Have you ever heard the term: “Chunking?” The essence of it is to learn in small chunks. I am sure you can find many discussions of the concept if you search on Google.
I recently finished New York Times writer, Daniel Coyle’s book: The Talent Code: Greatness Isn’t Born. It’s Grown. Here’s How. He talks about it in the book. He also described it in a blog post: Forget 10,000 Hours. Try Hans’s 2-Minute Method. Han’s is a music teacher and here is his 2-minute drill:
- Pick a specified target you want to perfect. It needs to be small and definable — a chunk, in the parlance. If it’s a tennis serve, target just the toss. If it’s a song, target just the toughest ten seconds. If it’s public speaking, target just the introduction.
- Pick a time of day. (Morning works best.)
- Be alone. This isn’t about a teacher or coach telling you what to do — it’s about you doing it, by yourself.
- Work as urgently and intensively as humanly possible on that target skill for two minutes.
- Stop. Walk away. And tomorrow, do it again.
A lawyer, who had read the book, asked me to write a day-by-day short (chunking) action plan to get started with client development. So, let’s try an experiment over the next 10 days. Each day, pick a time of day and answer the questions you will find here and create a plan based on what you got out of that day. So, today, decide what you specifically want.
Then, create a “self-assessment.” Where are you now?
- What are your strengths? To find your Top 5, Take the Gallup StrengthsFinder 2.0 Survey.
- What do you believe is the best way you can utilize your strengths for client development.
- Do you have a plan? (If you don’t I urge you to create one. If you need help, I have a LexBlog Webinar that is on YouTube.) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hoFneX7m6cw
- Are you making time for client development?
- Describe your current clients.
- How are the clients you are attracting finding you?
- What client development activities have you done this year?
- What client development activities do you enjoy the most?
- What client development activities do you believe gave you the greatest return on your time investment?
- Is client development a habit? If not consider making a list of activities each week.
See, this really does not take much time. So, are you willing to work with me on this for the next two weeks? Also, at the request of several lawyers, I am starting new group telephone client development coaching programs this month. There are no more than 5 lawyers in each group. Learn more by reading: Cordell Parvin 12 Month Group Telephone Client Development Coaching Program.