Podcast Ep. 7: Positioning Yourself as a Lawyer
When your practice area is too broad, you don’t know which conferences to go to, which journals to pitch to or what to say on social media—so you end up posting boring LinkedIn posts about recent case law. Now, that’s not going to build a clear brand or attract your ideal client, believe me.
Welcome to The Pathway to Partnership Podcast. On this podcast, we talk about what it really takes to succeed as a woman lawyer in a law firm.
My name is Cecilia Poullain and I’m a former finance lawyer. Today, I help women lawyers make it to partnership and thrive when they get there using the tools and insights I’ve developed in my Pathway to Partnership programme.
In this podcast, you’ll get clarity on whether partnership is truly what you want, you will build your confidence and you will master client development in a way that feels sustainable.
So let’s get you walking into the office every morning clear on why you’re aiming for partnership, free of imposter syndrome and confident in your ability to bring in clients without burning out.
OK, let’s jump in.
Positioning Yourself as a Lawyer
Intro
Just before the summer, a client sent me her business plan to review. The main thing that struck me as I was reading through it was that she was planning to do everything: write a book, start a podcast, write articles, run conferences, post on LinkedIn, client lunches… But before working on her business plan, we backed up a couple of steps. Because not only did she want to do everything, she also was trying to cover four different types of client. That was going to make her life so much more difficult.
Why do women lawyers think like this? It’s because they are incredibly intelligent, highly educated women so they can actually do an awful lot of things—and so they think they should.
At the same time, there is a real tension between developing your skills as a lawyer, not getting bored, becoming a great lawyer because you have looked at things from so many different angles - and developing a brand, and we’ll look at how to at least partially resolve that tension in a moment.
The Problem
First let’s look at what happens when your brand is too broad:
People don’t really know what you do. Even when you’re talking to people inside your firm, they might not really understand, and that is magnified with lawyers outside your firm who might refer you work and clients.
Clients and referral lawyers don’t come to you because you look like a generalist who does everything OK instead of a specialist. Think GP vs heart surgeon. And, if you’re a generalist, it means you can’t charge specialist rates.
You end up spending too little time on too many things and not doing any of them well.
But it also means that in terms of marketing, you don’t know which conferences to go to, which journals to write for, what to say on social media—so you end up posting bland, boring LinkedIn posts about recent case law. Now, that’s not going to build a clear brand or attract your ideal client.
Why Positioning Works
But when you start to position yourself in the market, your life gets so much easier. Why?
Because you develop your deep legal expertise faster in that particular area.
You start to understand your clients’ specific problems—and not only do you get better at solving those problems, but also, in your marketing, you can speak directly to your clients’ problems, which will absolutely catch their attention.
Your marketing becomes so much easier because you know what to post, where to go, what to write. And you only have to do what you like - you don’t have to do it all. You know where your clients are likely to come from. Perhaps they are quite a narrow group and you already know them all - for example, private equity firms or aviation companies, in which case posting on LinkedIn is useless - you’re much better off contacting them directly. But if your potential audience is very broad, as may be the case with personal injury litigation, for example, LinkedIn or even Facebook will be your friend. Your marketing depends on your positioning.
The Downsides & Nuance
Positioning isn’t all upside. There are risks.
Too narrow = risky
If regulations change or the market shifts, you could be left stranded. A friend told me about a woman partner who had a thriving practice in a very niche area until the market changed and disappeared from underneath her and it was too late in her career to change her focus. She retired soon afterwards.Too niche = no work
When I was a derivatives lawyer in France, there just wasn’t enough work in that area for external counsel. So even though that was my brand, I had to work on broader finance matters. Seth Godin: “smallest VIABLE audience”.Too niche = you get bored
Doing only one thing for years? That can burn you out. Years ago, I heard of a U.S. firm where lawyers had to change specialties every 5 years. It made them well-rounded and collaborative, but… it was also exhausting.
There’s a real balancing act here—finding focus without boxing yourself in.
Ways to Position Yourself
Positioning yourself doesn’t have to be all-or-nothing. There are many ways to approach it:
Fully Niche
Go all in. Pick one area. Abandon the rest.Front-Facing Niche
Brand yourself in one area publicly, but still take other work behind the scenes. That’s what I do - my brand is working with women lawyers to become partner. But I also work with a lot of women general counsel or heads of legal departments and also a few men.Broader Niche
Choose an umbrella—like “private client” or “business law”—which gives you more flexibility but it’s still focused enough for people to identify what you do. E.g. Clara - she was doing human rights litigation and also working with corporate clients on compliance. Instead of choosing one or the other, she went upwards and found an umbrella title that found the similarities and covered them both. In particular, she was able to market to her corporate clients that she was in court and really knew what risks they should be looking out for.Audience-Based Niche
Niche by who you serve, not what you do—e.g. “legal advisor for startups” or “lawyer for healthcare professionals.” A law firm opened up around the corner from my place recently that specialises in law for old people.Problem-Based Niche
Focus on a particular pain point—like “helping creatives protect their work” or “shareholder disputes.”Phased Niching
Start broad, build a wide experience as a lawyer, then gradually narrow as you figure out what you love doing and what there is a market for. It’s okay for your positioning to evolve.Campaign Niching
Position yourself for a season. Example: “This quarter, I’m helping families set up trusts for aging parents.” It creates urgency - if people need that help then they are more likely to reach out for it if they know there is a deadline - and it also means you test whether you have your “smallest viable audience”. I would suggest you test this for long enough - I don’t think 3 months is enough because often our marketing activities only start to bear fruit after 3 months.
Reflection Questions
Here are a few questions you might like to ask yourself to help you think about your own direction:
What kind of work do you really love doing?
Who are the clients you love working for?
If you said naturally what you did, what would you say?
What are you already becoming known for—even if you didn’t plan it that way?
Where do your best clients come from? Why did they pick you?
Wrap-Up & CTA
So to sum up—positioning helps you stand out, connect deeply with your ideal client, and make smarter choices in how you market and grow. But it is a balancing act. And, particularly for younger lawyers, it’s okay to evolve over time.
Outro
Thank you so much for joining me on The Pathway to Partnership Podcast. I really appreciate it. I hope that today’s episode has given you greater clarity and confidence on your own pathway to partnership.
If you enjoyed this conversation, please subscribe, please share it with a colleague who might find it useful, please leave a review — let’s together help more women make it to partnership and thrive when they get there.
And if you’d like to go deeper, head over to www.ceciliapoullain.com where you’ll find resources and ways we can work together.
Until next time, remember: you don’t have to do this alone, and you get to define success as a woman lawyer on your own terms.
Thanks for listening.