career development

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There will come a point in your career when you will get fired, let go, downsized or furloughed. No matter the circumstances surrounding you losing your job, it sucks. I’ve been through almost all of them myself.

But the bright side is that you can emerge from these situations as a stronger, better version of your professional self and use these failures to propel you to work situations that are a better fit for you – just like I did.

Every dark situation has a silver lining, and I want you to know that you aren’t alone in experiencing speed bumps along your career path. You can fail (multiple times in fact) but still have a successful career. Remember – just because it didn’t work out for you in one position doesn’t mean that you are doomed for your entire career. What will define you is how you dust yourself off after a setback and forge ahead. Resiliency, resourcefulness and determination will set you apart from others and help you get back on track. Here are some tips to help you.

Everyone is nervous about everything right now, including the economy and how that may affect their employment status. Some companies are doing mass layoffs and salary reductions. You don’t want to be unemployed right now because businesses aren’t going to be as quick to hire – they want to see how the coronavirus pandemic will affect their bottom line – and new projects will likely be put on hold for the foreseeable future.

It’s never been more important to be the model employee and to go above and beyond. Don’t give your company a reason to doubt your commitment or work product.

Here are a few tips to bulletproof your job now that you can carry into the future.

This is not the year to take a break from social media during the summer. Instead this is the time to focus on your business development and branding efforts.

I don’t know anyone right now especially (or ever) who would say they have enough clients or work. I think everyone is nervous about the economy, the ability to maintain their current volume of work, bring in future clients and support their people.

That being said, it’s incredibly important to ensure your current clients are happy and that you are consistently generating new sources of leads and referrals.

Here are 25 ideas on how to do that, which now involves shifting your strategy from in-person networking and client entertaining to having a strong online presence and thought leadership platform. If you have never used LinkedIn, written an article or blog post or spoken at a webinar, now is the time to pivot to doing all of these. It is never too early or late to start marketing yourself or your firm.

My guess is that many of you have more free time now due to the pandemic, which had slowed down deal flow and litigation activity.

Plus working from home eliminates…

Your professional biography is your opportunity to showcase your work, capabilities and areas of expertise, and what makes you stand out from your competitors.

Many in-house counsel cite lawyer bios as one of THE most important sources of information regarding researching outside lawyers (yes, everyone is Googling you whether you like it or not and your web bio is usually the number one search result of your name). In addition, lawyer bios are among the most visited pages on law firm web sites, further underscoring their importance.

Your bio can serve as an important business development and branding tool if it is well-crafted. Yet within the legal industry, so many bios are still lackluster, outdated, not client-focused or just poorly written.

Given the power of bios, it has always baffled me that many lawyers do not update theirs at least several times a year or write them with a client focus. The new year is a great reason to take a fresh look at your bio and make enhancements to it.

I recently wrote a much longer version of an article on creating a strong, engaging bio for JD Supra, which you can read here. This is an excerpt of that article, which concentrates on the show vs. tell concept, an essential component that many law firm bios are missing. The article also focuses on the idea that all bios should be client-focused and that you should always write for your audience, not your peers. Remember that often, your clients aren’t actually practicing lawyers, and even if they are, the world today isn’t as formal as it used to be (especially as clients are getting younger), so drop the legalese from your vernacular and speak in a more casual tone to your audience. Now let’s get to work!