Lawyers may have the facts at their fingertips – but not on the tip of their tongues!

Lawyers have a reputation for being able to argue the hind legs off a horse.  They can prove that black is white.  So why is it when language is the tool of their trade, they are not so good at using the spoken word to sell themselves and their services to clients?

Over many years of training lawyers in presentation techniques, I am still surprised at how many think that how they come across is not important – and how many are completely unaware of the impression they make.

The root of the problem is that the very things that make them good lawyers in the first place – the ability to absorb and present facts in an orderly and scrupulously accurate way - are a disadvantage when it comes to presentation skills.  Conventional legal training is all about linear thinking, problem solving, the art of argument, accumulating knowledge, and hitting billing targets and juggling files.  Such skills are often the opposite to the ones needed to hold the listener’s attention.

In fact, they can be a positive disadvantage.  Being too focused on content can deflect from performance and even lawyers need to stimulate interest in what they’ve got to say if they want to make any impact.  Too many speakers who rely on their technical and detailed expert knowledge think that is all they need to be good communicators.

Recognising that this is a problem is the first step to overcoming it.  One of the hardest things for all of us is to be constructively self-critical of the impact we make on other people.  We may be nervous, self-conscious, aware of certain weaknesses but we still won’t necessarily know what we sound like or what impression we’re making.  Even if we do, we may not know how to go about improving our performance.

It can be very frustrating, particularly for professionals, it you recognise that you’re not getting your message across as well as you could, despite your knowledge of the subject!
It can be worse than frustrating if you are actually losing business as a result.

Having acknowledged that being able to communicate effectively with your clients is as important as demonstrating your knowledge base, the next step is to develop the requisite skills for building better business relationships.  Such skills require time and training and without professional and objective guidance they will not develop, especially within a culture which doesn’t value their importance.

More and more clients want to feel comfortable with their professional advisers.  Trust and personal rapport are as important  - if not more so – than technical differences and sometimes even cost.

This means that the firm’s reputation for legal expertise will not be enough.  The ‘human face’ also counts.

Unfortunately many people whose roles require them to interact with others and who need that special ability to persuade and influence are left to acquire communications skills through a process of trial and error – and not always successfully.  If things don’t go well, confidence wanes and this in turn further affects performance.

So what can be done to improve your speaking skills and inject style and flair into your presentations? 

The good news is that interesting speakers are made, not born.  You can learn to master the techniques that will turn you into a more accomplished and dynamic speaker.

There are many confrontational aspects of the law, which are not naturally conducive to developing the human side of business relationships.  Part of the job of the professional trainer is to soften tones, develop a more conversational style and release that part of the legal mind, which establishes connections rather than putting distance between themselves and the other party.

A good trainer does not try to change the person but focuses on existing characteristics which can be used to improve communications.  Often a very small change in behaviour, such as using inclusive words – we, us, together – and more friendly body language can lead to a big change in the speaker’s image.

All professionals, and not just lawyers, need to put themselves in their clients’ shoes and think about what will be of most interest to them.  They should ask themselves the question, what will really make them sit up and say, ‘ yes, I can see how that will be useful to me’. 

The trap many speakers so easily fall into is thinking too much about what they want to say and concentrating too much on their expertise and knowledge.  Speakers should never lose sight of their objective – winning over the client.  Intellectually it is no great leap to make the connection between ‘this is what we do’ and ‘this is how you will benefit’ but in communications terms it represents a completely different standpoint.

Looking at the way you come across and adjusting your delivery is not a matter of changing personality, or adopting formulaic techniques and textbook gestures.  It is about developing the things we all do naturally in personal situations but don’t apply in certain professional circumstances.

A large part of the impression any speaker makes on an audience is visual.  The sound of the voice is also influential, while what the speaker actually says counts for a lot less than most people would think.  What this means in practical terms is that lawyers, like everyone else, need to pay attention to the ‘packaging’.

So will training really make a difference?

Yes, says one lawyer, who recently participated in a Speak First training course and commented: “I found training most useful – it made me realise the importance of communicating with the audience and not saturating them with too much legal detail.”

This is particularly relevant to those legal firms which are broadening their marketing activities.  For example, it is quite usual these days for lawyers’ clients to invite them to hold in-house seminars on the broader legal issues affecting their business – and to keep them abreast of key changes in the law,  such as the European Law on Human Rights.  These seminars may last up to a half a day in some cases.  Speakers need to know how to hold their audiences for that length of time!

Without exception, lawyers overload their audiences with information.  They say to themselves, ‘If we don’t mention such and such, then our clients will go ahead and do just that’.  It’s the trainer’s job to change this attitude and encourage them to think instead, ‘This  Act has many implications but I will concentrate on the one or two key points I think are most important’.  Training helps speakers look at the ‘whole’ picture rather than drown in detail.

As a profession,  lawyers write more than any other and feel very comfortable doing so.  It’s therefore not so surprising that they tend to write their presentations out in full – and then read them out, often at some speed as they’re not having to think about it very much.  They hide behind their lecterns and become ‘script bound’.

The best legal speakers recognise that they can do something about this and that presentation skills can be acquired through training and practice.  They know that presenting well earns a reputation for being able to communicate effectively.  This lends an edge in a competitive market helping clients to differentiate between firms with essentially similar services and expertise.

A few tips

Be prepared.  Some of the worst presentations are those where the speaker clearly hasn’t devoted enough time to preparation and it’s clearly evident to the listener. 

Be brief.  Whatever the complexities of your subject, keep your presentation simple.  Audiences do not absorb information like sponges and will find it impossible to take in a monotonous stream of data delivered in an uninspired monotone.

Concentrate on the key facts and messages.  Recap and summarise frequently.  Use hypothetical questions, examples, ironic observations and topical references to liven up the flow of dry information.