Lean Into the Chaos – The BD Advice That Shaped His Entire Career

Chris Newman: I think one of the things I've learned in my career is that being in chaos actually gives me energy. I think the more you kind of lean into that understanding, the more likely you're going to be able to make new things happen that maybe are not part of a firm culture.

Neil Barrow: Hi, welcome to I Hope This Email Finds You Well, a business development podcast for professional service firms. My name is Neil Barrow. I'm the founder of EnabledBD, a business development consulting firm UndergroundBD, a business development professional community and the host of I hope this email Finds You Well. Today I'm joined by Chris Newman, the Chief Marketing and Business development Officer for Mintz.

Thanks for joining today, Chris.

Chris Newman: Yeah, I appreciate it. You know, looking forward to this.

Neil Barrow: Yeah. So Chris leads growth, client development and marketing strategy. He spent his entire career inside AmLaw 100 firms and he's president with roles in LSSO and LMA. He's become known across the legal industry for building high performing teams, challenging outdated growth models, and bringing real energy, candor and creativity to how law firms compete and serve clients.

So really excited about our conversation today. And so we're going to start with our combo meal, which is three for five Chris's three hot BD takes. And we're going to bandy around that for 5 minutes. And so the first on the menu is I love this chaos creates opportunity.

What do you mean by that, Chris?

Chris Newman: Yeah. I mean, this is something that early out of my career I was taught by a senior partner at Cravath. We were in a situation where there was a lot of sort of disruption going on around how we were approaching business development and thinking about it. And she gave me this guidance that, you know, leaned into the chaos and, and makes sense of it.

And ultimately you'll come out on the better on the on the other side. And, you know, I think that's something I've always just carried with me. You know, I think as you go into these organizations and you look to disrupt and, you know, really reshape the interpretation of what business development and marketing can be, it's knowing that you're going to be entering that chaos stage and not being scared of it. And, you know, ultimately using that to your advantage.

You know, I think one of the things I've learned in my career is that being in chaos actually gives me energy. That's not for everyone. And I fully, you know, recognize that, But I think that also, you know, that leads you to form teams that also provide that right balance, right? You don't want someone that's always excited by chaos.

You need to have a bit more of a balanced perspective to that. So it doesn't mean it's always going to be, you know, the the least stressful amount of times, you know, or experiences, but I think the more you kind of lean into that understanding, the more likely you're going to be able to make new things happen that maybe are not part of a firm culture.

Neil Barrow: Yeah. No, I think, I think you describe a lot of the stuff that most business developers find themselves in, which is there's not a that we're going into an ambiguous type defined role. And it's up to us to make sense of what's actually happening within the chaos within the firm around business development and start to organize that. And so I think that's like a fundamental piece of business development for firms, right, is trying to make sense of where we're at in business development and growth and then trying to organize that chaos because we're all just kind of scattered and doing a bunch of stuff.

100% definitely.

Neil Barrow: So the next menu item is authenticity starts at the top.

Chris Newman: Yeah, this is kind of a funny story. So I was getting ready to go into my last round of interviews for the Mintz's chief marketing business development role. And if anyone knows me, as you can tell from my background, I'm a big sneaker head, and I was debating whether or not to wear sneakers to my final interview. I'm a Maryland Terrapin graduate and the Terps were in the Sweet 16 the day of my final interview and had this great debate of whether or not to wear my custom Terp dunks to the interview or wear dress sneakers.

And you know, of course, the natural insecurities started to take shape. You didn't want to necessarily have a bad decision ultimately to not getting a great job. And so I had my dress sneakers on. And I remember receiving an email from the Red Sox that day, and it was a ticket promotion.

But the subject line said authenticity starts at the top. And if anyone knows who I am as an individual, you know, kind of going back to the chaos element, I am chaos in a lot of ways. And so to me, being my authentic self, both in that moment, but also in the moments that really have helped transform my career, have really allowed me to be that authentic, you know, individual that helps me stand proud, but also, you know, knows where my boundaries are. And also being able to really help more and more people feel comfortable with being in their authentic selves.

Neil Barrow: Yeah, I think you hit in on a key point that we all have to learn eventually is there's this level of who we are at home and with our friends has to be translated in a professional way into our professional career. Because I think what that does is allows people to connect with us on a real human level. And then also it allows us to attract those types of people that want to come along, right? And so I think exactly.

And so I think being that authentic version of yourself is challenging when you're early in your career. But then as you progress and get more comfortable with who you are and how you want to portray yourself, there's a right way to do that, right? And so I think I think that's a great story that highlights, you know, being your authentic self and how can you integrate that into your professional environment. I think that's a big take away.

Chris Newman: Yeah. So it's, it really becomes your brand identity. And I do feel like it's, as you pointed out, you get more and more confident as you have more reps under your belt and the experience is built up over time.

Neil Barrow: Yeah, no, I love that. OK, last one, simplify to maximize.

Chris Newman: Yeah, this is so years ago as I was trying to get into more volunteer roles, I Co chaired a conference with another professional in the industry for LMA New England. And our theme that we came up with that year was simplify to maximize and it really has always stuck with me. I think a lot of times, especially in the complex world that we're in, we tend to, you know, overthink things. We tend to address that chaos with a lot of solutions.

Instead of saying, OK, how do we chip away at the foundation, really start to think about ways that will move the needle, but not having high expectations that everything needs to happen in one big swoop. So for me, you know, the simplify to maximize concept really defines being able to break off pieces, you know, see the see the momentum, see the success with it, Celebrate that success, you know, get that, you know that, get that surge of energy that shows you that you're making the right movements and continue to build off that. I think often times, you know, leaders don't come at, you know, growth or, you know, building out of system in a systematized way. And I think when you when you come at it where you're looking at bits and pieces that build up to the overall vision, it's a lot easier to motivate teams and really to execute on the outcomes that you're looking to achieve.

Neil Barrow: Yeah. So what's really funny and we didn't talk about this before is so in some of my presentations to leadership, I use a very similar phrase, but mine is simplified amplify, right? But it's the same thing because we see, we see the same stuff right where it's like, and that's the flag that I've been carrying for a long time, which is we're chasing the new, new, new, but we're ignoring the foundational elements of what business. Development actually is.

And so we need to get back to basics and then we can evolve that and grow it and build upon it. But if we're not doing the basics, then we need to get back to that. And that's not sexy. It's work.

It's it's hard work. It's behavior change for a firm. And so how do we do that in the right way practically to make it stick and change the culture? And that's ultimately what you're talking about, right?

Chris Newman: 100% And I love the way you described it. I mean, when you're doing culture change, you really have to look at the behaviors that you're looking to disrupt and build off of. But the reality is that is the foundation you're working with. And so the more you know, look to simplify the approach and don't necessarily try to mandate things too quickly, you're, you're much more likely to create the behavior that you want.

Neil Barrow: Yeah, we want consistency right in our behaviors. And so we can't build that by making a dozen changes at once or making big sweeping changes. It starts at the foundational level. So love that, man.

So thank you for sharing your combo meal. I can't wait to kind of weave some of that in into this now that we're kind of in that frame of mind. But let's kind of back up a little bit and tell me, tell me, how did you so your Chief business development Marketing Officer at a very large law firm, tell me how you got started in business development?

Chris Newman: Honestly, it was a fortuitous moment. I like many folks in legal had a high desire to go to law school. I was the lucky, I was very lucky to, you know, kind of fall into an opportunity at one of the best law firms based out of New York, Cravath, Swaine & Moore. Did you know, litigation case manager work for a few years and walked away from that and said, OK, I don't want to be a lawyer.

What do I want to be? And they happen to have their first ever litigation BD focus role opening up. And you know, if anyone knows anything about Cravath, they were always the firm that had the phone ringing. They were not ones that had to chase business.

And so, you know, when you're working with essentially some of the smartest people in the world, it really started to battle test that concept of being able to influence, to be able to create change management. And even early on in my career, it allowed me to really experiment and do things. One thing that I've always been blessed to have opportunities with is our blank canvas rolls. And so for me going in with, you know, sort of a no prescribed solution, but making those solutions up as I went some work, some didn't, that really allowed me to, you know, kind of get that confidence to build up progress fairly quickly.

And then accelerated once I moved back up to Boston after meeting my wife and, you know, went to Cooley. And at that point, I think that's probably where the greatest acceleration happened, you know, going to an environment where it was very progressive. They had a lot of hunger that a lot of cultural positives that really allowed you to be yourself, but also to be thinking creatively and to make heavy impacts without really a lot of boundaries. And I think those are a lot of the organizations that I've always looked for.

You know, to me, you can always look at the most attractive title and say, OK, that's where I need to be. I've never been that person. I've always been very selective on choosing the opportunities where I think I can make a difference. And that's a big part of where I've had success, you know, really elevating into these different roles pretty much every time.

I've always turned down the next level position at least once, if not twice before finding that the right platform to do what I think is possible.

Neil Barrow: So you said some really interesting things there and I want to kind of go back to them. So with your first role with Cravath you talked about it being a blank slate. Now, most business developers when they're hired at small firms or firm boutique firms, even medium sized firms, these roles are kind of ambiguous and undefined. And it's really up to the business development pro to kind of make that what it is, right?

And so you say that you've thrived in that environment where a lot of BD folks that I see are looking to leadership to tell them what to do, right? And those are different skill sets and different things to do, but you've kind of navigated through that. So tell me a little bit about how you thought about getting started in a blank slate role. Like what did you initially work on?

What did you initially do? Like what was a good success story for you there? Because then I want to talk about Cooley and like what you're looking for in that next role. Because you're right, it's dictated around culture growth.

Like how can I be successful in this role? And it takes those people that are a little bit progressive minded, right? That's how I can help the most.

Chris Newman: You know, you know, I would say it's a foundation of curiosity. You know, for me, when you're working with the level of attorneys that Cravath has, you really have to match the intelligence level. And, you know, one of the things that's always attracted to me to business development is being able to curate intelligence through market scoping, through research, through, you know, education. So where I made a major impact fairly quickly at Cravath was doing a lot of kind of investigative research, right?

Like thinking through like, OK, using my paralegal skills, using my leadership skills, you know, managing teams. How do I, you know, take the information in front of me, think about it from the lawyer perspective. I mean, I used to walk around with a Wikipedia page open just constantly searching things to like learn what the lawyers were talking about, connecting the dots and then building off of that. You know, I think for us, this is back in the day when the Bloomberg terminals were kind of the big thing.

And so we were like, you know, coming up with proactive identification systems for cases that were getting filed. Or, you know, a lot of I remember when the economic crisis happened in '08 and I think about some of the indicators that I saw coming through in the, in the Bloomberg, you know, sort of terminal news for probably six or seven months. And I remember like having conversations with the lawyers, like kind of seeing things happening before they were actually happening. And to me, that was like where my credibility took a, you know, a big swing upward was being able to really leverage the knowledge that was in front of me that the lawyers didn't necessarily have access to and being able to activate that.

I still recall to this day, you know, having partners, again, not used to business development professionals, you know, have a lot of pride in what they do and not necessarily seeing, you know, always the value from folks that maybe are not practicing law. But having partners come to me and say without the support and guidance and, you know, alerts and, you know, identification, we would not have gone XY and Z matters. And that was, you know, a huge supercharged moment because, you know, this was an experiment at the time and, you know, the experiment was working and LED to, you know, a quick promotion after a year, which was pretty cool.

Neil Barrow: That's awesome. And so a couple things that you said that I love, which is like what you're describing as you were the detective, you're the kind of the BD detective, right? You're.

Chris Newman: Trying to way to describe it you're.

Neil Barrow: Trying to put all this information together under the, under the umbrella of what your role was, which was business development enablement. I'm enabling our people to go have better conversations, to go generate matters, to go generate new clients, right? And I think that's a real key. And that's what I've loved about getting to work with law firms is they really take that view of enablement, which is different than a lot of firms take, which is typically we view business development as origination.

Like I need Neil to go out and get me a new client versus I need Neil to help our firm go generate new clients, right? And those are different skill sets and different things, but there's typically a little bit of a balance of both. But I love the stories around being a detective and helping our people go generate conversations and have better conversations with potential opportunities. And so I love that man.

And so.

Chris Newman: Huge asset at that point and it's still, I mean, as intelligence becomes more and more just available in the given state of affairs, I mean it's just more opportunity for business development professionals to, you know, day in and day out demonstrate that curiosity that leads to more opportunity.

Neil Barrow: Yeah, no, I love that. And I think that's a fundamental place to start. Like if you're thinking about hiring for business development or dipping your toe into it's the enablement side. Like how can we, how can we help our firm go develop new business rather than this person initially spending a lot of their time trying to source new opportunities?

OK, so you were at Cravath, got promoted, then you went to Cooley. And the reason you took this Cooley opportunity was because of the culture. So tell me a little bit about like what that look like Because I find that when you start in a new role, you take everything that you learned and you're saying, OK, what would I start with differently? Like how can I fast track myself?

So tell me a little bit about your start with Cooley.

Chris Newman: Yeah, I mean, with Cooley, it was, you know, I always say to folks, you got to use that interview process to your advantage as much as the company uses it to their advantage. You know, I the types of questions. So for Cooley, actually I was interviewing for a different role and they ultimately came back to me and said, hey, we want to create this role for you. We've been talking about having it and you seem like you're actually the right fit for it.

So I thought right away, OK, this is a culture that's willing to put investment behind the right person if they see it in front of them, even if it's not necessarily on the table right away. You know, I think for me a lot of it was how do I create more of a culture of cross sell? So they had such, they still have, you know, such a tremendous client base, you know, such an exciting client base. You know, coming out of the economic recession, the US economy needed a revitalization.

And so, you know, Silicon Valley became that, you know, that catalyst to really help grow. And so to be at the, you know, kind of the center of all these really cool new technologies, social media, you know, 3D printing, some of the other, you know, advancements that were happening that really excited me and that brought the energy to the day-to-day job. So, you know, I was in charge of litigation, IP and then eventually regulatory after we acquired a firm in DC. And to me, it was the excitement of just again, using that curiosity, looking at the clients that we represented, and then using a more strategic and influential voice.

You know, I remember when I first walked into the lead partner that I was ultimately going to work with, you know, he questioned why they hired me on the West Coast, I mean, on the East Coast, sorry, because he was a West Coast based partner. And I said, don't worry, I've got you. We're going to make this all work. And, you know, I think what was great about that moment was it motivate me to work even harder, which, you know, I think it came through with proactively constant looking for opportunities.

How do I become the dot connector, the person that really is going to, you know, find these opportunities that we have traditionally overlooked, not only bring them to the partner, but like actually mature them through the journey of where they need to go. And I think that's often times where a lot of BD professionals maybe fall or have opportunity to grow a little bit more is it's not a hand off moment, right? You really got to think through how am I going to, you know, extend myself to bring this through where we're trying to get into the results that we're trying to do. And Cooley allowed me to do that in a lot of different ways.

So I was very blessed to, you know, work there for almost 6 years and get the opportunities I did.

Neil Barrow: Yeah. And so when you're, you said a couple of different things. So one is cross sell, like this is almost a bad word now, right? Like when people hear cross sell, that's hey, that means what you're asking me to do is go to my clients and pitch them something like, Hey, we've got some of this stuff.

Do you want it? But we know that's not exactly what that means, right? It's like being, you've used the word curious many times, but it's like, Hey, I know that you might be dealing with these issues. How are you handling it?

Right? It's being that advisor to our clients. So tell me a little bit about how you're thinking about the cross selling and then the follow up question to that is you again, you mentioned curiosity many times. What is like a what is like a tactical application of your curiosity, like when you're thinking about your time at Cooley?

Chris Newman: Yeah. I mean, so on the first point, you know, instead of thinking of it as cross sell, I mean, I think it's bringing solutions to clients. And I think the more you can reframe that with lawyers, especially as they're in that doer-seller model it really is thinking through how I'm going to help the, you know, the business grow or protect its, you know, most valuable assets or, you know, reduce cost. So for me it was, you know, the cross sell component was more we have a solution to this problem.

It's, it's, you know, it's more public because it's out there in a, in a lawsuit or some other critical development. And, you know, I think part of it is, you know, you got to be able to identify the right supporting credentials to ensure that solution is going to match up to what we can actually do. The worst thing you can do is when you know, over communicate that we're great, a great fit for an opportunity. And in reality, we've never done that work previously or don't have the right people.

And, you know, I was always very careful with that. I, I didn't want to, you know, to me it was again about learning the practice in ways where I became an extension of the practice. It wasn't just waiting for people to tell me information. And that I think bleeds into the second part of your question, which was, you know, how did I demonstrate curiosity everyday?

I mean, to me, there's a healthy diet of, you know, information you're consuming on a daily basis, right? So for me, it was read the Wall Street Journal, you know, scan the New York Times, look at the Law360 newsletters, look at Business Insider, look at some of the kind of the entrepreneurial, you know, you know, magazines that only wasn't that wasn't just for being able to identify opportunities. It actually was also for leadership skill development, because for me it was a combination of OK, how many are better at business development, but then how am I also going to become a better leader and create more of a voice of influence? Because those two go hand in hand, especially when you're working with, you know, high profile individuals that only have so much time to spare for you and also you know, maybe are sometimes tough to win over on the respect front.

Neil Barrow: Yeah, no. And I really like how you describe that, which is like, we've got to keep up to date with what's going on in our industry and in the of the world in general, so we can help identify those opportunities and then armor people for those conversations if relevant, right. Ultimately. And so on the cross selling front, I again, I think you're right most.

So there's a lot of statistics out there about our clients not knowing all the services that we offer, even though we've told them multiple times and we send them emails, but they still don't, don't know, right. It takes a couple times before they owe you do that. Oh, I didn't know that, right. So to your point, it's like making sure that we're aligning the right foundational services at or the ones that were great at a foundational level because you're right, we don't want to get over our skis and, and trying to pursue an opportunity with a client that we really don't have the expertise in or we might fumble.

Chris Newman: The ball, yeah. OK. So I think sometimes law firms get too comfortable, you know, describing themselves as a full service model and they think that naturally the lawyer, the client or, you know, is going to think, oh, full service, they must have everything. And I think, you know, part of it is they, you know, on the client side, there's just so much noise that they're trying to make sense of and, you know, they lose track of it.

And it's, you know, it's roles like that, you know, my team and others, you know, own that they should really be driving that, you know, effective communication. But you know, it's also working with the lawyers to feel confident that, you know, sales is not a dirty word. And if you start really thinking about it, do we have the right solutions? Can we bring the right solutions to clients?

You know, they start to rethink how that communication looks and in terms of, you know, looking to make intros and things like that.

Neil Barrow: Yeah, over my career and then with my consulting work, it's for sure like it's, it's a mindset challenge initially. Like we've got to reframe if you're comfortable using sales, great, right. But we've got to reframe either sales or business development, right, Whatever that means to the firm, whatever terminologies we're using. But we've got to reframe that for our people because it is in service.

Ultimately, that's what we're trying.

Chris Newman: To do yeah, they, and I think sometimes the only thing I would say is that those sometimes you also have to kind of disrupt how the terminology is. I mean, I came into an organization that sales has not been a word that we've used. And I have ultimately said we actually need to say this. We need to say this out loud because we are in a business.

We have moments where we I don't know if you've ever read the book Dan Pink's To Sell Is Human, but as being human beings everyday. It's it's an art of persuasion, right? We're always trying to create our position and and get people to, you know, understand our perspective and reality. That is sales, right.

And so to me, it's what I try to get more and more people comfortable with is yes, you want to meet your, you know, your culture where it is. But there's also a certain point where you have to kind of reframe that, you know, when you're in professional services, in many instances, your doers are your sellers. And that's sometimes where if there isn't that acceptance or that understanding, it's a lot easier for everyone to kind of look, you know, like this and say, OK, it's everyone else's job to get to get the work for us.

Neil Barrow: Yeah. I've had this debate a lot, right? And I love it because I come like I started my career in sales and I believe that it isn't a dirty word. It is actually the fundamental thing that we're trying to do as a business, right?

If we are trying to generate new clients and opportunities for people as a business. And so I love that you're trying to disrupt it. I think that for me, it's just a lot easier to get people to like least listen and buy in a little bit when you're not a, when you're not the chief at a firm, right. So it's like, I've got to get you to take the baby steps to get that mindset changed.

I love how you're coming in and disrupting it. Yes, this is sales. We are in sales like, but it's a, it's all in service. That's what we're trying to.

Chris Newman: Do it's all in service? Exactly, it's service and solutions, that's what I can do it.

Neil Barrow: I love that. OK, so you're a Cooley for a while, so tell me about where you went from there.

Chris Newman: Yeah. So the next big leap was going to McDermott. And you know, I think that's where I was really blessed to be surrounded by just hyper progressive minds. You know, McDermott had been growing at A, at a pace that was much, you know, slower than what most wanted, you know, traditionally about two to 3% post '08 economic crisis.

And yeah, there was a really a supercharged moment to say, OK, we, we really have to, you know, change that and really grow at a faster pace. I was, you know, fortunate enough to work with a brilliant individual who came in and really one of the things that we did at McDermott was we stripped out marketing and business development. We created 2 separate departments. I was, you know, a senior level individual working with a new Chief business development officer who had previously been at CEB.

He's now one of the Co founders of DCM Insights, which is tied to the Activator Advantage. But we really, you know, built out the BD system there. So a lot of the baseline concepts and you know, elements that came from Activator or with Activator Advantage now was started at McDermott. So we put, you know, robust client feedback program in place.

We put Salesforce in place in the, in a way that, you know, most law firms would only dream of, let alone be able to execute. We put practice strategy plans in place. We put a lot of investment around up, you know, upgrading our talent in ways that would get our lawyers to just, you know, think differently around business development. And you know, I did that for about 9 years, held a number of different roles.

You know, when I, when I wrapped up my almost nine years there, I was running our sales enablement team and that consisted of a, you know, a, an attorney training program, which is the best in the industry, worked with some brilliant minds there. I was in charge of business intelligence. I was on product development side, so actually developing products that we were selling to clients, using knowledge to really build that out in a different lens, you know, working with client feedback, starting to go into client experience. So I've seen it from a lot of different lenses.

You know, my first five years were more on the practice and industry side and then being able to move more into, you know, owning those core functions that, you know, really activated the rest of the department and the rest of the firm.

Neil Barrow: I love that and I think I think we could spend the whole, you know, episode like just talking about that and what you learned and built. But I think, you know, when I because I've read the Activator Advantage, I love the challenger sale. I love Jolt effect. I love the DCM Insights.

Yeah, exactly. We're DCM Insights in Rory Channer, all those. Yeah, they're doing great work. And I love the Activator Advantage because again, what it's what it's trying to show you is here are the behaviors that lead to growth, right from our people, right?

Ultimately, that's the foundation of what they're describing. And it's not overly complicated, right? But we've got to have those systems and people and leadership in place to help enable those behaviors and do the change. And so it is practice plans, it is technology, it is training and development, it is, you know, probably coaching a little bit for our people.

Chris Newman: Yeah, voice to the client was voice to the client was huge because that voice to the client that often times would allow the lawyers to see it from the perspective of the client. So, you know, when they're saying, oh, they don't want me to sell to them and you're hearing clients saying I'd really love them to introduce me to these, you know, 3 individuals or, you know, I don't want to be a bother to them. And they're saying, I really wish they would come to our, you know, our headquarters more often and just spend time with us. And, you know, I think those that's a great way to really supercharge your BD curriculum in your in your coaching and training is being able to use the voice of the client to redirect that thinking.

A big believer in understanding Dr. Larry Richard research around the lawyer brain and understanding kind of how, you know, the practice of laws is done with this, you know, these core components of how the brain activates. And then when they're going into that seller mode where there's almost a contradiction. And so how do you, how do you manage both sides of those, you know, those behaviors in a way where you can actually get that change management to be, you know, aligned to actual growth goals?

Neil Barrow: No, I think, I think you're moving up the chain of complexity, right? Like what y'all are installing, which is natural right for firms to move in that direction. But I guess I had, you know, one question. Well, two, I guess CRM adoption is terrible, implementation is terrible, upkeep is terrible for most firms.

And So what was maybe one thing that y'all did at McDermott that maybe surprised you or was like a key to maintaining the goal of the CRM. I guess we can start there is like what was the ultimate goal of the CRM and then maybe what is one thing that you saw that was maybe outsized to make it work?

Chris Newman: Yeah, I mean one thing I would definitely put on the table is that it has to really be a leadership buy in. We were fortunate to have, you know, a chairman who's, you know, currently still in place, that big believer in the, in the sales force, you know, framework, big believer in being able to track and understand our BD efforts and our growth efforts. So I mean, when you have that buying to start, it makes it a lot easier to create the culture shift. You know, I think one example that we did to really make sure that, you know, individuals were engaging was all expense reports.

If they were going through the approval process, they would not be able to be approved unless there was actual opportunity entries in the system. So that was a big way to transform the behavior. But I think just importantly, like as we became a more sophisticated system, every opportunity we look to integrate into the system, right? So it became the backbone of really what everyone communicated through.

I'll give you an example. You know, probably about four or five years ago, one of the things that the firm moved to was having individual lawyer plans and every year as part of a forecasting initiative, this, you know, the partners would go in, they would put their, you know, their essentially their pipeline into the system and they would manage against that. And that was something that everyone could see from a transparent lens. And when you have that kind of, you know, hygiene on a regular basis where, you know, the expectation is that you're using it, that there's engagement at all levels.

So it wasn't just the, you know, the partners, it was the assistants, the, you know, other departments on how to use it and activate it for their own advantages. I think also, you know, one of the things that we became an organization around was being able to have measurable impact. So when we were looking at you know, events or other big investments, everything had to tie back to a 5x multiple of what the investment was. And that was all based on measurement going into Salesforce and we had full right of refusal if folks were not willing to engage in that way.

Neil Barrow: Wow. OK. No, I love that. I think, I think I love the expense reports.

I see that a lot, right. That's the usually the first step to start tracking some activity, right, where it becomes not just a database of contact information, it actually becomes a activity tracker, right. And I love what you said about the individual plans. Like that's my core work with clients is ultimately we've got to get individual plans to our in our people's hands and get them to self build personal, personally build it and then have a mechanism to self report up and to what that is.

And so.

Chris Newman: Well, I think, I think just to piggyback on that, I mean, and we're actually going through this right now with Mintz. I mean, it literally launched in the last two weeks. But you know, I think it's, it's, it also is to help create a benefit to the partners beyond just the system, right? It's to create more efficiencies for them.

It's also to help them prioritize like your best opportunities are this. That's where you should concentrate. Let the marketing ecosystem and some of the other systems work the way they need to. So that way you're, you're keeping those targets warm without having to overcommit your scarce time.

And I think that's where a lot of firms fall short in terms of how to effectively show the benefits tied to having a robust system, something like that.

Neil Barrow: Yeah, no, I agree. I think that's the key is like what role am I supposed to play with my part time role in business development? What am I supposed to be doing with that time? And having an individual plan really helps focus that effort so we don't get frustrated or it's not ambiguous or it doesn't create anxiety.

I have my plan. I know what I'm supposed to be doing, right. I love that. So, OK, the last question around McDermott before we move on to your current role is thinking about training.

So you mentioned training. So tell me about how you all were thinking about training your attorneys or the programs that you were building for them. Because I think a lot of firms have some sort of professional development or they're looking to integrate professional development. And in that way, you know, I've got my opinions, but I'd love to hear your opinions about like what an effective program looks like.

What did y'all learn?

Chris Newman: Yeah, I guess a couple of things come to mind. You know, one of the things you have to understand is what are the behaviors you're actually training to? So we were blessed to actually bring in Korn Ferry led by Matt Dixon to do a behavioral analysis on our partners. So we looked at Rainmakers and then we looked at more of the traditional, you know, partner framework and we did a lot of analysis looking at, you know, behavioral psychology.

We looked at time sheets, we looked at, you know, survey results and really kind of put together the, you know, the key ingredients that made the, the best sellers most successful. So I think that behavioral understanding is key. So that way you can help redirect. I think also you got to make sure you're, you're smart about how you use outside help, You know, so I think a lot of times firms really don't have the discipline of, OK, what are we trying to teach?

And are we consistently teaching the same thing across the board? And I think that tends to be where larger firms trip up where they just, you know, they bring in too many outside perspectives. And, you know, one perspective's here, one perspective's here. And it's not necessarily matching up to the same, you know, the same behavioral rhythm that you're looking to push out, right.

I think outside of that, you have to really use communication effectively. So, you know, often times where I think firms fall short is they do A1 and done, they don't think about the muscle mass to read the, you know, sort of the rinse and repeat approach to how that's being done. So interesting enough in Mintz today, we actually just launched our bi weekly newsletter that will now be, it's called Mobilizing Opportunities. It's intention is to really, you know, journey with the lawyers as they're going through their shift and how they think about business development and how they think about managing pipelines.

I can't stress enough how important communication is. I think that's where the greatest breakdown happens. And you know, I think as soon as you start making assumptions that they've learned what they need to learn to be successful, it probably means that it's an opportunity to go even further. So you have to really understand the segmentation of your population, you know, be able to advance the curriculum for the folks that need that, you know, that deeper dive, but also, you know, track with the individuals that still are, you know, a little bit wobbly on how they should approach, you know, that journey.

Neil Barrow: Yeah. So you said a couple different interesting things there, which is 1 is what is the behavior that we're trying to train on? Like if we don't understand that at the firm, it's very difficult to get anything to stick. Because you also mentioned having multiple outside voices come in or it's a one and done or we're going to send you to this training, which is all great.

Those are great things. But ultimately, we need our own program that aligns with what we're trying to accomplish as a firm, right? So that's what we're training towards is that element. And I think how y'all the meeting everybody where they're at and understanding, we have some people using your term wobbly by getting their feet underneath them on BD all the way up to those that are really experienced and like it and are doing it.

Like we've ultimately got to provide it something for everyone here. And then how do you partition that out to make it make sense to drive the revenue and the behavior change and who you are as a culture for the firm or who do you want to be as at your culture at your firm? So I love that man. OK, so now you're at Mintz.

OK, how are you been at Mintz?

Chris Newman: I just finished my first year last month.

Neil Barrow: OK, awesome. Congratulations. You made it you.

Chris Newman: Made it last year even with your shoes man, so more shoes so tell me what was your kind of.

Neil Barrow: What did your like first thirty 90s, you know, thirty 6090 days maybe you're looking at 9180 days for you, but how did you think about that coming into this role? Did they have Someone Like You before? Is this new? Is this different?

Like tell me a little bit about that.

Chris Newman: Yeah, they've, so this is not a new, a new role for them. I think it was a new direction in terms of what I was, you know, being asked to do from what previous, you know, leaders have been, you know, doing this, you know, in, in former forms. You know, to me, it was about understanding where we were. So, you know, one of the things that we were really being aligned to is driving more of the strategy of the firm and, and not necessarily, you know, I think we really did a great job on providing high level services or high, you know, high grade services to our partners.

But I think a lot of times, like many institutions, it's sort of just trying to service everyone without really much intention and understanding what are we trying to do. So for me it was about, you know, going to our team. So I spent a lot of time in the first six months on where are we as a team and how we're going to create that voice of influence. You know, I think, you know, some of the stuff that we've talked about today were definitely things that I brought into our team culture, Mintz, mobilizers, which I have my jacket on, you know, supporting that.

But it really is a it's a concept, right? It's a team charter that defines the expectations of what we are going to push every day, which is, you know, really be thinkers, be educators, be ones that are willing to push the conversation outside into more, you know, areas that maybe folks are not as comfortable with right away. You know, looking for growth opportunities, not necessarily having that more commercial mindset. So we start every department call with our team charter.

We often we also look at high performing teams. So we've got a clear definition of what our high performing team is, which we also start with every call, all that we do because ultimately if we're going to win, it's going to be a team sport, It's not going to be an individual sport. So you know, we really looked at the structure of our department, made sure there was proper alignment. I think, you know, where we were probably stuck a little bit was there was too much coming at one individual or two individuals and it became overwhelming and they couldn't do more proactive, you know, predictive even business development.

So, you know, disrupting that, obviously getting buy in with partners with the vision and the, you know, the intention of where we're going. To me, there's, you know, sort of five core building blocks and let's see if I can get all five of them because I always seem to miss one. But one, creating a BD culture 2 technology, three talent upgrades for, you know, looking at data and really driving that. And then communication and the other sort of parallel to that is the way I see my role is being in charge of strategy, growth and storytelling.

And that's something that we as a department have really been building out the infrastructure to support that through, you know, the five, the five building blocks that I just mentioned.

Neil Barrow: You know, I love that and I think that if you So what strikes me is how we've you've kind of organized a framework that helps guide your decision making around where you're going to spend your time and what initiatives that you need to have under those five categories, right? Because they will all fall under those five categories. And that gets us to, if you are at the table to talk about how we're going to grow the firm and what are our growth goals, then you're able to align what you're going to do about it within those five categories. And I think having frameworks and shared language around the firm that everybody's using, which I'm sure you're working on, that's super important that we're all speaking the same language at the firm.

Chris Newman: Yeah. I mean, I think and I think that's, that's exactly where we are, right, we are. And to me, for the first six months, it was a lot about the team, right, because the more you have evangelists or ambassadors out there really speaking the language, helping start table set with the lawyers where we're going on this, you know, this ultimate journey, the more advocacy, the more, you know, socializing you have, you know, to your advantage. And so I'm always I'm a very much team first guy.

I'm a big believer that success comes from high performing teams and that's ultimately where you know the best results are going to maximize.

Neil Barrow: I agree. And I think when you're on the subject of team, one of the things that most business development or some business development professionals, marketing leaders, growth people at firms deal with is mobilize, since mobilization is on your jacket, mobilizing their idea up to leadership for approval, right. And you talked about two things. So I want to ask you this question, Do you think that we can influence leadership in a certain way if they're not already bought into growing the firm and have that kind of growth mindset to be able to explore?

Because you talked about it where you're not selecting for title when you're looking for a role, you're selecting for culture and innovation and leadership growth, right? So how do you think about that? Because we run into roadblocks sometimes when we're trying to do new initiatives, but we can't get leadership buy in. Do you think that we can actually influence that?

How have you done that in the past? Or do you think it's like incumbent upon us to choose a culture that allows us to take our ideas and run with it? How do you think about that?

Chris Newman: You know, it's a great question. You know, I think it's part of like looking at the journey, right? Cuz there's gonna be moments where you feel like you're in high acceleration and you're like, OK, they're all believing in the influencing the way I need to. And then all of a sudden something stops you in your tracks and you and you have to say, OK, like, oh, wait, we're, we didn't get that moment right.

You know, I think influence comes from a lot of active listening. And if you start to, you know, really start to hear out where people are, you know, what they, you know, ultimately see as what the, you know, how they're interpreting the journey and then being able to build up that credibility, build up that rapport. You know, I think you have to be able to have that discipline to manage those conversations. I mean, you're always going to have, you know, individuals that are supercharged up on it.

And then you're going to have the, you know, the detractors, right, the folks that have, you know, had a very successful career that don't want to necessarily disrupt. But, you know, I think part of it is knowing how to marry both internal and external knowledge, you know, with this. So I'll give you an example. Recently we've had our partner retreat in the last few weeks and I leveraged Patrick Fuller, who recently just left the American lawyer, but a brilliant mind in this industry who really came into perspective on like where the industry is as in its current state and how it marries up to where Mintz is.

And the reason why I thought that was an important conversation to have at the retreat was, you know, you really want to kind of show where other firms are disrupting. I think sometimes lawyers can get very, or even any industry, they can get very, you know, tunnel visioned and heads down. But I think when you can bring that perspective and into the why, it makes it a lot easier to them to want to understand what how you know what the how is and then ultimately what that's going to lead to for results. And so one book that I'm a huge believer in is The Five Dysfunctions of a Team.

If you ever look at that, And that's one of the things that we start off with my department every that's the high performing team, because we have to be a team built on trust. We have to be a team built on, you know, being able to have self, you know, safe and healthy conflicts got to be committed. We got to have accountability and we got to get some results. I think to me, that's exactly what you're trying to build up in a, in a firm culture as you try to move in the direction or do move in the direction of creating more of a BD-centric mindset.

So it's not an easy journey. And I don't want to mislead anyone to think that this just happens with a little, you know, magic Pixie dust and you know, all of a sudden things will change. But I think when you've got the discipline and the durability and the resiliency combined with all the stuff that we've been talking about today, it does become a more feasible opportunity to, you know, see those results over time.

Neil Barrow: Yeah, I think what you're nailing here is you said it external and internal, which is, you know, I found the most effective conversations. If we have an initiative that we want to move forward, we need to back that by industry data or show what other firms are doing, right. We've got it. We've got to show how it applies, to show the why instead of just focusing on the how, which is what you just said, right?

And I think, I mean, that's super important. When we have these conversations with leadership around initiatives, we've got to show the why. Why is this important to us.

Chris Newman: Yeah. But I would also say the same time you got to be careful because a lot of times the why can be stated. It's the how that people sometimes can also.

Neil Barrow: Get full. Right, especially if it's, you know, especially if it's the sort of that top level leadership role, like it's easy to say stuff, right? It's easy to kind of be that effective, you know, that visionary. But I often find the how is the hardest part because it's that's where the behavior change has to happen.

And it's like, oh wait, like we've been doing it this way. The how is now like how we're going to change that to get to the other side to be much more effective with what we're trying to do.

Chris Newman: You got to have it kind of both you got to have a plan, right, if you're going to have this conversation.

Neil Barrow: So I love that. OK, So tell me about what you're excited about in your next year at Mintz. What are some of the things that you're working on? What are some of your initiatives?

Could you share with us kind of like what you're excited about working on within y'all's organization?

Chris Newman: Yeah, I mean, anyone who knows me is I'm a big visionary for where things are going to go that sort of being stuck in status quo. So, you know, I think, you know, to your question really about CRM and, you know, some of the other kind of technology advancements, One of the things that attracted me to Mintz was being able to build up an apartment kind of a, I want to say a blank slate because obviously we had a tremendous team already in place that we're, you know, helping, you know, grow new skills with. But, you know, I look at business development in a way right now where there's just endless opportunity with, you know, artificial intelligence, with thinking through how it, you know, systems can be interconnected to really create more technology advancements. So we're looking to do something completely different around CRM, working with some, you know, great legal industry visionaries to really build out something special.

I think that's a great advantage to us, you know, moving in the direction of creating, you know, our own systematized way of deploying teachable content to our, you know, our partners into our key stakeholders, you know, maximizing, you know, the voice of the client. I think the big thing that's on the horizon that I think more and more firms are going to be focused on is client experience. And the thing with client experience is that it very much intersects with innovation and technology. And that's the fun stuff, right?

When you start really starting getting into the journey mapping and thinking through, you know, what does client successful retention look like, especially as loyalty, you know, seemingly continues to erode as you know, at least in the legal industry. So, you know, those are all things that we're pushing. I think right now our big objectives are getting strategy plans and you know, pipeline pipelines in place with our lawyers that will give us a lot more opportunity to build out more systematized marketing campaigns and you know, just prioritize the best growth areas for Mintz. And I know that we're we're on that journey in a way that's already being well received and has a lot more opportunity to accelerate.

Neil Barrow: That's awesome. Well, I love those like the continuation of the, the progress that you've already made and making sure that we can keep some momentum that you've already built over the last year, right. But then it's also, I like what you said, and I'll leave this with just a, this is the thought for everyone, But like everyone, we're moving towards that customer experience, client experience, client success type roles within firms. And you made a very interesting point is like, how does technology and, you know, AI tools, how does that help us create more of a better experience for working with us?

But also how do we marry that with our people to make sure that the relationships are tight for retention, right? And right. So it's, it's this, it's this, it's going to be this interesting combination over the next couple of years about how do we get the organized around that? Because everybody's going to be focused on client experience based on what you've said, which is loyalty is for sure eroding among all professional services.

So how do we do that effectively? So, Chris?

Chris Newman: And that was, and that was over. The hot topic is that I just finished up being president of LSSO after a 2 year run. And I was at the Rain Dance conference last week or two weeks ago and in Chicago. And thematically that was the big take away.

It was, it was this is, this is where a lot of these, you know, I think BD strategies, tactics are going to go. It's just much more in that client experience, you know, portion of it. And, you know, I think that's as folks get, you know, I think it would be dismissive if folks, you know, weren't thinking about how AI is going to disrupt their roles. But I think as more and more people lean into seeing like there's, there's actually a huge opportunity here, there's a huge opportunity to do more attractive work.

I think that's where there's even more excitement for the industry.

Neil Barrow: No, I agree. And I think what you're, what you're describing is, you know, how do we effectively we're, we're chasing the AI around, how does it help us with our delivery, right? But we're also looking at it on the business development marketing side about how do we help us stay in communication and organize around our clients, right? And so it's those really two things and how do they go together.

And I love it, Chris. And you also said LSSO, right? So tell, give us a little plug for LSSO, give us a little plug for LMA. I know you're very involved in both of those organizations.

Chris Newman: Yeah. So LMA has been a great organization for, you know, for a number of years, you know, several decades, you know, I think for professionals that are really looking for community and learning from a whole slew of different, you know, different roles and you know, what they do and how they operate. You know, LMA is, you know, several thousand person community, whereas LSSO, which is the legal sales and service organization, is an organization that's been around for 20 years. I think we're at a supercharged point where a couple years ago they put me in as their first ever president.

And what we did in the last few years is really establish our five pillars of content and curriculum that we're concentrated on. They do an annual conference called Rain Dance that's every year in June. Next year it's June 9th and 10th in Chicago. So anyone who's interested, please look at it.

But you know, it's a smaller conference. It's, you know, probably about 200 people. We're obviously always looking to continue to grow that. But the beauty of that conference compared to something that's a bit larger is that there's a lot more information shares, there's a lot more workshops, there's a lot more, you know, kind of connected networking in ways that doesn't feel as overwhelming.

So we've been looking at it as an opportunity for us to really concentrate on sales and service in legal and it really expands into professional services beyond, but it gives everyone an opportunity to refine, you know, skills that or you know, teachings that maybe are a bit more high level when you go to bigger or you know, bigger organizations. Yeah, no, I love that. Well, thanks for sharing that and thank you for sharing all your insights like we might need to have a follow up episode about what all you're working on because we touched on a lot of different things that we weren't able to get to. But I, I love the thank you for sharing your stories and tactics.

So, and thank you for joining. So thank you for watching or listening to. I Hope This Email Finds You Well and we'll catch you next time.