Business development has always been important to the successful law firm and lawyer. However, nowadays, when the market for legal services is shrinking and thus so much more competitive, business development has become mission critical.
The Business Development Challenge
Business development can be challenging for the law firm and the individual lawyer. According to an October 2015 LexisNexis survey of more than 400 law firm marketers and business development professionals (the “2015 Survey”), there are a number of barriers to business development for law firms. Challenges noted by the 2015 Survey included:
- Difficulty getting lawyers involved in business development and marketing;
- A lack of a long term strategy, and a lack of focus, for business development efforts; and
- No accountability.
The challenge of getting lawyers to engage in business development is well-known. Lawyers are sometimes reluctant to engage in business development, because of:
- A fear of rejection;
- A negative reaction to being seen as, or behaving like, a “salesperson”;
- A lack of knowledge about how to develop business or a lack of confidence in their ability to develop business.
Transcending the Challenges Through Coaching
Business development coaching works because it gives the lawyer the opportunity to talk freely about, and the structure to work through, business development challenges. Through coaching, the lawyer becomes a more successful business developer by:
- gaining insight into his/her business development strengths and challenges; and
- getting the benefit of the coach’s perspective, experience, know-how, support and guidance to capitalize on those strengths and address those challenges.
Coaching also helps to make lawyers more successful business developers as it imposes a discipline on the lawyer’s business development activities. As part of the coaching process, the lawyer develops clear business development goals and a detailed plan as to how to accomplish them. As part of each coaching session, the lawyer reports on, and is held accountable for, progress against goals and the plan. The 2015 Survey concluded that the legal market now is much more competitive and that the law firm strategies and activities required to win new business has changed considerably. Clearly now is the time for firms and individual lawyers to up their business development game and to consider different strategies, like coaching, to do so.
Hilary Clarke is the Founder and Lead Coach at Potentia Coaching. Prior to founding Potentia, Hilary was a senior partner in a large Toronto law firm and experienced first hand, business development successes and challenges. If you would like to explore whether business development coaching is right for you, please contact us at hilary.clarke@potentiacoaching.ca for a complimentary half hour coaching session.