University lawyers need to advertise - part 5

In this final part of the series, I am going to share some reflections from a recent event I attended where we discussed this topic and to my surprise, people were not big into it.

Workgroup Legal

Earlier this month, I ventured out of postcode to the Royal Armouries in Leeds for a Workgroup Legal event for General Counsel. Peter Daniels ?? and Charlotte Hudson had kindly invited me to run a breakout session on this hobby-horse of mine. I was joined by about a dozen in house lawyers from a range of sectors, size of teams and indeed there was another HE lawyer in the room (Chatham House rules apply, so I will not name names).

I was quite surprised with the direction of the discussion. I asked if attendees had, in the last 3 months, posted something on Linkedin, that wasn't a job advert.

No hands were raised.

Undeterred, I asked if anyone had been nominated for, submitted for, shortlisted or won any awards.

Two hands went up. Aha, I thought, I've got you on the hook now.

I was wrong.

Reasons not to

The discussion that followed sat along common themes, some of which I have alighted upon in earlier parts of the series. Generally though, I was in the minority in starting from a position that promoting ourselves, our teams and our work was a 'good thing'. Reasons shared for not being keen:

• We're quite busy actually - attendees discussed how much hard work awards submissions were, including some frankly ridiculous requirements from award organisers for 'silly photos' of the team. I have to be honest, that would have been a deal breaker for me too. I think that comes back to what I said in part 4 - it's got to feel right and if not, don't do it.
• We don't like being in the spotlight - we reflected on whether lawyers are natural introverts (or not) and that even when we do a 'good thing' we naturally caveat our involvement and play it down. In-house lawyers were described as 'unseen' or 'part of the furniture' and I got the sense from some in the room that they quite like that. I never had lawyers down as being introverts - maybe in-house lawyers are more likely to be introverted than private practice lawyers? This feels like the topic of a research project...
• The law has an image problem - one attendee posited that people don't like lawyers and so they don't want to hear from lawyers (see also part 1 of the series on my views on that).

One person reflected that when they see an in-house lawyer posting on Linkedin they assume that they are looking for a new job. A bit of nervous laughter ensued - but I'd take you back to part 2 on this point and say to that 'so what?'.

Your profile, your career are valid reasons to promote the great work you're doing.

A change in tone

So, having heard quite a bit of negativity on the topic, I went into pitch mode - which I realise was perhaps not exactly what I should have been doing in the chair, but my passion on the topic overtook me (sorry everyone). I won't repeat the points I made in the session, as they are covered in the articles on this topic I have already posted here.

However, as discussions continued, we moved into a space where people talked about improving the reputation of their team within the business, if only to improve engagement with them at the right time - a stitch in time saves nine. This is a worthy reason, even for the introverts among us. It is then about doing a good job of positioning your service within the business.

The event was held on World Mental Health day and over the course of the day and during the session we had talked about the benefits of being kind to ourselves and that celebrating successes was good for team building and morale. Something I wholeheartedly agreed with. As I said in part 2, this can improve your job satisfaction and your wellbeing, if you do it right (and avoid submitting for things which require photos that might get you featured in Roll on Friday if they got out).

So what's next?

As the session ended, I reiterated my call to action from my last article - just do one thing. What's the worst that could happen?

And that's where I'll end this series - I encourage you all to post on Linkedin, submit for an award, update your intranet pages, whatever - just do something to share your amazing work. See what happens. You might get a rush of serotonin when someone engages with your post, you might take the time to feel a little pride in the work you've done, you might get a candidate at interview tell you they have seen your post. Worst case scenario - nothing happens. So what have you got to lose?

Thank you for reading! All comments, corrections and challenges welcome in the comments section. For members of Association of University Legal Practitioners (AULP) I hope this has inspired you to submit for one of the gongs in the AULP Awards in 2025!