Social media training now manadatory for law firms
When Jeanne Meister (@jcmeister), a well recognized consultant, author and speaker on the future of work places, wrote her book, The 2020 Workplace, in 2010, she predicted that, social media training in the workplace would be as common as ethics and diversity training by the year 2020.
Thanks to the boom in social over the last two years, Mesiter writes at Forbes that the time for businesses to make social media training manadatory is already here.
Social media training is quickly becoming mandatory for an ever-growing range of companies, far surpassing the first wave of IT firms that rolled it out two years ago, like Dell, Intel and IBM. While it began as an added ‘bonus’ in the arsenal of the marketing spokesperson of a few years ago, now companies ranging from Unisys, PepsiCo, Adidas, HP and Sprint are making social not only part of the company’s core training curriculum, but also a key element in their recruiting message, stressing the employee benefit of receiving social media literacy training.
If you’re a large law firm, how are you going to connect with others in corporate America if you don’t know how to use social media? If your law firm’s lawyers don’t know how to use social media how are they going to nurture relationships with business leaders in corporations who have social media training. If you’re a small or solo firm, how are you going to compete with lawyers who have a high social media IQ?
The time is past for law firms to look at blogging and social media as some novelty. Law firms ought not look at the few lawyers learning to use social media as a curious use of their time.
Meister shares five ways for companies to do their social media right. Her points are well taken and worth a read.
Here’s six points applicable to social media education for law firms.
- Begin with the why. Why is social media important for the law firm and its lawyers. Having firm leadership involved is critical. For more information on the why read this post of mine on how to get buy in on social media.
- Educate on what social media is all about. Relationships, word of mouth reputation, listening, and engagement.
- Educate on how social media is not unlike traditional business development in the law. Lawyers and law firms have always gotten their work via relationships and a strong word of mouth reputation. Social media has not changed that.
- Cover how a social media strategy is developed as to a particular industry, consumer group, or area of the law, and create one.
- Review the tools and platforms that may be used and when they are appropriate and when they are not.
- Train the trainers (business development/marketing professionals) in large law firms and the lawyers themselves in smaller firms on how to use the tools and platforms and the tactics involved in using them. The trainers will train the lawyers in the larger firms.
A couple keys as well. Note that tactics was not involved until the last step in social media training for lawyers. Most lawyers and law firms begin with tactics first. As a result they waste the firm’s and the participating lawyers’ time. Worse yet, they embarrass the firm and its lawyers.
Second, have experienced legal professionals lead the educational program, or at a minimum lead off with the first few steps and lay out a curriculum. Right or wrong I have seen many lawyers not listen to professionals who have not practiced law for a good period of time like themselves and built a firm or company.
No matter the approach you take, social media training ought to be mandatory in law firms.