College blogs could teach law firm recruiters a lesson
The Blog Herald shares that for the second year Wabash College in Indiana has appointed three freshman to blog ‘honestly and openly’ about their first year experiences at the college.’
Staff decided not to edit or censor them, though they vetted those who wanted to write first, not only to get a range of backgrounds and interests, but also to ensure that ‘they’d want their mother to read it’.
‘For a lot of students looking here, they want to hear from students,’ said Associate Director of Admissions, Chip Timmons. ‘They want to know what the food tastes like, how hard the classes are. It’s honest, it’s genuine and it’s what students want to know.’
The blogs are so popular that, aside from football, they are the most read pages on the college’s web site.
With 80% of students making their first contact with their chosen college via the Internet, using blogs from new students make all the sense in the world.
Law firms ought to do the same. Get 2 or 3 new associates to blog ‘openly and honestly’ about their first year experiences. Such blogs are going to be the most popular pages on the firm web site because they’ll include exactly what recent law grads want to know.
Ethics and liability issues? Be smart. It can be done. Blogging about general interaction with lawyers, staff, and lawyers at other firms (without use of names, if appropriate) as well as talking about the general nature of transactional work or litigation work one is doing can be done without creating problems. And with the popularity of pro pono and community service opportunities, lots of new grads would love to hear about those experiences first hand.
Such content is already leaking out and appearing on new associate message boards and listservs as well as blogs such as Above the Law. Take a little control of the flow of the information by promoting it via new associate blogs.
If there’s any law firms promoting the use of such blogs, let me know. It merits a shout out here and then into national legal publications.