Social media is not a job in a law firm

Vickie Elmer (@WorkingKind), writing at Quartz, says that social media managers may wish to find a new job title. Not to worry, your skills are still valuable.

Elmer’s point being that social is a skill required at every position in an organization, not a position or department with the organization.

Social media is less seen as a position within a department and is now seen as a skill spread out across an organization. Job offerings mentioning social media in the description, not the title of of the position, jumped almost 90% in the last year.

Per Amy Crow, Director, Global PR and Communications at Indeed:

We are seeing an increased demand for social savvy candidates across the business – from human resources to product to customer service. In addition, we’re seeing this demand span many levels, from executive assistants to senior vice presidents.

Buzzfeed contributing editor, Rob Fishman (@rbfishman) argues for the death of the social media position altogether:

In speaking with higher-ups at outlets old and new, I heard from all of them that social was no longer peripheral, but core to their strategy. Concentrating authority in a single personage no longer made sense; Jennifer Preston and Liz Heron needed to get Twitter, but so too did reporters like Brian Stelter and David Carr.

Sound message for law firms here. Law firms are a knowledge, reputation, and relationship based business. Your people not using social media are holding the firm back and reducing the quality of the service offered to clients.

Why?

• Social media may be the finest learning tool that has come down in our lifetime. A professional’s ability to read, share, and network with people in the know has never been greater. The less people you have using social, the dumber you are as an institution, it’s that simple.
• Relationships founded on trust are at the heart of offering legal services. Social breeds and nurtures trust with clients and prospective clients.
• Relationships and word of mouth reputations are the lifeblood of business development for a law firm. Without them, you’re dead. Social media accelerates a word of mouth reputation and relationships like nothing before it.

Is everyone in your law firm going to use social right away? No. Not everyone used a computer, email, or text right away. But those not on a computer or available via text today are the odd one’s out. It’ll be the same with social over time.

Sure, hire for social skills – across the firm from lawyers to HR to IT to knowledge management. And hire people who know social like the back of their hand to teach and coach your lawyers and other professionals how to use social for professional and business development.

Just don’t make social media a job in your law firm. Make  social a mandatory skill for everyone in the firm.