Gaining the Competitive Edge

All lawyers require extensive business, relationship building, best practices and practical skills instruction in order to survive and prosper in today’s uniquely challenging competitive environment and in a profession undergoing dramatic structural and cultural change. These skills are rarely addressed in depth in law school or at most law firms.

Betsy Munnell provides career coaching services to partners, associates and counsel, individually or through their law firms and to law students pursuing business law careers, in each case with a particular focus on the skills essential for business development.  Betsy’s work includes the following:

• Individual and group coaching for lawyers at all levels of experience who are committed to building self-sustaining, thriving law practices.
• Individual lawyer coaching for young partners and seasoned senior associates preparing for leadership positions in their firms and facing increasing pressure to generate revenue and bring in their own clients.
• Consulting to law firm professional development, business development and marketing directors interested in offering business and finance skills training, including hands-on application via case studies and guided written exercises derived from corporate and litigation practice.
• Blended group and individual coaching for groups of women lawyers close in age or years of experience, within a single law firm or drawn from several firms. The Women’s Coaching Program concentrates on business development and on strategies for navigating the paths to partnership and senior leadership opportunities within the participant’s law firm.
• In-firm group programs, organized around the core one-on-one coaching component, culminating in the creation of a detailed career plan tailored to market, practice group and firm culture.
• Individual and group social media training, for lawyers interested in learning how to use social media and other essential internet tools to build client relationships and develop business (the Social Media Tutorial and the Social Media Boot Camp.)
• Consulting to law firms creating or rejuvenating their diversity initiatives, including efforts to address the consistently low percentage of women and minorities among income and equity partners.

The pillar of both group and individual coaching programs is one-on-one personal coaching.  Coaching is highly individualized, reflecting each individual’s skills, experience, personal style and network resources, focused on advancement within the client’s law firm or legal department and his or her legal and business communities, in each case aligned with the firm’s strategy and marketing resources. In every engagement we work with the client to achieve each of these core objectives:

• Articulate  personal career vision and realizable 4 to 6 month client development and business generation goals.
• Build a strategic online presence consistent with desired professional “brand”; and learn to use social media and other internet tools to deliver value to clients and prospects, stay “top of mind’, and enhance both legal work product and client service.
• Create or update a written strategic plan: Career vision and goals, network mapping, top 10-20 A-List, visibility and leadership opportunities, internal self-promotion and skills and knowledge building.
• Understand the core components of effective networking and relationship building and ways to design practical business development activities consistent with personal communication style, professional and available marketing resources.
• Take meaningful steps to acquire and/or strengthen the attributes of a successful communicator and “trusted advisor”: listening, empathy, curiosity, and confidence.

All group programs include both individual coaching and workshops addressing topics of interest to the client. These may include: relationship building strategies, internal self-promotion, time management, social media training, leadership and executive presence and “trusted advisor” best practices.

For more information about EHMunnell’s lawyer coaching programs, please contact Betsy directly.