Life skills and career tips for Canada's lawyers in training
Issue link: https://digital.canadianlawyermag.com/i/50715
business people aren't predisposed to enjoy the level of detail that lawyers are trained to appreciate. For such people, listening to experts share everything they know about a subject can be excruciat- ing. A good friend of mine recalled being forced to listen to someone who didn't quite get this and constantly saying under his breath during the entire presentation: "Summarize! Summarize! Summarize!" Some clients will be less nice and just cut you off, or worse yet, simply not invite you back for another dance. So learning the art of being concise, of getting to the point before the paint dries, is worthwhile. Bullet points are good. Some attribute their popularity to the low state of executive intellect. I won't get defensive and just repeat: bullet points are good. But there is something valued even more highly than brevity and that's op- tions. Business people love options, espe- cially those involving stock. But they also love being presented with options when facing a business problem. Again, some might attribute that to an obsession with control, akin to the male need to hold the television remote and constantly change channels, even when it means moving away from something you really want to watch. And again I will bypass psychological analysis because it doesn't really matter; business people just tend to love options. So a short list of options, with pros and cons for each, and a bottom-line recom- mendation, will go down like momma's pudding. See appendix for details. Save displaying your expertise for questions they want to ask. Finally, most business people have less regard for suck-ups than advertised. In hierarchical organizational structures there are always some people around whose mission in life is to tell you what you want to hear. But they don't tend to be viewed as very valuable to those who hold a lot of responsibility and recognize they don't have all the answers themselves. While a measure of tact is almost al- ways required, clients appreciate an advis- er who is committed to telling the truth, especially when the truth isn't particularly welcome. That may sound counterintui- tive, but it's the truth, at least for many business people. They respect someone who tells it like it is, who delivers bad news early — even when it involves the adviser's own inability to deliver as expected (of course, that can't happen very oſten: see "commitment" above). Obviously, not every corporate client is cut from the same cloth. Learning to treat clients as individuals is critical to a lawyer's success. But in my experience, business people do tend to share some of the com- monalities described above. All the rela- tionship skills in the world aren't worth very much if these basics are ignored. ■ A native of Vancouver, Mike Nienhuis is entering third-year law at the University of Victoria. Prior to law school, he spent about 15 years as an executive in the soſtware industry. He has a BA in history and classics from the University of Brit- ish Columbia and an MBA from Simon Fraser University. Untitled-3 1 C ANADIAN Lawyer 4STUDENTS F all 2011 37 2/23/10 2:55:50 PM