CLE Leadership & Management
Ideas, Resources, and Techniques for
CLE Professionals
A periodic e-newsletter
By Chuck Bingaman - chuck@chuckbingaman.com
#35 May 2007
Leadership  Why hasn’t some CLE organization put pictures and
names of customers on the opening page of its web site along with brief testimonials?
That page really should tell readers that it is for people like THEM. For
an example from the law firm world, see http://www.colsonquinn.com/. And
why hasn’t any CLE organization that I know of created separate,
tailored web pages for Baby Boomer and for GenX lawyers? The research clearly shows
that they are looking for different things and respond to different themes
and different graphics. And, as long as we’re in this groove, why haven’t
CLE organizations in MCLE jurisdictions, mounted annual efforts, supported
by their governing boards, to improve their MCLE rules for the good of the
bar and the public? E.g. rethinking rules against accrediting practice management
courses, moving toward nationwide uniformity, etc. From a recent New York Times Sports Page: “Whenever
you work with somebody, you must make people laugh, because the message goes
through easier. If you try to be hard, it doesn’t matter what you teach.
Some people will put up a front. So you have to be loose and you have to
have fun doing it. That makes it easier.” So says Tony Pena, first
base coach of the Yankees.
Management
For many CLE organizations, it’s year-end performance
review season. While many people—on both sides of the desk—dread
the process, it can be positive and valuable. I recommend using one of the
many commercial forms available to guide you through the process and to act
as an objective checklist of things that need discussing. Train your people
on using the forms so that everyone understands what is happening and why.
If you have communicated reasonably well during the year, there should be no
big surprises at year’s end. But still it is often useful to review each
person’s performance highlights and not-so-high lights from the past
year, both the supervisor’s views AND the supervisee’s views, and
to agree on goals and new approaches for the coming year. Emphasize strengths
and potentials for even better performance in the coming year. Little is gained
by painful revisits to failures or mistakes during the year, but discussion
of euphemisms such as “learning experiences” can make the discussion
complete and sometimes generate better understanding on everyone’s part.
And it can lead to agreement on how to produce better performance in the future. Every
CLE organization needs a good overall strategy to succeed in a challenging
marketplace. But that great strategy means nothing without focused,
consistent execution. Keys to great execution include the leaders’ staying in touch
with day-to-day realities in the market (and sharing that knowledge with others
in the business). It requires the setting of specific, measurable goals and
priorities AND consistent follow-through that sees that milestones are reached,
that conflicts surfaced and resolved, and that follow-up meetings see that
people are accomplishing what they’re supposed to. It requires the rewarding
of “doers”, the sharing of skills and information so capabilities
of the entire organization expand, and the honing of character traits on the
parts of the leaders that include authenticity, self-awareness, self-mastery
and humility. Those are large orders. But they are essential to solid strategy
execution.
Resources Google Docs & Spreadsheets now offers free, web-based,
collaborative, word-processing tools that can
be powerfully efficient for many CLE uses. Check them out
at http://www.google.com/google-d-s/whatsnew.html.
Creating a CLE course marketing plan, a curriculum, a budget,
a report, or other documents, where the input of others
is needed or valued, can be facilitated by collaborative
word processing tools. They take a bit of learning and
practice, but they are worth the effort! Check out the web-based approach to learning Mandarin
Chinese promoted on a Chinese web site, http://www.chinesepod.com.
According to Elliott Masie, “this unique site includes audio
pod/segments, news from China and live one to one coaching services
from Shanghai. Upbeat, well-structured and highly interactive content
and assistance flows from this site. There is a fee for on-going content
and personal coaching. Can CLE take away something from this approach? In another Masie brainchild, he says, “We
are launching a new project in our Learning CONSORTIUM… focused
on Open Source Learning. Volunteers from dozens of our corporate members
are working
together to create free, reusable learning content on two topics: Working
Virtually with Teams and Better On-Line Search Techniques. There are
two provocative elements to this project: first, all content will be
developed by teams from multiple Fortune 1000 companies. Second, all
content and modules will be placed in the Public Domain for any organization
to use, modify or extend. [The project] will extend to dozens of modules
this year and beyond. If you are interested in joining our Learning
CONSORTIUM, go to our website at http://www.masie.com.”
Consulting
Ideas If you are budgeting now for next year, include
funds to pay for an innovative, high-impact strategic planning
session with
your governing board or committee, with your staff or with a combination
of the two. If done well, it will return more in added revenue or cost
savings than you spend. If you choose to use an outside facilitator to
maximize the value of your planning, I can provide an objective, outsider’s
view AND the experience of leading strategic planning sessions with large
and small CLE groups all over the USA and Canada. If you would like a
detailed, no-obligation proposal, let’s discuss your needs. I guarantee
that you will be pleased with the outcome of our work together! If you would like to raise the impact
of your advertising pieces, including your web site, I can give you a
proposal for a sharp-edged
set of recommendations based on reviewing your current efforts. If you have a nagging--or even raging--management/personnel
issue with your staff or governing board, I am willing to listen, to
ask questions and to make suggestions, if I have any. For such confidential
executive services, I pass along my expenses, if any, for reimbursement
and suggest a fee range. But you decide the value of the services and
the eventual fee based on actual outcomes on the time frame that you
deem appropriate.
Following 20 years as Executive Director of a major American CLE organization,
Chuck now consults on CLE strategic planning, marketing, management challenges
with CLE organizations, bar associations,
law firms, and law schools. He welcomes your inquiries on projects designed
to enhance your
organization’s effectiveness.
You can contact
him at chuck@chuckbingaman.com,
at 1-603-756-9268, or at P.O. Box 390, Walpole, NH, USA 03068-0390. Past
issues of this newsletter are archived at www.chuckbingaman.com.
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