Practical Advice

Marketing Tips

• Spend at least 5 percent of your time building relationships …business development is all about relationships.
• Keep a notebook or create a database that includes the contact information on the people you meet and note any information they may have shared with you which could relate to your practice or firm.
• When deciding on a business development objective, don’t just start “doing it”. Develop a business plan and approach it with proper planning, resources and the right team.
• Read the business section of your local newspaper and the Wall Street Journal …your clients have.

Paula W. Hinton
Vinson & Elkins LLP

Mentoring Tips

• For a mentee to make the most of a mentoring relationship, develop goals for what you’d like to accomplish in the relationship, and share those with your mentor. Being proactive, and letting your mentor know how you want to benefit from the relationship will help you achieve those goals.
• Bring your mentee to ABA meetings. Walking into a room of strangers may be intimidating, but it can be made easier through introductions from a mentor. Plus, it is a good time to get to know each other outside of the four walls of your office environment.

Nan Joesten
Farella Braun + Martel LLP

• Don't limit your search for mentors to people in your own firm. No matter what the stage of your career, it is always beneficial to share experiences and lessons with lawyers who practice in different environments. Exchange ideas about challenges and successes in your respective practices and then bring those ideas back to discuss at your own firm. You may find that you enrich not only your own practice, but those of your colleagues, too.
• Women tend to eat lunch at their desks in order to get home and manage the rest of their lives. Put lunches with your mentor or mentee on your calendar, so that you consider them a scheduled time commitment. Making these relationships a priority, like meetings with your clients, is crucial to the success of the relationship.

Anne Marie Seibel
Bradley Arant Rose & White LLP

Young Lawyer Tips

• Stay connected with your law school classmates. Learn what they do in their practices, and share what you do in yours. Strive to create a cross-referral relationship.
• As a new associate, you are bound to make mistakes from time to time. When that happens, write it down and make a list. It will help you remember, and keep from making the same mistake twice!
• Never rely on someone else's pleading when asked to draft one of your own, because you risk overlooking errors or changes in the applicable law. Instead, start from scratch the first time around and file an extra copy in a “form file.” As your workload increases, it will be useful to have a ready means of locating your prior work product.
• When you are a new associate and are given conflicting assignments from two or more partners, immediately advise the partners of the conflict, and let them prioritize your workload.

Bronwyn L. Roberts (Duane Morris LLP)
Amy Messigian (Hill, Farrer & Burrill, LLP)