Law Times

Law Times • December 3, 2012 Page 11 FOCUS Building a mediation practice 'hard and frustrating' BY MICHAEL McKIERNAN Law Times W hen Jeff Morris landed in Toronto in 2003 after two decades in law in Nova Scotia, he knew he wanted to be a full-time mediator. But apart from that goal, he didn't have much else going for him. "I didn't know one lawyer. I had no connections in the business world. I didn't know anybody," Morris said. "I was really intimidated by this city and I didn't have a lot of confidence that I could do it." Yet within five years, the former managing partner of Halifax's BoyneClarke LLP had doubled his hourly rates and was doing 25 to 30 mediations a month. On Oct. 4, he shared some of his secrets with an audience of budding mediators and arbitrators at the Toronto headquarters of the ADR Institute of Ontario. But there was bad news for anyone hoping for an easy fix. "Building a practice is really hard and frustrating. There were times in the first year or two when I wanted to pack it in and do something else. I blew through my savings, I blew through my retirement savings plan," Morris said. "What it's about is building a marketing system and following that system . . . taking little steps towards the goal. It takes time and a little bit of dedication, but you can do it." A useful first step, Morris said, was to find a mentor, "someone who has already gone through the path." His was Gary Furlong of Agree Dispute Resolution, another speaker at the event. According to Furlong, new mediators looking to make a name for themselves need to identify two or a maximum of three target areas of practice. "If you say, 'I want to be all things to all people,' in other words, go broad and shallow, you will never be any good at any one thing and you will never build any momentum to build a practice," Furlong said. "It does not mean that you turn anything else away, but what it means is your time spent actively marketing is only funnelled into two or three areas. That's how you have an impact in those areas. . . . Once you begin to build a practice, you can charge a lot larger fees when you're going narrow and deep." Preferably, those target areas will be natural markets in which you have particular expertise or interest, Furlong said. For most lawyers aiming to boost the number of mediations they handle, that would involve current areas of practice or industries in which they have a background. " natural market is somewhere A you already have contacts, you already have credibility, and you already know people. You have ins to the business," Furlong said. "These areas will be much easier and quicker to build work in." For Morris, his former litigation practice in Halifax pointed him towards areas such as employment, commercial contracts, and lease disputes. Once his practice began taking shape, he boiled it down to an "elevator-speech" paragraph and made sure it appeared in all of his materials, including brochures, web sites, and even e-mail signatures. "Repeating what you do and who you do it for is key. You need a clear message. It's essential it's built into and is filtered through all of your marketing efforts," Morris said. He seized on anything that could lend his practice an air of professionalism by hiring a virtual assistant to answer calls to the office and getting a graphic designer to produce a logo. He also subscribed to an online calendar that allowed clients to book time, an application that caused problems early on when business was slow. "How much confidence would I instil in a lawyer who came to my calendar online and saw that I had no bookings for the next five months?" asked Morris. "What I did was just when I had things to do, like go to the grocery store, I'd block it off my calendar. They didn't know what I was doing. If I was taking a trip to Florida with my family, I'd block that week off. Was that dishonest? No, because I just wasn't available for mediations those days. But I guess maybe I looked a little bit busy." With a carefully cultivated image complete, all Morris needed were clients. Getting them proved to be a labour-intensive process as well. He went to the courthouse and looked up a list of all cases approaching mediation within the next three months. But after firing off more than 300 letters asking to be considered as their mediator, the hits didn't reach double figures. "But those lawyers used me again and again and again," Morris said. Looking to make connections, he went through a list of all of his fellow law school alumni from Dalhousie University currently practising in Toronto and gave them a call. "If you don't personalize the first contact, you're wasting your time," Morris said. Once mediators settle on their practice areas, Furlong said they need to figure out who the decision-makers are in that field. For example, in workplace law, human resources professionals end up picking mediators. But in the insurance industry, adjusters almost invariably rely on their outside counsel to make that call. In the construction industry, it's a tightknit band of about 30 senior project managers who do the hiring. Next, you've got to get yourself in front of those people, Furlong said. Social media connections and e-mail newsletters can work, he said, but speaking engagements are particularly useful. "If I get 50 HR people sitting in a room, in that one hour I do more than I could do in 50 hours oneon-one," Furlong said. "If I can get in front of 30, 40, 50 targeted decision-makers, I don't mind doing it for free." Morris said new faces in the alternative dispute resolution landscape shouldn't be afraid of going low with their pricing in order to distinguish themselves. Toronto can be particularly price sensitive, he said, because mandatory mediation for civil cases means some parties are forced to go to mediation when they have no intention of settling. "Do they want to spend a couple of thousand dollars to just say hello? Probably not, so if you price your fees at the lower end, you may get some of those cases," Morris said. "Is that the kind of work you want to do forever? No, obviously not, but are you going to get a chance to meet one or two more lawyers. . . . Early on, it's really about creating an opportunity for yourself that will get you a chance to meet someone who will become a client." LT STEVE NOYES I. T. Consultant Volunteer The McKellar Structured Settlement™ Financial security. Guaranteed payments. 100% tax free. Some decisions are easy. Untitled-1 1 www.lawtimesnews.com 12-05-08 11:11 AM

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