The Many Faces of ROI: How to Sell Your Training to Partners and Clients

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When it comes to training, you can’t just say “they will be happy” anymore. Law firm leaders—and even clients—are increasingly asking a tougher question: “What’s the ROI?”

You can find below some tips on how to use ROI for effectively promoting your favorite training - whether the audience is internal lawyers or external clients.

1. Revenue-Linked ROI: The Obvious (and Often Overlooked)

When we talk about ROI, the starting point is always revenue. For example:

  • Internal Example: Cross-selling workshops that lead to new introductions and shared matters between practice groups.

  • Client Example: A client training that helps them reduce risk or cut costs.

Usage Tips

  • Select wording for you program that focuses on enabling revenue, as opposed to merely enhancing skills.

  • When possible, communicate examples or stories that show a relationship to winning new work.

  • If you can’t demonstrate immediate revenue results, describe how the training supports the sales pipeline (e.g. follow-ups after networking training that led to meetings).

2. Retention ROI: The Hidden Driver

You can also make your training attractive for decision-makers by focusing on the pain and costs of attrition. For example:

  • Internal Example: A leadership or feedback skills program that keeps younger lawyers around by making them feel seen and invested in.

  • Client Example: Offering client team training that helps in-house counsel up-skill their team and boost morale.

Usage Tips

  • Position your training as being essential to your firm’s culture of developing and retaining talent.

  • Communicate how it will help younger colleagues with their struggles by highlighting the benefits of making them feel valued, included, and better equipped.

3. Recruitment ROI: Standing Out in a Competitive Market

If you want to bring in top talent, they will want to know that your firm is committed to developing the next generation of top talent. (They don’t want to get stuck doing the work of less talented lawyers.)

So, it’s never a bad idea to explain the ROI in terms of attracting legal stars. For example:

  • Internal Example: You can describe a high-level presentation skills training as attractive bait for laterals strongly motivated to boost their profiles as market leaders.

  • Client Example: You could entice your client to choose your firm’s legal writing offering by emphasizing how it’s proven effective in attracting and retaining high performers at your firm.

Usage Tips

  • Include training offerings in your recruitment pitch (for both lawyers and clients).

  • Make sure that you emphasize your unique offerings, like customized development tracks or client learning events.

4. Relationship ROI: The Long Game

In most cases, you can’t position your training as being about an immediate skill or sale. But, you can almost always talk about how it will build trust and keep your firm top-of-mind. For example:

  • Internal Example: If you organize an intelligence sharing BD training for practice group leaders, you can sell it as sparking deeper collaboration both across the firm and with key clients.

  • Client Example: If a practice group provides a negotiation workshop for in-house counsel, the practice group can help build trust amongst the members of the legal department and strengthen the firm’s relationship with their team.

Usage Tips

  • Position training as a value-added service or a relationship-building tool.

  • Use it as a reason to reach out (“Thought this session might interest your team…”).

5. Personal ROI: What’s in It for Me?

Finally, never forget the individual lens. Whether you’re engaging a partner or a GC, ask yourself: How does this help them personally? For example:

  • Internal Example: A partner might value a training that helps their team become more autonomous or frees up their time to actually see their family.

  • Client Example: A GC might appreciate a session that helps the GC stand out by enabling his/her junior team members to communicate more clearly with the C-suite.

Usage Tip

  • Ask stakeholders about their personal goals, and show how your program supports them.

Final Thought

Don’t forget that ROI doesn’t have to be a number. Instead, it just has to hit a pain point that your audience truly cares about. The better you tailor your training’s message to addressing that pain point, the more likely you are to hearing a “yes”.