Case Studies

Leadership development; career enhancement; developing a leadership presence, expanding a practice and being an effective marketer.

Paul was a 49-year-old partner in a top-tier international firm who wished to develop his leadership skills and expand his practice. He had a stellar background (high court judicial clerkship, multiple publications, and a multi-million dollar practice), and he was ranked by his peers as being among the top five lawyers in his practice area in the city where he was based. He did not, however, believe that he had a leadership “presence,” particularly when compared to the other lawyers ranked with him among the elite. He was also having difficulty doing what was necessary to expand his practice.

Paul’s coach helped him to understand that leadership skill and ability are not necessarily equated with the strong, forceful personalities of his peers. Through coaching, he came to appreciate what Jim Collins discovered during his five-year study of successful companies leading to the publication of his book, “Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap . . . and Others Don’t” — that the most effective leaders are humble and strong-willed rather than outgoing. With this knowledge, Paul was able to exercise his natural leadership abilities with far more ease, and take advantage of his affable and humble nature to advocate effectively for his clients and for his practice within his firm.

Paul was also able to overcome some of the hurdles that he was facing with regard to his marketing efforts. The coaching sessions provided him with the discipline and time that he needed to focus on what he knew needed to be done and to work on a plan to accomplish that.

The coaching sessions also highlighted for Paul some of the psychological barriers that he faced in marketing his expertise. Although, on the conscious level, Paul was sincerely committed to spending more time marketing to potential clients, the fact that he was simply not doing it pointed to an unconscious fear or resistance to making the effort. What Paul discovered over the course of the coaching engagement was that, underlying his commitment to spend more time on marketing, he was also fearful of asking for work. Once Paul was able to acknowledge that fear, he was able to examine the assumptions on which his fear was based. For Paul, these assumptions were that either he was not as good as he thought he was or the client did not like him. As Paul thought about these assumptions over the course of several weeks, he was able to understand that they were largely unfounded — that there are a number of reasons why a client would decline his approach that were most likely entirely unrelated to his competence or likeability. Having surfaced these assumptions, Paul was able to start to more authentically and effectively market himself.