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Brand Experience: Comment acts for Norton Rose
CommentUK delivers first for one of the world's largest law firms with live communications piece designed to drive advocacy and new business development
CommentUK has been engaged by the International law firm Norton Rose to create an alternative and innovative communication approach to the business development and client relationship
management training of its newly qualified lawyers using advocacy and buzz marketing techniques.
CommentUK has been engaged to stage a live communications event at the firm's London headquarters as part of their International Academy Week. The academy involves a group of about fifty newly qualified lawyers who have trained at and work in Norton Rose's various offices around the globe. The academy is organised by the HR and training departments to bring these lawyers together for a week of lectures, workshops, presentations and social events to build understanding and a common culture between offices.
CommentUK has conceptualised and written a 25-minute theatre piece to unfold among the audience at a presentation given by Cindy Godwin, Norton Rose head of international business development. While Cindy is very much in on the act, to members of the audience the theatre piece is designed to strike them as real - at first.
The theatre piece opens with Cindy giving a PowerPoint presentation on getting involved in business development activity, much as the junior associates would expect. Five minutes into Cindy's presentation there is a loud knock at the door. An actor, playing the role of a partner enters, a bottle of Champagne tucked under his arm. He asks whether a lawyer, visiting from the Beijing office is in the room. He announces that he had come to celebrate the fact that a key piece of research that she made him aware of had led to Norton Rose winning instructions on an M&A deal. And so begins a conversation and debate among actors and a couple of rehearsed staff on the opportunities for associates at Norton Rose to get involved in business development activity at an early stage in their career.
Justin Foxton, founder of Comment UK comments:
The key here was that we are playing characters that come across as authentic and that the script is sometimes believable and sometimes slightly exaggerated. The intention is to motivate and enthuse associates by helping them really think about what they can do practically to get involved in business development. These are objectives that can be hard to achieve in a standard presentation format.
Cindy Godwin comments:
We wanted to create an understanding of the major business development projects that the lawyers can get involved in a way that is fun and that they can relate to. Here, they get a real taste of the potential benefits to them. Morever, as the debate gets going, the questions and concerns that we know they have but that they usually don't like to say can be tackled directly between the actors. This is a completely new approach for us. The purpose is to seize the moment to deliver a message to the audience in a way that creates a buzz, excitement and gets people talking. The team at Comment certainly helped us to achieve that!
06 December 2006