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UK: Clyde & Co Encourages Female Lawyers To Raise Their Profile With Launch Of New Training Programme
Global law firm Clyde & Co has today launched an innovative
new training programme aimed at helping to ensure that female
lawyers and senior staff at the firm are well-equipped with the
skills and tools needed to successfully build their profiles in
today's fast moving, 24/7, digitally-enabled world.
The programme, which will run throughout 2019, includes training
in social media, on camera interview technique, presentation
skills, writing for offline and online audiences, creating a
personal brand, and effective networking. All the training will
also be available to men but will be particularly promoted to women
at the firm to encourage greater gender balance in the firm's
approach to marketing, business development and communications.
While women make up nearly half (46%) of the lawyer population
and one quarter of partners at Clyde & Co, on average across
the firm globally less than 20% of external spokespeople quoted in
the media are female.
Mun Yeow, Partner and member of the firm's Global Management
Board, says: "As is well known, the legal profession continues
to suffer from a perception of being a male-dominated industry.
Thanks to the great work of very many people across the profession
that is slowly being eroded but we still have a long way to go.
Through this initiative we hope, as a firm, to engage more of our
people in that process by presenting a more gender-balanced brand
to our clients and the wider market."
Liz Jenkins, Partner and the newest member of the Global
Management Board, says: "It's my firm belief that women
are sometimes more reticent than men to put themselves forward for
profile raising and personal brand building opportunities. Our own
experience and figures also suggest that. What we want to do with
this programme is to challenge the status quo and provide all our
lawyers, but especially our female lawyers, with training to help
them develop the skills to promote their expertise and the business
confidently and professionally."
As part of the initiative, and in the run up to International
Women's Day on 8 March 2019, Clyde & Co will also seek to
involve female spokespersons in as many media interviews as
possible.
Simon Konsta, Senior Partner says, "Having the ability to
promote your practice and expertise is core for any successful
lawyer but as a greater part of law firms' branding and service
offerings move online, the way you effectively achieve that
promotion is also changing. That requires all of our lawyers and
senior leadership to learn new skills but has also provided us with
the opportunity to step back to make sure that we're reflecting
our gender balance in our communications and marketing. For
this reason we are especially encouraging our female lawyers and
staff to get involved in this programme and to showcase their
skills and expertise."
The training package will be administered through the firm's
Learning and Development team, working in tandem with its
Communication team, and will be added to the firm's career
development framework. Progress will be tracked throughout 2019.
The initiative is part of a wider programme of initiatives across
the firm to encourage greater gender balance in a range of business
development activities including client pitches and
events.
Stephen Doggett, Global Head of Communications, says: "We
are a global business that is online 168 hours every week. With the
flexibility of today's communication tools and the range of
channels available to us, there is no reason why any of our
professionals should not be confident and involved in building
their and the firm's profile online and offline in order to
develop business."
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