Law firm seminar

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WHY ARE ALL LAW FIRMS SO BAD AT PRESENTING SEMINARS?

All right, my little chicklings. This is a heartfelt plea to you on behalf of those of us who’ve been in this game for years and are obliged, by regulation, to sit through continuing professional development seminars, to make them at least tolerable and, if you can, entertaining.

As a matter of fact I’m sitting though one now, as I write this. It’s about — and I swear I had to check this by looking at the title on the outlook invite, because in forty minutes I’ve absorbed nothing — “Brexit and beyond”.

Now I am telling you this not primarily for your own good, but mine. I crave enlightenment, failing that entertainment, and failing that, mere distraction will do, but preferably I’d like all three: having bent my ears for an hour to your message, I yearn to depart with something for my trouble: some kind of enrichment to my “lived experience”, to borrow a vogue expression.

I want to be in some way better equipped, better informed, armed with better anecdotes, even if it won’t realistically move the needle much on my professional acumen. IS THIS REALLY TOO MUCH TO ASK?

After all, what is good for me is good for you: if the lords of our profession declare that every member must be spoken at on topics of professional advancement, for an aggregated period each year — and, okay, they don’t really, any more, but this hasn’t stopped the military industrial complex of law firm seminars — this the chance for those doing the speaking to a bit of marketing. Sell yourselves, friends. PLEASE. Transport me, for an hour, away from my tedious mortal shell. Telescope me into a wondrous new world where I am piqued, thrilled, bettered and, mostly, entertained.

Brexit and beyond: there is so much scope for levity here. Buzz Lightyear! Put Dominic Cummings in a Buzz Lightyear outfit! Something! Anything!

So:

Speak to your audience, not to your powerpoint

It should go without saying, but clearly doesn’t, so let me say it: don’t read out your goddam slides.

I can read quicker than you can speak. If you’ve put all the information you plan to deliver on the slide, I don’t need you. Just send me the slides and I can read themRemember the point of the exercise, from your perspective: it is to give me the impression I do need you. I don't need someone to read to me, and if I did I would choose Martin Jarvis or David Horowitz, not you.

Don’t clutter your slides

Limit yourself to a sentence per slide. One short sentence. Try it. This also helps you to speak naturally to your audience.

The best exponent of excellent, uncluttered slides is Lawrence Lessig. Watch him in action (see panel to right)

Vary your tone

You are not a Gregorian monk. Nor am I. Speak with some animation. Bring that personality. Moderate your range. Pause. Punctuate. Be dramatic. Be hyperbolic. This is a performance, not a root canal.

Speak in idiomatic English

I know it is hard, since legal discourse has been beaten into you, but try not to speak like a lawyer. Don’t speak the way you draft. (Come to think of it, don’t draft the way you draft). Say less, perform more. Build rapport.

Keep out of the weeds

This may be the worst of all. Your objective: to give a high-level overview: to present issues in stark, apocalyptic terms, apt to terrify your audience into calling you and paying for your legal advice. You are not meant to be reading out your firm’s internal knowhow folder on your topic.

Be funny

Now not everyone can be spontaneously witty on the fly. To be fair, most commercial lawyers have trouble being witty in any circumstances. So prepare something that might raise a chuckle beforehand. No-one is expecting Richard Pryor. And, okay, “Security and Enforcement in the Cayman Islands” is tough material, BUT YOU ARE THE BEST IN YOUR BUISINESS, RIGHT? That is why people are prepared to hear you out, isn’t it? So this is your challenge. Find something fun or outrageous to say about your topic: something your audience will remember. If there really, really isn’t anything like that — and “Security and Enforcement in the Cayman Islands” may be just that topic, then consider: why are you giving a seminar about something so dull in the first place?

Questions

encourage questions. Get a dialogue going. but realise you may get random qestions about things you don’t expect, especially if you are a dull speaker, since no one will really have been listening, and they may be asking questions just out of politeness, and to reassure you that the hour you have just spent has not been quite as wasteful as it in fact has. Whatever you do, don’t ever say, “well, I’m not an expert, but —”.

Remember what your audience wants and what you want, and be careful not to invert them. What your audience wants is to be entertained, first, and enlightened, second - but it is an optional extra. What *YOU* want is for your audience to think: hey she’s pretty neat. She’d be fun to work with (first) and hey — she knows tons about the regulatory environment post Brexit (second). She is definitely who I will call!

See also

• Magic circle
• Private practice