A World of Possible: Uncovering Opportunity for your Alumni

As international law firm Bird & Bird celebrated 5 years of managing an alumni program, we spoke to Bianca Zinsheimer and Raya Blakely-Glover to hear about the challenges and learnings they encountered as it began, what was changed along the way, their focus today, and where they see the value of their alumni community for the future.

They also shared:

• How networks can genuinely provide value to alumni
• Managing engagement through events
• The long-term benefit to a company's brand

Thank you to our guest speakers:

• Bianca Zinsheimer, Business Development Bird&Bird
• Raya Blakely-Glover, Global Head of Business Development, Bird&Bird
• Emma Sinclair MBE, CEO EnterpriseAlumni

Five Things We Learned About Uncovering Opportunity for your Alumni

Relationships are everything …

“It helps to work with people who know you well and who like you. Your alumni are a key place to start because they have already had a good relationship with the firm who know your strengths and culture …”
Raya Blakely-Glover

You can do better than LinkedIn …

“A private LinkedIn group for your alumni is a great start, but you cannot really see who your alumni are. With a dedicated alumni platform, we can publish direct stories and newsletters to ensure all the content is tailored …”
Bianca Zinsheimer

It’s all about communication …

“When the communication flows, alumni know what's going on and you have an easy way to contact them. You get better client relationships and industry relationships …”
Raya Blakely-Glover

You need to engage with your alumni …

“If you don’t engage with your alumni, you can't expect any engagement from their side ...”
Bianca Zinsheimer

EnterpriseAlumni rule! 

“We talk to you guys all the time about our objectives and you guys have worked with us to tailor what the platform can do. It’s been an absolutely instrumental and we couldn't have done it without you …” 
Raya Blakely-Glover

Top Five Emma Quotes …

• “We all spend breakfast, lunch, dinner, nights, days and weekend thinking about alumni …”
• “I drive myself a little bit mad thinking about alumni …”
• “I find it obsessing if not ironic if an alumni manager can't join the alumni network after they leave …”
• “A little bit like a cooking show, here's one we made earlier …”
• “If you just say thanks bye it doesn't make sense …”

Q&A

What is the value in an alumni network for a law firm? 

Raya: In all professional services, particularly for law firms, relationships are everything. In relationships, you have to have trust. It helps to work with people who know you well and who like you. Your alumni are a key place to start because they have already had a good relationship with the firm who know your strengths and culture. The alumni program sits within the business development team. That's unusual for law firms. We do that because we see the client and relationship potential with our alumni program. Our alumni use their awareness of our firm and our culture to build a profile for us in a much bigger way than we could ever do ourselves.

Bianca: Your alumni are your brand ambassadors. They have great experience during their time at your firm. They're more likely to talk to external people. That leads to a company reputation and new and better relationship with clients.

What was the point that Bird&Bird decided: we really must have a program?

Raya: We have always placed a high value on our alumni relationships. We are a big firm with 32 offices in 22 countries, so six or seven years ago, we realized we needed to have a centralised cohesive global program for alumni that would be managed within MBD. We've really tried to invest in the alumni program as we have been developing our sales capabilities. 

How did the program formally start?

Raya: We were extraordinarily lucky that our management was very supportive. They absolutely understood the value of a cohesive global alumni program. We’ve had support from our CEO and our executive committee from the get-go. We knew a dedicated resource was key. We then had to get support from heads of all of the 22 countries to interact with those alumni. We then brought on MBD and HR in all of our jurisdictions.

How did moving to dedicated software help manage the program? 

Bianca: Some companies only use LinkedIn to engage with alumni. A private LinkedIn group for your alumni is a great start, but you cannot see who your alumni are. You might post amazing alumni stories, but 1000s of new posts show up every time you log into LinkedIn. With a dedicated alumni platform, we can publish direct stories and newsletters to ensure all the content is tailored to Bird&Bird.

What does success mean for your program?

Raya: You can feel when there is a common purpose and cohesion – when recruitment, current employees and alumni are all in sync. When the communication flows, alumni know what's going on and you have an easy way to contact them. You get better client and industry relationships. We can see that people are excited to come to our events, and proactively ask: “What else do you have on?” We do a lot of internal communications around our success stories. We’re always thinking about what we can do next. For example, we have a fantastic internal diversity and inclusion team, so we’re planning what we're going to do for International Women's Day. Our alumni program is for every person who works at Bird&Bird. It doesn't matter if you were a courier or a partner. We are all part of Bird&Bird. 

Why do legal professionals want to join networks?

Raya: For a lot of reasons. Access to resources. Our alumni end up in a diversity of places. They might join a big corporation with lots of resource, but they might not. Access to resources such as continuing legal education credits or our soft skills programming. We invite them to participate in fun stuff like our sports teams. We have discounts for relevant professional associations, access to working spaces, and do everything to help develop their professional networks wherever they are in their career. 

How do you continue to encourage community growth and alumni engagement? 

Bianca: We hold induction training about the alumni program twice a month in our London office. So you're already in touch with the alumni program within your first month. We explain what our alumni program is all about, why we have it and the benefits. It continues during your journey at Bird&Bird. Alumni are always present in internal communications. We invite our current colleagues to join so they have the best alumni related news. If you don’t engage with your alumni, you can't expect any engagement from their side. 

How does globality, locality, segmentation and targeting work at Bird&Bird? 

Bianca: We have alumni across the globe, from London, Paris, Italy and Germany to Australia and Singapore, all with local alumni-related content, sports groups and newsletters. In every country we have at least one HR and one MBD person dedicated to alumni activities. Twice a year we have a global call with all of them, and also a country specific call to update everyone on recent successes. 

With five years of experience, what do you wish you would have done differently?

Raya: Getting the platform right from the get-go would have saved us a lot of time and heartache. There were some data protection issues that everyone was going through, so we've all come a long way. Trying to do it without a dedicated resource would have been extremely challenging. Everyone in our team is client facing and able to really champion all things alumni internally and also be the main external point of contact. 

What role has EnterpriseAlumni played in the development and management of your alumni program?

Raya: Hopefully a big takeaway from today is that it's been a partnership. We talk to you guys all the time about our objectives and you guys have worked with us to tailor what the platform can do. It’s been an absolutely instrumental and we couldn't have done it without you guys. There’s been lots of great technical support on everything from data to design. Ease of use for us and for our alumni is so important. And then, thinking about what's next. The world of data and tech is exploding, so how can we harness that to to do more? We know a lot of exciting stuff is happening for your company so we are always interested in being part of that journey because we think it can enhance the experience for our alumni. 

Presenters:

Bianca Zinsheimer, Business Development Bird&Bird
Raya Blakely-Glover, Global Head of Business Development, Bird&Bird
Emma Sinclair MBE, CEO EnterpriseAlumni