by the Meyler Campbell Team
For years good business coaches in the legal sector have often been the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff, now it’s our chance to be the fence at the top. Much of the misery, or confusion, we see in our coachees is caused the fact that traditionally, in complete contrast with say the accounting profession, even the most basic management skills (eg how to give feedback properly) were not, some honourable exceptions apart, taught in legal training. And coaching was not included, taught, or even mentioned. Now we have a once in our working lifetime opportunity to fix that: the Legal Education Training Review (LETR) is coming to a close after a long period of searching scrutiny and we have been invited, indeed encouraged, to comment on the final draft report. More info on LETR here http://letr.org.uk/about/faqs/#faq1.
Tactically, while Meyler Campbell would be happy to co-ordinate as much of the profession’s input as we can, we have been advised this would be unwise, as it would then be treated as only a single submission – much better for the powers that be to see the breadth and range of professional power behind as many as possible separate submissions, no matter how short. Also it’s good business for the major names in coaching in the legal sector – Praesta, Sherwood, Moller, QV Career Counsel, The Professional Career Partnership, STS, The Alliance, Hayfield, TXG, iOpener, Peer Professionals etc etc, plus the accrediting bodies – WABC, EMCC, ICF, AC, APECS etc, plus any other bodies we have not thought of and even more importantly the many crucial individual coaches, to stand up and be counted, be respected as serious contributors to the profession, named in the report, etc. But we all care about our work far beyond the simple business sense of it – many people come into business coaching to make a difference, well here’s a chance to leave a legacy not just for one year, or ten, but for decades to come, and to make a positive impact on thousands of lives, and the hundreds of thousands of people with whom more focused, effective and fulfilled lawyers will then come into more positive daily contact.
Tony King of Clifford Chance has very kindly agreed to host a conference call for our community in early September briefing us on precisely what we should do (submissions close couple of weeks later.) If you would like to be on that call, or have a representative on that call, please email Claire Maidana with LETR CALL in the email heading.
Thank you and we hope you will join us in this major campaign.
