What’s Your Groundhog Day?

February 2nd is Groundhog Day in Pennsylvania, USA. It was made famous by the film of the same name starring Bill Murray.

Murray plays a weatherman assigned to cover the Groundhog Day in Punxsutawney, an event he really hates. He finds himself in a time-loop, repeating the exact same day over and over again. Initially, he takes advantage of the situation, and the people in the town. He then becomes angry at the repetitiveness of daily life. It’s not until he uses his experience of his daily life to help people instead that he breaks the time-loop.

So what’s this got to do with you? Well, if you are anything like me, you may be used to having regular Groundhog Days – at collaborative POD meetings, when you meet new clients or when you receive hostile letters from another lawyer.

Initially, as a solicitor, I often took advantage of clients by charging them for managing their cases in ways which gave them no real control over the outcomes.

POD meetings were always the same “How do we get and do the work?”. How often have you heard that said?

Like Bill Murray’s character, the repetition made me angry and self-destructive. I realised I needed to change.

So I joined even more PODs, trained as a mediator, set up or joined lawyer groups and mediator groups, blogged, and trained some more. I took all the training I could find to provide me with more tools than the ones I had. I also pestered everyone who shared my distaste for the way individuals and families are treated by the system.

I realised that I could help people after all, it just wasn’t in the way my law degree and law school had taught me.

As a mediator, my Groundhog Days are long gone. I still go to PODs, but to network not because I hope to it will offer any practice and development tips. My learning comes from actually working alongside – not just talking about working alongside – coaches, mediators, financial planners and lawyers who are as keen as I am to team up to help clients.

It may sound like a cliché but building a client-focused practice will help your clients achieve better outcomes. And if you manage to build one, waking up in the morning will never be the same again.

I am Stephen G Anderson. I am a professional mediator.

stephen@andersonfamilymatters.com