You may have seen mention of the LMA’s “Think Tank” in various places recently: there is a “Think Tank Live” event at the upcoming National Conference; or you may have seen links to intellectual capital generated by the Think Tank in recent LMA Briefs.
The Think Tank is a relatively new part of the LMA’s operations, constituted only a few years ago. It was originally formed to provide advice to the LMA’s Board of Directors on the most pressing issues faced by members of the legal profession. However, its remit has expanded during the past year to support all members of the Legal Marketing Association by helping them understand the nature of and possible responses to emerging trends and issues.
I am very fortunate to share my role as Think Tank Committee co-chair with Jonathan Mattson, chief marketing and business development officer at Tucker Ellis in Cleveland and a member of the LMA’s Ohio Valley Chapter. The committee’s membership also includes former LMA Midwest president Tasneem Goodman, as well as LMA members from across the country, including Jason Bovis, CMO of Akerman and Ashley Tenney of McKenna Long & Aldridge in Atlanta, among others.
If Jonathan and I were to sum up the purpose of the Think Tank, it would be to think about “What’s Next?” in the legal marketing profession. The Committee does this in three specific ways:
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Identifying topics, issues and concerns that affect all members of the Legal Marketing Association, but which are of particular interest to its leadership, including the Board of Directors
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Working as a Committee to generate intellectual capital that describes, explains, and addresses these topics
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Facilitating and documenting in-depth discussions of these topics among groups of legal marketers, at meetings of various chapters, city groups, and local SIGs, and at the annual conference
You can view some of the intellectual capital that the Think Tank has produced during the past year by visiting its dedicated page on the LMA website at LegalMarketing.org/ThinkTank. (I particularly encourage you to watch some of the SHORT videos found in the Acceler8™ series there on a variety of topics including content management, branding and marketing through mobile devices.)
One of the most important of the committee’s innovations is the Think Tank Live event. The primary goal of a Think Tank Live event is to conduct a discussion of a topic identified by the Committee and to generate a structured, thoughtful description of the discussion’s outcomes to be shared with the LMA’s Board of Directors and with its membership as a whole.
Primary responsibility for generating the first draft of the output from a Think Tank Live event lies with one or more members of the local organizing group. For example, if a Think Tank takes place at a meeting in Chicago, then the task of preparing an initial draft falls to LMA members in attendance from the Chicago City Group; if a Think Tank takes place within the auspices of a SIG, then a SIG member will take the first cut at the deliverable. A member of the Think Tank Committee will work closely the person or persons designated by the local group, but in this instance the “laboring oar” lies outside the Committee. To ensure the quality and consistency of its output, members of the Think Tank Committee have editorial control over the final product that is published and shared across the LMA.
There is no right or wrong way to prepare the output from a Think Tank Live event. In fact, the Committee encourages creativity and innovation in the means of sharing the key points from the discussion. The Think Tank’s deliverable could take the form of a podcast, a Prezi, an infographic or a written report. Whatever form is chosen should allow for easy distribution via digital media and for ready comprehension by its end-consumer.
The Committee is already planning to conduct three Think Tank Live events during 2014. There will be two – on the topics of “Disruptive Business Models” and “Big Data” – at the upcoming LMA Conference. We are also intending to conduct an event on “Change Management” around the time of the P3 Conference in Chicago in June.
Unfortunately, those events require a (substantial) paid registration, so we are also working on plans for one or more Think Tank Live events in Chicago and across the Midwest region during the course of 2014, as well as events in other locales, such as New York, Atlanta, and elsewhere.
Please contact me at iturvill@freeborn.com, if you would like to:
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Express interest in attending a future LMA Midwest Think Tank Live event as a participant.
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Suggest a specific topic that should be the focus of a future Think Tank Live event, and particularly if you know of a good speaker or facilitator who could help guide that program.
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Be part of the “organizing committee” of a Think Tank Live in your City Group, and particularly if you would like to serve as part of the group that prepares the deliverable resulting from the Think Tank.
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Simply receive a far more detailed description of the Think Tank Live process, including an example of an illustrative deliverable.
I look forward to welcoming you to a Think Tank Live event in the near future, and Jonathan and I hope that you will take advantage of the Committee’s output to advance your legal marketing career.
Ian Turvill is chief marketing officer of Freeborn & Peters LLP and Co-Chair of LMA Think Tank.