relations, manage our (brand) reputations and provide extraordinary client service by satisfying the expectations of our customers in ‘real-time’.

With social media, a little effort can produce a return of a four, five, or even six-figure instruction, reaching a potential annual seven-figure revenue from social networking activity alone. With potential numbers like those, why wouldn’t we use social media?

The bottom line is that being a successful lawyer in the 21st century requires being sociable in 21st-century media. Lawyers who use the free social media streams will have a higher survival rate. And that’s why, all things considered, I’m happy confessing my guilt as a social savvy junkie. The defence rests.

Chrissie Lightfoot
The Entrepreneur Lawyer, CEO EntrepreneurLawyer Limited.
Author of The Naked Lawyer: RIP to XXX – How To Market, Brand & Sell YOU!

Please do feel free to comment on this post. I’d love to hear your thoughts…

There’s a perception that the glass ceiling has been shattered by successful female lawyers. It’s wrong, I say — women are still smashing their heads and much vital progress needs to be made.

‘Don’t mind me, I just like legs,’ crooned the male partner to the female trainee lawyer perched nervously on his office sofa. Placing a sweaty hand just above her silky knee, he provocatively slid his fingers down to her ankle and slowly back again. Stroking and caressing continually — he then proceeded to take her through the finer details of boiler clauses and bespoke terms.

This is not an overwrought passage from a romance novel designed to get the heartbeats of middle-aged housewives racing. Or indeed a pastiche of America’s latest television craze, Madmen. It is instead the kind of scene that is still regularly played out in the offices of business law firms — along with a host of other ‘hushed up’ behaviour.

Cracks in the ceiling

Several years ago I conducted some research that resulted in a thesis entitled ‘Relative work, relative leisure; women entrepreneurs in the 1990s’. In it, I firmly concluded that there was no such thing as the glass ceiling. If women were prepared to work thrice as hard, make the right bold choices, bring about the necessary changes in behaviour and ultimately take control of their career journeys, then they could, quite simply, shatter the glass ceiling.

I was wrong.

My research was flawed. I’d failed to interview women in the legal profession. Also, at that time, I’d never worked in it myself, witnessed what actually goes on or met the hoards of highly talented ladies who suffer from sexual harassment, bullying, ‘professional prejudice’ and ‘baby prejudice’. Those who dare to complain endure the daily patronising, megalomaniac, egotistical old boys’ club mantra of ‘if you want to get on in this firm you’d better shut up and wise up’.

In a legal world where clients and prospective clients are being entertained in lap dancing bars and schmoozed by high class escorts to ‘seal the deal’, it’s not uncommon for women lawyers attempting to scale the corporate ladder in London, New York, Sydney and elsewhere to be stone-walled and ostracised in conversations and meetings with male colleagues while they guffaw in their deliberations over which strip (or sex) club their clients would prefer.

Problems and solutions

But should this be the attitude and behaviour we’re proud of as a profession and business? Do all male lawyers behave in this way? Unlikely. Do all female lawyers endure and/or tolerate this kind of behaviour by their male (or female) colleagues? Again, unlikely.

Yet, when I recently posed the question ‘does the glass ceiling exist in our beloved business of law?’ to many female lawyers, the overwhelming response was typified by one reaction. It came from a female city lawyer who has managed to claw her way to partnership in a global law firm, and who also witnesses the daily prejudice against her female assistants and associates. She admitted with a pained expression: ‘I didn’t think it existed…but it does.’

So is there a problem? Yes, definitely. Is there a solution? Yes, there’s always a solution if we — men and women — are prepared to put our egos, ignorance, arrogance and prejudice aside.
In an earlier article I shared the thoughts and predictions from leading futurologists that the world is moving towards a networked global society, typified by hyper-collaboration, return on involvement, an appreciation by clients of emotional intelligence, the importance of human brand, interaction before transaction and a desire for legal advice based on emotion. Arguably, these are just the type of skills in which women lawyers, women partners and women in boardrooms naturally excel; for example, communication, conversation, engagement, involvement, emotion, empathy and relationship marketing (networking).

Girl power

Female entrepreneurs — buyers of legal services – currently account for approximately a third of all entrepreneurs worldwide, and the US Census Bureau predicts that by the year 2025, the share of women entrepreneurship in that country will increase to more than 55 per cent. And the UK-based futurist, Rohit Talwar, predicted in a recent report that by the year 2020, 20 per cent of the US working-age population will be self-employed entrepreneurs.

Where America leads in business, the rest of the world eventually catches up. Therefore, taking account of trends regarding the number of female entrepreneurs worldwide, we’d be wise to temper our attitudes, behaviour and prejudice towards women lawyers. We’d be foolish to ignore the fact that we need talented women in the business of law.

Why? In a networked society and collaborative world where trust, relationships, emotion and humanness are currency, where the number of present and future women clients is set to increase, where clients do business with those they know, like, trust, understand and share common interests; where clients buy legal advice on the basis of emotion, and justify that purchase with logic, it’s a no-brainer.

Fortunately, in adversity there is always opportunity.

Be sure to check out my next article because “well behaved women rarely make history” (Lauren Thatcher Ulrich).

Chrissie Lightfoot
The Entrepreneur Lawyer, CEO EntrepreneurLawyer Limited.
Author of The Naked Lawyer: RIP to XXX – How To Market, Brand & Sell YOU!

Please do feel free to comment on this post. I’d love to hear your thoughts…

Law firms can no longer hope to survive on providing legal advice alone. If they are to thrive in an increasingly technology-driven era, they must add value in the data field – as well as being generally more human.

Gerd Leonhard – described as one of the world’s ‘leading media futurists’ by the Wall Street Journal – confidently suggests that ‘data is now the new oil’. He proclaims passionately that the legal profession is in the content business, the marketing business and, ultimately, the data business. Why? Because the world is headed towards systems of peer-to-peer collaboration, unbundling and fragmentation. Mr Leonhard says: ‘We’re living in a digital society where there is a different world view on control, ownership and authority’.

Hyper-collaboration

The abbreviation RoI once stood for ‘return on investment’; it is now superseded by return on involvement. We are moving from hypercompetition to hyper-collaboration. We’re living and working in the networked society and law firms themselves must be networked. And to be successful in a networked world, the human factor of adding value is essential to how we use information and data. Other sectors – such as finance, insurance, banking and music – are examples of the shift.

Mr Leonhard suggests adding value means focusing on elements such as ‘time and attention, influence and reputation’, in other words, intangibles such as high-end intellectual capital and emotional intelligence.

Ultimately, he suggests, the key is being a human brand, where trust is the new currency, and where the focus is on humanity and being social. Interestingly, he predicts lawyers will be paid by virtual currencies in the future – for example, Facebook credits, as the public rating of lawyers becomes increasingly important in a world where we value interaction before transaction.

UK-based fellow futurist Dr Patrick Dixon agrees. He maintains that while there are current frustrations – for example, the modern world is already digital with digital clients, yet lawyers operate with ‘dinosaur interfaces’ – the future of law will be driven by emotion. He says, ‘what clients want in the future is advice based on emotion’. Evidence of this can be seen in the fact that lawyers themselves have already ‘become rated. If you post a tweet about law, Google will take it seriously’.

Barriers to entry

Nonetheless, concern remains in the legal profession that big branding is still prevalent and causing problems. The managing partner of a midtier UK law firm recently told me: ‘We must not forget that corporate brands provide barriers to entry’. For example, the ‘nobody got fired for buying IBM’ mantra is as applicable to the legal market as it is to any other, and can be seen in operation daily at every level of the legal services market.

But personal – or human – and corporate brands are not mutually exclusive. It is important to view corporate brands simply as the umbrella for multiple human brands in a networked, collaborative world.

Data-focused companies are building, exploiting and nurturing personal brands now in a smart way. This relates to how they use their personal brands and the customer experience within social networks (and social media streams) to leverage and build awareness of the firm’s brand.

It is a networked world and will continue to be. Trust and being human are – and will remain – the reasons clients are attracted to law firm brands. And all firms are going to have to look at new ways of adding value on the periphery of their core propositions if they are to remain competitive. Law firms may not realise it yet, but, to re-iterate Mr Leonhard’s belief, they are in the content business. In addition, they are in the marketing business and their value will be in becoming data businesses.

Shifting positions

We are shifting – and arguably have already shifted – from the oil age to the data age. The early 20thcentury world, in which the American industrialist John Rockefeller dominated, has been superseded by the 21st-century digital data age where the shots are called by the likes of Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg. Law firms and their lawyers need to shift their positions too.

Just as man cannot live on bread alone, no longer can law firms live on providing legal advice alone. If they attempt to do so, the oilwell riches of the past and present will surely run dry. Could the end of oil be the end of the traditional law firm as we know it? Conversely, could the rise of data value and focus be the beginning of the true business of law?

Chrissie Lightfoot
The Entrepreneur Lawyer, CEO EntrepreneurLawyer Limited.
Author of The Naked Lawyer: RIP to XXX – How To Market, Brand & Sell YOU!

Please do feel free to comment on this post. I’d love to hear your thoughts…

In a legal world flush with lies, damned lies and frightening statistics in relation to ‘lawyer shelling’ (my crude terminology for expulsion and even possible extinction of our treasured profession and the comfortable roles we once enjoyed) I reckon we can find great wisdom in a variety of books beyond the standard ‘technical law’ tomes to help us become better lawyers, managers or ‘whatevers’ in this wonderful industry.

Certain books can even help us make the right choices, embrace the inevitable changes, equip us with lifelong tools and skills and thereby enable us to take control in our career, business and life.

And so I pose this question to you: If we’re going to be successful in being the lawyers of tomorrow, today, what should we lawyers be reading to become better managers in our careers, businesses and life? I propose the following as I share with you now an excerpt from The Naked Lawyer eBook.

‘My professional and life journey started many years ago… as a wee girl when I began reading books and wisdom written and shared by gurus. I was hungry to “know”. At a very early age I realised that throughout my professional life, I was going to be working for and with business people, so I figured I’d better get to grips with understanding trends, understanding organisations, understanding the people in them and the people I will be serving. But first and foremost I realised that I’d better understand myself most of all if I had any chance of ever making anyone happy (let alone me).

‘Naturally, I gravitated towards reading stuff which would teach me how to “find” myself, understand “me”, make the right choices to create an optimal lifestyle and to identify my life’s true priorities. I was helped by the wisdom of Lao Tzu and Pearl Bailey respectively: “Knowing others is wisdom, knowing yourself is enlightenment”, and “you never find yourself until you face the truth”.

‘During my junior and teenage years of the 1980s, I began to read about understanding organisations (businesses) and trends from the works of Tom Peters, Thriving On Chaos; Charles Handy, Understanding Organisations, The Empty Raincoat; Moss Kanter, The Change Masters; James Collins & Jerry Porras, Built To Last, Good To Great; John Harvey Jones, Making It Happen, Troubleshooter and Thomas Peters & Robert Waterman, In Search Of Excellence.

‘In my twenties, which spanned the 1990s-2000, I focused on understanding more about people, including myself, and read more hardcore stuff, in particular psychology, spiritual, business and trends texts, by authors such as: Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Flow: The Psychology of Happiness; Maslow, Hierarchy Of Needs; Carl Jung, Nostradamus; Deepak Chopra, Ageless Body, Timeless Mind; Maltz, Psycho Cybernetics; Jack Black, MindStore and Bill Gates, Business @ The Speed Of Thought.

‘I was particularly enamoured by the technological revolution unfolding and the founding father entrepreneurs of the very same who helped create what we are doing right now in the legal space, that is, web based communication and interaction. The likes of Tim Berners-Lee – inventor of the world wide web, Vint Cerf – father of the internet and Jakob Nielson – authority on how people use the internet.

‘In my thirties, from 2001-10, I began reading the new kids on the block, in particular subjects covering marketing, sales, social media, innovation, change, customer service, communication, talent, futurology, law and ethics.

‘For example: Seth Godin, Permission Marketing; Malcolm Gladwell, The Tipping Point; Robert Scoble & Shel Israel, Naked Conversations; Gary Hamel, Leading The Revolution; Chip Conley, The Rebel Rules; Jack Welch, Straight From The Gut; Bruce Abramson, Digital Phoenix; Marcus Buckingham & Donald Clifton, Now, Discover Your Strengths; Tom Rath, Strengthsfinder; Gary Russell, Big Rocks: Balancing Life & Work; Philip Kotler, Marketing Moves; Locke, Gonzo Marketing; Ken Blanchard, Gung Ho!; Spencer Johnson, Who Moved My Cheese; Chris Anderson, The Long Tail; Regis McKenna, Total Access: Giving Customers What They Want; Ming Zeng & Peter Williamson, Dragons At Your Door; Clayton Christensen, The Innovators Solution; Richard Susskind, The End of Lawyers?; Ray Kurzweil, The Singularity Is Near; Roger Steare, Ethicability; Chris Brogan, Social Media 101 and Bob Burg, Go-Givers Sell More.

‘You see I figured knowledge wasn’t / isn’t just power. Having knowledge in the 21st century was / is going to be about survival as we move toward singularity. More about this concept in my next article. I therefore view continual learning as a life-long quest… not only out of pleasure, but necessity. Maybe that’s something you should think about too. Why?

‘Because your present and future may well depend on it.’

In a knowledge currency networked world, if you don’t want to be the kind of lawyer who is shelled or shelved, maybe pick up a book today. Not a book about law, I hasten to add, a book about what encompasses the business of law and what will help us become better managers; even better human beings, along the way, perhaps.

When all is said, written or done, even in a world full of lies, damned lies and collective wisdom, ‘with all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world’ (Desiderata poem).

Chrissie Lightfoot
The Entrepreneur Lawyer, CEO EntrepreneurLawyer Limited.
Author of The Naked Lawyer: RIP to XXX – How To Market, Brand & Sell YOU!

Please do feel free to comment on this post, share the books which have touched you, and add to the collective wisdom. I’d love to hear your thoughts…

This article was first published in the Law Society Gazette 23rd December 2011 and is reproduced by kind permission.

As Christmas comes but once a year, I’d like to share with you now a simple verse:

‘And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice cold in the snow, stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so? It came without ribbons. It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags. And he puzzled and puzzled ’til his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before. What if Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store. What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more…’

The above is a verse from my absolutely favourite piece from the Christmas movie The Grinch. You may be thinking where’s Chrissie going with this? So, here’s my take on it…

‘And the Grinch Lawyer, with his Grinch Lawyer-feet ice cold in the snow, stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so? They used to come without ribbons. They came even in rags. They came with bribery packages, gift boxes and loadsa cash bags. And he puzzled and puzzled ‘til his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch Lawyer thought of something he hadn’t before. Why don’t clients, he thought, simply walk through the door anymore? What if clients, perhaps, are opting for more. And whilst scratching his puzzler to the very core, trying to figure out how to give clients much more, Grinch Lawyer began to experience a fuzzy feel, as he mumbled and grumbled… WHAT’S THE DEAL?’

As the Grinch begins to understand the true meaning of Christmas I liken it to us lawyers understanding what our clients are really all about and what the true meaning of extraordinary customer service actually is. Have you ever found yourself thinking, feeling and suffering with Grinch Lawyer Syndrome? I have…

Three years ago I was sat at my sparkly desk in Grinch Lawyer Ivory Towers R Us Lair, *hands cupping face and elbows supported on desk*, staring at the office door, glancing every now and again at my email inbox, the telephone and my mobile phone. After a while, I realised that the new legal world order had actually kicked in and things were definitely not going to return to the way they used to be. We were in a new enlightened digital consumer age. Clients weren’t simply going to walk through the door anymore.

What to do when clients are opting for more, I thought? What is more? Why do clients go somewhere else? Who do they go to? Where, when, why? What do clients really want?

Let me share with you now a secret in true Spice Girl style – I’ll tell you what they want, what they really really want. For some of us, it will come as no surprise, but for others it may be rather enlightening… I read a recent survey (research report published October 2011) by Peppermint Technology – only a couple of months ago – entitled What Clients Really Want from a Legal Service Provider. It is the first fully comprehensive research into the role of the customer experience in legal services, post the Legal Services Act.

Obviously, I cannot share with you the entire findings (copyright ‘n’ all). You will have to read the research for yourself. But, I believe I can share with you one wee part of the report, a particularly intriguing piece, no less. The survey report asked a series of questions to law firms, consumers and businesses. Here’s just one example, I think, that will help us understand what our clients would like for Christmas, and beyond.

The following question was asked to consumers and businesses (buyers) of law firms (suppliers): ‘If you were purchasing legal advice how important are these factors?’

Respondents then had to rank six factors in order of importance. One of the six factors to be ranked was ‘they have a trusted brand name’ in relation to the law firm – “Brand,Firm”.

Upshot? Businesses ranked ‘they have a trusted brand name’ LAST; consumers ranked it fourth from last.

This confirms what many people outside the legal profession (and arguably legal industry and legal market) have long since suspected, meaning, clients couldn’t give a rats about “Brand,Firm”. Law firms have zip visibility in terms of their firm brand names and have been wasting their marketing budgets for years on “Brand,Firm” activities.

The research findings also confirm what entrepreneurial lawyers of the Super Lawyer kind, whom I wrote about back in May 2010, realised (The end of lawyers? Pah! This is the time of the ‘super lawyer’), namely, that what clients really really want is “Brand,You”. How can I say this with such confidence and conviction? The number one ranking for businesses with regard to answering this particular question was it was important to ‘know and trust a lawyer that works for the firm’ and for consumers it was ‘the quality and promptness of customer service’.

Ultimately, “Brand,You” trumps “Brand,Firm” in the clients’ heart and mind.

“Brand,Firm” is an entity. It can only have personality if it has a human being (us) breathing life into it. The client is telling us that “Brand,You” is the oxygen to the lifeblood of “Brand,Firm”.

At the very heart of what the client wants is the need for us to extol our soft skills, emotional intelligence, engaging behaviour and extraordinary ‘giving’ focus on them through our “Brand,You”; the elixir for knowing, trusting, quality and promptness of customer service.

What do clients want for Christmas? Grinch Lawyer, or Super Lawyer? I’ll leave you to reflect on what I’ve shared with you here. It just may help to snuff out Grinch Lawyer Syndrome.

May I take this opportunity to thank you for getting involved in my posts throughout 2011 and I look forward to engaging with you in 2012. I wish you the most wonderful, extraordinary, super and ‘naked’ Christmas

Cx

Chrissie Lightfoot
The Entrepreneur Lawyer, CEO EntrepreneurLawyer Limited.
Author of The Naked Lawyer: RIP to XXX – How To Market, Brand & Sell YOU!

Please do feel free to comment on this post. I’d love to hear your thoughts.

My tribute to Steve Jobs (1955-2011)…

Albeit the world is full of great visionaries and innovators, only a special handful of human beings through time truly touch the people of the world and become extraordinary change masters. Steve Jobs is a legend and one of such masters. His legacy, genius and brilliance will live on as we move toward singularity…

Steve Jobs: the greatest innovator of my generation, an extraordinary change master and a human being with exceptional IQ and unrivalled EQ. You will be sorely missed not only by the techy world but by the business world and the legal world too…

The iCyborg Lawyer is Near?

iCyborg lawyers: the future of artificial intelligence (for law firms, lawyers and entrepreneurs) - first published 21st September 2011, Managing Partner magazine, October 2011, Volume 14 Issue 2. Full feature article here.

Artificial intelligence (AI); nanotechnology; genetics; social networking; web 2.0 > 10.0; global economic effects; emerging economies; population time-bomb; employment time-bomb; working patterns and lifestyles; consumer sovereignty. Just a few things to consider for those of you who may wish to join me in playing ‘join the dots’.  When you do, my prediction that the iCyborg lawyer is near may not seem so ridiculous…

Universal truth?

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a lawyer worth his salt must be worthy of employment for his lifetime. Do you reckon? I put it to you that no matter how fabulous a lawyer you are intellectually, you will meet your match and be superseded by iCyborg lawyer within the next two to three decades. Huh? Guffaw. Groan. Harumph.  No doubt just a few reactions to my statement.

Well, I’ve recently returned to England after delivering a couple of keynote sessions at the Australian Legal Practice Management Association in Melbourne, Australia.  As the theme of the conference was ‘Adapt, Innovate, Inspire’, I duly spent the final 30 minutes of the closing session looking at the present and future of the legal profession, industry and role of the lawyer. My intention was to encourage the delegates to think, feel and act on what I shared, hoping they would leave the event feeling inspired, eager to adapt, embrace more technology and to innovate by re-inventing themselves, their teams and their businesses in preparation for the bold new legal world.

Legal beagle booties…

However, in sharing my vision and prediction from present day up to the year 2045 I fear a number of the delegates may have departed the conference quaking in their legal beagle booties…

Why? Well, err-hum. I posed the question “is the iCyborg lawyer near?” and then proceeded to suggest that due to the ingenuity of man – supported with evidence – the answer is indeed a resounding ‘yes’.

I’ve written a full feature on this subject in Managing Partner magazine; available here now as featured on the cover of the October issue, first published 21st September 2011. Highlights of what I share in the article include my belief that we’re already transitioning toward ‘two faces of the law’.  Two dominant umbrella business models have come to the fore in relation to what, where, why, when and how we serve our clients:  Face to Face and Interface. Nonetheless, ‘WHO’, will be doing the serving in the future may well be rather different due to ‘machine systems’ coming into ‘their’ own. In the feature I talk about the humanization of lawyers, the impact of nanobots and brain computer interfaces and suggest that come 2045 iLawyers will transcend biology.

Utopia or road to hell?

Actually, by this time, in a utopian world (if we so choose it to be and manage not to destroy the planet in the meantime) I predict there will no longer be a need for us ‘purely human’ lawyers.  Also, from now until 2045 it will be interesting to see how powerful pulsed magnetic fields which inhibit the ability to lie will impact our legal world. Time will tell whether this will be a godsend or the road to hell. Perhaps Susskind’s suggestion in his provocative book entitled ‘The End of Lawyers?’ may actually come to pass.

Undoubtedly, with Steve Jobs passing we have lost one of the world’s greatest technological innovators of our time. When we look back over the past 35 years and marvel at the impact Steve Jobs has had on advancing technology and introducing artificial intelligence positively into our world perhaps as we look ahead to the next 35 years the iCyborg lawyer may be closer than we dare imagine?

Fact or fiction, virtual reality or reality, one thing is for sure, as we continue to join the dots our world (and its technology and artificial intelligence) will inevitably evolve at an accelerating speed for “ours is the species that inherently seeks to extend its physical and mental reach beyond current limitations” (Ray Kurzweil).

Thank-you Steve Jobs, for dedicating your life to technology, innovation and entrepreneurship, for being brave enough to think differently, bold enough to feel and believe you could change the world, and extraordinary talented and spiritually gifted to actually do it.

Chrissie Lightfoot
The Entrepreneur Lawyer, CEO EntrepreneurLawyer Limited.
Author of The Naked Lawyer: RIP to XXX – How To Market, Brand & Sell YOU!

With the plethora of reports and blog posts of late whizzing around cyberland in relation to online legal document and service providers, legal innovation, the law firm business model and the future of the legal profession I reckon we’re transitioning toward ‘two faces of the law’.

I believe two dominant umbrella business models are coming to the fore in relation to who, what, where, why, when and how we serve our clients: Face to Face and Interface.

At a time of great change I believe a key differentiator in the success of both of these models and their adopters will be the ‘humanisation’ of lawyers. As we transit even more in the years to come, as Artificial Intelligence (AI) evolves further within legal provision and service and Singularity edges even closer, ‘humanisation’, that is, our ability to simply be human- a social creature – and naked (our authentic self with Lawyerly Intellectual Capital and empathy), will become even more important and valuable.

During August we’ve seen the following revelations:

• Rocket Lawyer has been backed by Google Ventures with a whopping $18.5million treasure chest. Rocket Lawyer, founded by a lawyer, provides legal documents for consumers. It has a network of approximately 6,000 practising lawyers in the USA on hand to review forms created by Rocket Lawyer’s documentation system. It’s not a law firm and the lawyers involved are part of a referral network; they are not employees. It plans to enter the UK legal market in 2012.
• LegalZoom, the best known legal brand in the USA, also founded by lawyers, has had $66 million pumped into the business in the last few months. Again, not a law firm, LegalZoom provides legal documents created via its documentation system and checks are made by its customer care team, who amend errors such as spelling mistakes, capitalisation and so on. It will also be entering the UK online legal market in 2012.
• Aderant acquired Client Services and CompuLaw for an undisclosed sum. Aderant, a software vendor used by law firms for billing, content management, and practice management is now the legal technology field’s largest independent software provider and its newly expanded applications catalogue is similar to that of LexisNexis, but without content and research services.
• Hewlett-Packard purchased Autonomy, which is a leading e-discovery provider, for a staggering $10 billion.
• Entrepreneur Ajaz Ahmed (the founder of Freeserve) has joined forces with Last Cawthra Feather, a UK Yorkshire law firm, to launch Legal365 (powered by Epoq Legal – desktop lawyer service already established in the UK). Legal365, an online venture providing automated document assembly where lawyers will be on hand to help fill-out fixed fee legal documents the customer has purchased plans to roll-out a UK national network of city centre law shops. Mr Ahmed hinted that Legal365 could even become a franchise.
• Slater & Gordon, a leading Australian law firm and the world’s first to list on the Stock Exchange is eyeing up the UK legal market opportunities. It’s one of its business priorities for the coming year.

Here in the UK QualitySolicitors, founded by a lawyer, is already up and running with its business model. Legal365 will be soon. Legal365 is a different model to that of QualitySolicitors (with its WHSmith Legal Access Points) by providing advice on the spot, rather than arranging appointments at another location.

So, the Americans are coming, the Aussies are coming, the techy geeks are coming, the entrepreneurs are coming… and the disruptors will be here to stay and to agitate.

The new legal marketplace

Clearly, the transformation and arguably re-invention of legal service provision is well and truly underway and, as legal commentator Jordan Furlong puts it, “we’ve begun crossing over from the old legal marketplace to the new one.”

In reading Jordan’s thought provoking ‘Goodbye to all that’ blog post, three statements struck me:

1) “the new providers and new technologies are not going to replace lawyers’… but they are going to marginalize us and ‘render law firms mostly irrelevant”.

2) “lawyers still have outstanding value to offer in certain quarters, but we need to concentrate our market offerings around that value, and we need better platforms for our services than traditional law firms provide.”

3) “lawyers are smart, knowledgeable, creative and trustworthy professionals who, unfortunately, suffer from poor business acumen, terrible management skills, wildly disproportionate aversion to risk, outsized revenue expectations, and a business model about 25 years out of date. The market won’t abandon them — they have unique and sometimes extraordinarily valuable skills and characteristics — but it will find the best use for them: expert specialists with limited influence over the larger process.”

I agree. I would add that as we lawyers become marginalized, our role and value both Face to Face and at the Interface will be in extolling our expert niche specialism with exceptional emotional intelligence whilst delivering extraordinary customer service (humanisation – naked – something AI and computers will never be… or will they?).

The franchise model

Not surprisingly, ALL of the business models mentioned above are different. But I confess, I was wondering when somebody, a non-lawyer, would come up with the idea (and act on it) of rolling out a legal franchise from scratch welcoming and supporting frustrated entrepreneurial lawyers who are looking to capitalize on this transformation, re-invent themselves and start up their own ‘business of law’ with all of the usual trappings and trimmings associated with the benefits of being a franchisee.

The franchise business model has stood the test of time in the business world. It’s a proven model which works. It could work for the new legal world, perhaps?

Imagine a legal business model for the franchisee where there are NO existing solicitors firms already at ‘the coal face’ with potential conflict where uniform brand, values, quality, outdated fee structures and legacy systems, policies and governance would be an issue. Wouldn’t it be a marvellous opportunity for a franchisor, attractive for the entrepreneurial lawyer franchisee and great for the customer if uniformity of brand, values, quality and extraordinary customer service was available and achievable by combining a joined up Face to Face relationship building approach whilst embracing online document technology, at the Interface?

It appears face2face solicitors has done exactly that. It is alive and kicking right now in the UK. As the first national franchise for lawyers and/or law firms, face2face solicitors is the brainchild of a team of business experts who have provided strategic planning advice to business professionals for many years.

I’ve taken a thorough look at the face2face solicitors website and, due to my curiosity, I even picked up the phone to ask them a few probing questions.

Now, usually, I don’t as a rule make such an overt plug in favour of a particular business model (seriously, I don’t ) but I’m tempted to with this one because I can see the mega attraction for both lawyers and customers during this transitional period.

What attractions do I see? Read on…

A new concept

Law providers, both existing and start-up, operating in the alternative business structures landscape – and global legal market place for that matter – will require a different type of approach to their business: even more client-focused but with a far lower cost-base to enable them to meet the challenges and exploit the opportunities that lie ahead.

face2face solicitors appears to be a new concept in legal provision operation, designed for small-to-medium sized firms and/or frustrated entrepreneurial lawyers who want to take control of their future in the newly competitive world. It appears to have been designed specifically to counter the growing number of web and call centre based, low-cost providers of ‘face-less’ legal services.

The way I understand it, it’s pretty much a ‘law business in a box’ where franchisees will be able to start up their business without the ‘this is the way we’ve always done things around here’ mentality and the ‘baggage’. I’m a firm believer and eternal optimist that the future is bright for progressive entrepreneurial lawyers and small firms who love the law but recognise the need to deliver it in a new innovative whilst personal (human) way.

What I particularly like about this model is that the franchisees at face2face solicitors will be vetted for their drive and passion in delivering extraordinary customer service in a new way to their clients. All franchisees are fully supported and receive continual training and mentoring to help them to develop and build their own successful business in the law, an essential part of which is the development of personal brands – the ‘Brand, Me’ – something which is dear to my heart.

A cool option

As I understand it, what will be attractive for potential franchisees is as follows:

• Accessing a host of ‘best of breed’ I.T. and services – including Virtual Practices legal accounting, case and practice management from SOS;
• Compliance and Risk Management embracing latest Outcome Focused Regulations;
• Bags of help and advice for marketing – something we lawyers would definitely welcome no doubt;
• On-going Mentoring on a monthly basis – business savvy support;
• On-going CPD training in management / marketing / sales / team motivation;
• Being part of a network of likeminded people;
• Being part of a strong national brand;
• Preferential PII arrangements;
• Lower start up costs;
• Franchise financing – to be offered; and
• Creating and building value for their practice for subsequent retirement/exit.

I guess if you’re looking to be a player in the new legal market place and would prefer to straddle Face to Face and the Interface, and you’re considering grappling with the challenges of taking the best of the old and integrating the best of the new, face2face solicitors looks like a pretty cool option. I can’t see how one could put a complete legal start-up business together for anything like the alternative capital and cash-flow outlay or loss of control and reduced equity alternative, as would be the case if one chooses to go down the external funding (venture capital; business angel; listing) route when Legal Service Act 2007 takes full effect.

This franchise model is worthy of further investigation, I reckon.

Professional evolution

As for the paradigm shift and getting your head around this model and potential opportunity think of it this way. As Mike O’Hara says it:

“Even though you went to law school and have spent your career so far practicing law, the truth is, you actually run your own small business—regardless of the size of your firm. And while you may like to think of your practice as a runs-itself enterprise, your long-term success depends on your ability to think and act as an entrepreneur (in between practicing law, that is).”

You may now be questioning yourself as to whether or not you are an entrepreneur, or could become an entrepreneurial lawyer. Let me help you. I’ve just read ‘Are You an Entrepreneurial Attorney’ blog post by Mike. In the post I found the following definition of an entrepreneur and an interesting quick quiz:

An entrepreneur:

‘… an innovator who establishes a new business … strong beliefs about market opportunities … willingly accepts a high level of personal, professional and financial risk.’

Based on information from The Entrepreneurs Guild, if you take this quiz you can assess your own entrepreneurial tendencies and entrepreneurial comfort level. Albeit there will obviously be shades of grey, for the purpose of this exercise just see if you mostly ‘agree’ or ‘disagree’ with the following statements:

• I’m great at and enjoy networking
• I’m optimistic about positive, successful results
• I need to do it my way
• Results derive primarily from my own behaviour and actions
• I thrive on innovation
• The most important thing is achieving the goal
• I have a plan, and work my plan
• I’m comfortable with change, ambiguity and uncertainty
• I’m self-motivated
• I’m a risk-taker

If you mostly ‘agree’ and presently think, feel and act in a way in relation to the above statements then you’re already well on your way to becoming an entrepreneurial lawyer and the face2face solicitors legal franchise business model could be for you.

I wrote a blog post a year ago entitled ‘Frustrated Lawyers R Us. Plan ‘B’ Mutiny?’. If it resonated with you and you’re maybe feeling a little disenfranchised right now, maybe consider a franchise.

As the legal profession and our industry continues to re-invent itself, transform and transit ever more so toward two faces of the law – Face to Face and Interface – I have no doubt there will be a plethora of new business models which spring up under the two dominant umbrella models to compete feverishly in this plump, innovative, new and increasingly fragmented and diverse global legal market.

The way I see it, it’s a wonderful and exciting time of opportunity for both personal re-invention and professional evolution for us lawyers and I welcome the ‘humanisation’ of lawyers (and no doubt many customers and lawyers do too) in the face-off between Face To Face and Interface.

Whether we like it or not, agree with it or not, welcome it or not, to quote the ubiquitous ‘future’ statement by Neuromancer author William Gibson, “the future is here… it’s just not evenly distributed yet”. You bet. It probably never will be.

Accordingly, “the great excitement of the future is that we can shape it” (Charles Handy).

Chrissie Lightfoot
The Entrepreneur Lawyer
(of the naked kind)
Author of The Naked Lawyer: RIP to XXX – How To Market, Brand & Sell YOU!

As lay-offs continue to sweep through Wall Street I got to thinking about our legal world and the movie Indecent Proposal. There’s a thought provoking and inspiring line spoken by Demi Moore at the very start of the film. She is reflecting on her (film) husband’s view that ‘A life without risk is like no life at all’.

I agree. To truly experience living, and not merely existing throughout our careers, business and life, the progressive evolutionary dynamics of our present decade (and beyond for that matter) is compelling us to get out of our comfort zones, to dare to be different and ultimately, to re-invent ourselves.

In a climate of fear, low morale and the unknown – something we’re all (arguably) dealing with right now – I reckon we need to adapt, innovate and feel inspired by both the finger biting challenges and extraordinary opportunities staring us in the face.

But to do this we will need to take some risks.

Why? Because disruptive forces are sweeping through the entire globe; in particular, the technology world, finance world, political world, business world and legal world (law law land) right now. I also believe and agree with Robin Sharma (a leadership expert and author) that success is driven via evolution versus revolution: ‘Small daily innovations stack up into stunning results over the passage of time’ (Robin Sharma).

I tweeted this recently which attracted the following response from Professor Richard Susskind:  ‘Good quotation. I call this “incremental revolution” or “incremental transformation”,’ (@richardsusskind 11^th Aug 2011).

We need to get a grip. We actually need to take complete control of our personal destinies, make the bold choices necessary and ultimately embrace the topsy-turvy changes occurring in our crazy world. Bottom line… we need to continually innovate (more so now than ever) because the world is always innovating. We need to re-invent ourselves and thereby make the transformation required to make a lasting success of our careers, businesses and lives now and in the years to come.

IMHO Susskind’s view sits nicely with that of Whatify’s when reporting on a news source which suggests that there are only three kinds of innovation remaining (Whatify newsletter, 17 Aug 2011); a welcome revelation no doubt for those of us with bad memories or those of us who don’t have time to explore the other five.

The three kinds of innovation are as follows:

1) Incremental Innovation: that is, doing what we have to, to keep existing products up to date. Apparently, many consumer goods companies tend to spend more than half of their innovation budgets on incremental innovations simply because they lack the ability to systematically scan the market for the most attractive opportunities and develop winning ideas to capitalize on them.

Question: does the average law firm and its leaders even scan the market for opportunities and encourage their lawyers to develop ideas, never mind have an innovation budget?  Answer: moot.

2) Platform Innovation: this is about coming up with a completely new product. Coke Zero is a good example where the focus here is to grow the innovator’s market share by giving customers a reason to switch from a competitor brand. Now, this is an interesting type of innovation, particularly in the present UK legal market place where we’re seeing strong consumer brands, for example, Tesco, the Co-Operative and AA (to name a few) and new brands such as QualitySolicitors and face2face solicitors enter the legal playing field.

It’ll be interesting to see whether their propositions are compelling enough to entice customers away from their existing legal advisers and how much existing and latent market share these brands mop up.

3) Breakthrough Innovation: this is where we come up with a ‘market-changing innovation’, for example, the iPad. The test seems to be ‘…delivering new benefits to customers and creating a new market that the innovator can dominate for some time.’ Online legal document services (including legal advice) such as Epoq, Rocket Lawyer, Law Pivot and Legal Zoom spring to mind here.

I am not at all surprised that such groundbreaking innovations can attract staggering amounts of venture capital from the likes of Google Ventures (as in the case of Rocket Lawyer). Only last year Mark Zuckerburg (founder of Facebook) said that over the next 5 years or so social networking will make it possible to ‘pick any industry and rethink it’.

Question: could this mean the legal industry? Answer: it’s happening now.

There is an excellent blog post by Jordan Furlong (Canadian legal commentator and award winning blogger) who looks at these market changing innovators. Jordan suggests that from now on, lawyers’ and law firms’ profitability hinges completely on what we choose to do and how we choose to do it. I would add that the real game change at play here with regard to profitably will be WHY lawyers’ and law firms’ choose to do what and how they do it.

WHY sits at the very core of an entrepreneurial law firm’s purpose and the very soul of an entrepreneur lawyer’s raison d’etre.

Accordingly, I suspect that the new game change players will be even more discerning and passionate in their focus and drive for delivering extraordinary customer service. They know that focusing on THEM, i.e. the customer – first, last, always – by investing in their people – first, last, always – that the bottom line (profit) will naturally take care of itself.

I would argue that in law law land we’re witnessing survival of the fittest as the strong firms grow stronger and the weak firms weaker largely due to the ‘fittest’ firms adapting to the disruptive forces and competitor ‘disruptors’ by continually innovating.  Leading law firms and their innovative leaders are resetting their strategies by taking bold moves.

The key areas ripe for innovating which I believe we should consider that will be fundamental to future firm success and individual success is as follows:

Our law firm business model and umbrella strategy

I read a fascinating, brilliant and entertaining blog post recently by Professor Stephen Mayson entitled “Breaking News: Humpty Dumpty Falls Off Wall” in which Stephen suggests that the traditional law firm model is well and truly scrambled. I reckon it’s fried.

Sadly, it’s taken a global economic nose-dive off a cliff, smart liberalisation in the form of legal reforms (Legal Services Act 2007 and alternative business structures) and switched on entrepreneurial global venture competitors to prompt traditional law firms and their lawyers to start writing new messages on Humpty’s wall.

As Stephen shares with the reader his expertise on the subject it is apparent there can be a sunny-side up for those firms and individuals who are prepared to re-invent their model and strategies; which in essence, IMHO, is what the strong firms and individuals have done and will continue to do.

Our technology

This is a massive topic in and of itself so I think I will leave this for a future blog post. Suffice to say I reckon Professor Richard Susskind can smile after twenty years of preaching as he begins to witness that his beliefs, research, teachings and drive for a technologically savvy and online legal world is actually coming to fruition.

Hey-ho, we’re getting there in the end, even if some of us are frothing around in the wake whilst others are surfing ahead.

Our marketing and sales strategy

Most firms still allocate prime responsibility for winning new customers and keeping existing clients to the partners and allocate ‘marketing the firm’ as the prime responsibility of the marketing, brand, communications or business development person and/or department; an individual pumping out ‘marketing and PR messages’ about the firm behind the corporate veil. It’s neither engaging nor interesting to the recipient.

Potential and existing buyers of legal advice want to engage with individual lawyers so the lawyer being visible, available and engaging to the seeker is of paramount importance.

It’s time to turn the traditional top down triangle marketing mantra upside down to capitalise on each and every lawyer’s social capital and human capital; two of four essential pillars in a law firm’s make-up which Stephen Mayson highlighted five years ago in his book Law Firm Strategy.

Let’s encourage and support everyone in marketing the firm by re-inventing and marketing themselves. Devise a niche, create your ‘Brand, Me‘ and have EVERYONE embrace new innovative tools such as social media and social networking in order to attract and keep more customers through efficient and effective relationship marketing.

Our core purpose

It appears that at the very core of the successful firm and individual lies passion, energy and enthusiasm for their clients. Integrated Legal Holdings (ILH) and Slater & Gordon (Slaters), the only two law firms in the world that have listed on a stock exchange (to date) are testament that taking a gamble, focusing on innovation and delivering extraordinary client service and care actually pays large corporate dividends.

Andrew Grech, managing director of Slaters, an Australian law firm that became the first law firm in the world to be listed on the Stock Exchange in May 2007 reveals his secret to success when interviewed by author Simon Tupman in Legal Eagles.Legal Eagles profiles sixteen innovative and visionary lawyers from around the globe who are changing people’s lives and making a difference in the world; they offer candid insights into their careers and share the secrets of their success. Their stories dispel many myths about the legal profession and prove that lawyers can, and do, make the world a better place.

Andrew said ‘Good lawyers care; they give a damn… to be successful, you have to be passionate about the work you are doing for your clients.’

For the financial year ending 30 June 2011, Slaters announced net profits of $27.9 million (up 40.9%).

ILH has recorded a 51 per cent increase in profit after tax for the 2011 financial year. Graeme Fowler, managing director, told Lawyers Weekly that the ‘results were realised through a combination of getting the basics right… and continued business improvement.’

As the Legal Services Act 2007 swings into full action in England in the ensuing months I believe the ambitious and innovative firms in the UK can look to these successful Australian firms for inspiration which have proven that raising external finance via a stock exchange listing (taking a bold move) and adapting their strategies to be totally client-centric does indeed come up trumps.

Even Baker & McKenzie’s – the world’s largest law firm by turnover, where average profit per equity partner rose by 7 per cent, to $1.2m – chairman Eduardo Leite says: ‘The most important metric is client recognition and that’s what we’re focusing on. Higher profits and revenue should be the consequence of better client service.’

The Lawyer recently reported (15^th August 2011) that the number of firms where partners earn more than £1m has sky-rocketed. What’s interesting and encouraging is the diversity of firms; there are magic circle firms, silver circle stalwarts, niche boutiques and all manner of firms in between.

Berwin Leighton Paisner (BLP) and SJ Berwin were the standout performers among the City firms in 2010-11. Both posted ­drastic increases in profitability. At BLP, average profit per equity partner (PEP) was up 57 per cent from £455,000 to £712,000. According to Neville Eisenberg, managing partner, the 2010-11 impressive result was down to investing during the downturn and that the majority of the firm’s increased revenue was due to improving its standing with existing clients so they give the firm more work across a more diverse range of sectors.

Question: what was the end result? Answer: no less than a big fat turbo boost to the bottom line.

If we are to question how and why BLP has been so successful in scooping up a plethora of awards over the past 11 years, including most recently, The Lawyer magazine’s ‘Law Firm of the Year 2010’, we only need to take on board Neville Eisenberg’s professional opinion that ‘Law firms are not innovative enough’ (and thereby ensuring that BLP differentiates itself from competitors by being innovative) and his personal view that ‘There is a need to keep inspired and to continually challenge yourself.’ (Legal Eagles, 2010).

The innovative moves shown by the likes of Slaters, ILH, BLP, Baker & McKenzie, Epoq, Rocket Lawyer etc (amongst others) reminds me of a telling opinion and quote by Robin Sharma: ‘Smart leaders show up on time. The best leaders show up early.’

The same rings true for innovators.

In The Naked Lawyer eBook I ask the reader to question where they would rate themselves from one to 10 on the PEE Poor Work Ethic Continuum (PEE = Passion, Energy & Enthusiasm) in relation to the PEE they have for their role, job, career, clients, people and in other respects. Where do you think you and/or your firm would sit right now?

Our mindset

I reckon some of us could do with a paradigm shift lobotomy. We need to rid ourselves of the fear of failure, our aversion to risk-taking and to change. Ideally we could do with cultivating an environment which loves idea generation. Serial innovators like Google give employees time to explore ideas, even when some of those ideas turn into massive failures, writes Tim Harford in Adapt: Why Success Always Starts with Failure.

Why shouldn’t law firms take on board the same innovative strategy? One thing’s for sure, there’s a reason Google Ventures has backed Rocket Lawyer. Traditional law firms had better be prepared to compete with new entrants who do love to encourage, support and reward their employees in idea generation. As Robert F. Kennedy once said, ‘we need men who can dream of things that never were.” Are you that man?

Chris Marston, CEO Exemplar Law, another visionary legal eagle lawyer named in Legal Eagles feels that ‘our industry is plagued by too little push for change’.

He defies the norm and he and his Boston based law firm continually innovate to the extent that he is proud to say that ‘some lawyers seem to think offering a service guarantee is risky. In our history we have not had a single customer take us up on this’.

Personally, I came to the conclusion a few years ago that I needed to adapt, innovate and feel inspired by the wonderful opportunities in our present and future. I confess, it was largely because I did not (and do not) wish to end up Fat, Forty & Fired or Overworked and Underlaid – any combination of these for that matter; leading themes in two excellent books that I have enjoyed reading recently by author Nigel Marsh.

I re-invented myself and transformed a whole bunch of stuff in my career, business and life to ensure that I would be in control of my own destiny (arguably, mutiny) and never be tempted to accept an Indecent Proposal of the kind we find in the movie’s core theme. Those of you who have watched the movie know exactly what I mean.

With Demi Moore’s touching line ‘a life without risk is like no life at all’ in Indecent Proposal, “Breaking News: Humpty Dumpty Falls Off Wall” blog post by Stephen Mayson and Richard Susskind’s ‘incremental transformation’ tweet rattling around in my legal beagle mind I find myself inspired to aspire to become a legal eagle (as documented by author Simon Tupman in his book Legal Eagles) who is prepared to take some more risks to ensure that I live a truly fulfilling life.

Can you say the same?

If you find yourself in a place like Mick Jagger where you just ‘can’t get no satisfaction’ then may I respectfully suggest the following? Re-invent and transform yourself…  dare to adapt, innovate, feel inspired and ‘don’t wait for the light to appear at the end of the tunnel…go down there and light the bloody thing yourself!’ (Cameron de Bough – Australian Paralympian).

Warmest… and with best intentions as always…

Chrissie Lightfoot
The Entrepreneur Lawyer
(of the naked kind)
Author of The Naked Lawyer: RIP to XXX – How To Market, Brand & Sell YOU!

PS: If you enjoyed reading this post and would like to know/share more then please:
* Feel free to comment and get involved
* Come and join me at ALPMA (Melbourne, Oz), the International Bar Association (Dubai) and Future Firm Forum (Lake Taupo, NZ).
I’d love to see you here and there!

I felt moved to write on the following issue because many prospective clients, conference delegates and colleagues constantly ask me “Chrissie, this social media and social networking thing, what’s it really all about?”.

Towit my usual response is “try it and see!”

The response nine times out of ten is often, “Yeah, but how can my firm use social media to win work?”

Hmmm. I’d like to share something with you… may I?

Social media together with social networking, when used correctly, is undoubtedly a fabulous tool to complement traditional marketing, sales, PR and business development. I say ‘used correctly’ because its real power, strength and ROI (return on investment), IMHO, lies in social capital and human capital, which means, the activity must be done by the individual lawyer, not ‘the firm’.

Undoubtedly, most firms have allocated social media activity as the responsibility of the marketing person or business development person; an individual pumping out ‘marketing and PR messages’ about the firm behind the corporate veil. It’s not engaging or at all of interest to the recipient.

How can I say this? Well, I’ve read enough articles, spoken to enough entrepreneurs (buyers of legal advice) and seen enough law firm website statistics to know that in some cases over 50% of the traffic to law firm websites goes directly to lawyer profile pages.  It tells me that potential buyers of legal advice are interested in the individual lawyers. The lawyer being visible, available and engaging to the seeker is extremely important. It’s why having a video clip on a lawyer’s profile is beneficial for the viewer because they feel that they can begin to relate with the lawyer before they’ve even met.

Social media is all about involvement, engagement, being human and being authentic. The recipient (follower) of one’s message is interested in the individual expert who is sharing their information, knowledge, interests and personality. An entity (a law firm) is not human; it certainly doesn’t have character or personality; but the people within it do.

It’s why the top law firms have been lambasted in the past few months in various legal media for churning out PR dross into the social media streams. Firms fail to realise that it’s not about them, the firm. It’s about THEM, the recipient, where the focus should be on the individual lawyer providing information of real interest to be useful and beneficial to the potential and/or existing client. And herein lies the greatest challenge for the profession as I see it right now…

If a leader or manager in a law firm is asking themselves “how can ‘my firm’ use social media and social networking” the answer is simply, it can’t. It’s THE LAWYERS who should be using social media and engaging in social networking; they are your best PR mouthpiece aligned with your firm wide PR strategy because social media is all about relationships. People build and engage in relationships, not entities.

I believe it’s definitely time to turn the traditional top down triangle marketing mantra upside down to capitalise on each and every lawyers’ social capital and human capital.

The question leaders and managers within the profession should be asking themselves is ‘should we be reinventing our entire marketing, sales, PR and business development approach to embrace, involve and engage all of our lawyers?’

The real challenge therefore for ‘the firm’ and every lawyer is to embrace the social media revolution for the benefit of the potential client and existing client; ultimately the firm and the individual lawyer will benefit of course. In order to do this we must adapt, innovate and defy our comfort zones.

Invariably, most of us lawyers are not comfortable marketing and selling ourselves. Fact. Take a look around any networking event, offline or online. We’re usually the ones huddled together in a corner somewhere hoping that we won’t be disturbed. But, when we are, we’re usually more than happy to engage in conversation.

Simply put, if we view social media as engagement and conversation, it shouldn’t be that challenging. We might even find that we actually enjoy it…

What’s your thoughts?

Warmest as ever

Chrissie Lightfoot
The Entrepreneur Lawyer
(of the naked kind)

Do you realise it’s Australia Day on 26th January?

What’s the significance of this, you may well be wondering? Well, I was just contemplating the topsy-turvy time most of us have been enduring over the past 24 months whilst at the same time sympathising with my friends from ‘the land down-under’ losing the Ashes; enough on that subject, too many unsympathetic jokes still doing the rounds. Have a heart Poms

The fact that it’s Australia Day got me thinking about a theme… and about you… 

Do you feel as though your world has been turned upside down during the past couple of years? Perhaps you feel as though you can do your job standing on your head and need something ‘more’, but you’re not sure what? Or, maybe, in fact, you’re looking for a ‘better way’ in business and/or life because things just aint the way they used to be, or you thought they were going to be? If you’re anything like me, then thoughts along these lines may have popped into your head at some point.

So, if the answer is ‘yes’ to any of the above then permit me to share something with you which just may interest you and help you…

96  69  96  69  96  69  96  69  96  69  96…  69

In celebration of Australia Day (26^th January) The Naked Lawyer (the prancing, dancing, naked lawyer in law law land in the eBook) has decided that the usual dancing price for The Naked Lawyer: RIP to XXX – How to Market, Brand and Sell YOU! eBook (ALL 12 VOLUMES) needs to take a running flip….

For a limited time-frame the eBook will NOT be £96…

Yup.  You guessed it. She’s treating you to the special price of £69 (inc VAT) for The Naked Lawyer eBook from 13.00 (GMT) on 25^th January 2011 until midnight (GMT) 31^st January 2011. 

Btw – it means the eBook is actually ONLY £57.50 if you’re buying from outside the EU or if you purchase the eBook through your business (EU buyer) as you can reclaim the VAT; subject to your company being VAT registered of course. Neat, eh?

Why not make the positive choice? Take control. And change your life and career (present and future) for the better. Be bold. Be courageous.  Make your first step toward turning your world the right way up and fox trotting off in the direction you always wanted to take it…

The Naked Lawyer can help you. I have every confidence. She helped me… and many others. (The Naked Lawyer Interview)

Go on now, give her a whirl whilst she’s prepared to treat you. I guarantee she will positively make your toes curl!

Warmest as ever

Chrissie Lightfoot
The Entrepreneur Lawyer
(of the naked kind)