One wanted to be a Formula One driver, one wanted to be a doctor, another wanted to take over the world. They all ended up as lawyers
Law firms seem hell-bent on embarrassing their solicitors and staff in ill-advised bids to add a dollop of the human factor to their businesses.
The latest in the spotlight is Cardiff-based Capital Law, which has launched its own version of social media trend #ThrowbackThursday by cajoling several of its team to post childhood photographs of themselves on the firm’s website.
Wince-worthy, indeed; and one wonders just how helpful the firm’s clients find a picture of an employment law partner aged around six standing next to what appears to be one of Jackie Stewart’s cast-off racing cars.
But that’s exactly what poor Sarah Forster has been asked to do. Along with posting anodyne comments about how her ambition in 1974 was to become a Formula One driver, while now she has matured to the stage where her “likes” are “old Volvos” and “cars that don’t go over 40mph”.
If nothing else, Capital Law has provided a salutary illustration of how so many in life have seen their youthful bubbles burst and their ambitions recalibrated.
Rather predictably, at least one trainee has been roped into this marketing wheeze. Nick Lewis is pictured as a cheeky toddler with what appears to be a birthday cake in 1994. Then, he detested vegetables and bedtime. Some 20 years on, he’s rather keen on bedtime. Thankfully, no more is said on that subject.
Commercial partner Duncan Macintosh candidly admits that he hated being a law student, a comment that is illustrated by him bunking off to Lake Washington on the west coast of America in a bid to avoid exams.
To be fair, managing partner Chris Nott has led from the front in this charge over the top into law firm marketing no-man’s land.
Nott is pictured in 1962 standing before an image of a manor house, with his childhood ambition listed as a desire to be “lord of the manor”. Today, in a stroke of comic genius, Nott lists his ambition as wanting to be “lord of a bigger manor”.
The firm’s website blurb boasts:
“For our clients, the added value comes through our attitude.”
Worth remembering, then, that the attitude at the top is that they want a bigger house.
You can find the full collection here.