Tuesday, February 07, 2012Also in this section
Transactional training
The basic knowledge and skills that all junior transactional lawyers need are essentially the same. Unfortunately, as a result of the early assignment of associates to specific transactional practice areas, this basic foundation is often overlooked. Instead, the young lawyer receives training that focuses on the substantive law of their area of practice, which would be much more meaningful to them after they have been introduced to more fundamental learning. FPD has developed a comprehensive set of training programs for junior lawyers designed to remedy this common problem.
The benefits of more effective training for junior transactional lawyers include:
- They require less time to become value-adding members of a deal team
- Their on-the-job learning becomes more productive
- Clients are more willing to accept them as billers on transactions
- Their stress level goes down; their morale goes up
What is the function of a well-designed training program for lawyers?
- For junior lawyers, it provides the fundamental skills that must be learned before more advanced concepts can be mastered. Good training of this type boosts young lawyers up the learning curve, accelerating the time that they become profitable to the firm.
- Effective training for more senior lawyers refines existing knowledge and introduces advanced skills and concepts. It provides guideposts that the participants can use to measure the experience that they have attained and to identify the areas of development that they still want to pursue.
- Professional development activities contribute to a culture of learning. All of FPD's training programs stress the responsibility that experienced practitioners have to train those more junior in their organization. We help lawyers understand how sharing what they have learned on a regular basis results in significant benefits to themselves, their firms and their clients.
Unfortunately, the increasing stress of a high-level law practice often has a negative impact on lawyer training, as client and business requirements create more pressing demands on senior lawyers' time. Conversely, as firms grow in size and clients demand more from their lawyers, effective lawyer training and development are increasingly essential to a law firm's competitive position. FPD offers solutions to this problem.
The keys to good training
FDP's approach is based on the following keys to excellent professional training:
- Understand and train to the experience level of the program participants.
- Target the important issues: don't lose the forest for the trees.
- Provide participants with a conceptual framework for understanding the subject matter of the program; tie specific skills and knowledge back to this framework.
- Use an interactive format.
- Provide excellent materials, examples and takeaways.
