About one-third of my students’ employers hire contract lobbyists. Students occasionally comment, “We pay our [expletive deleted] contract lobbyists too much [expletive deleted] money for the [expletive deleted] service we get.” When I was a novice in-house lobbyist I felt the same. But the root of our problem is simple: most of us were just bad clients.
For you who hire contractors, ask yourself: how effective a client am I? How can I know? Can I get better results for my principal and my career? This free Lobby School Principal’s Representative Performance Evaluation[1] instrument will guide both you and your contractor to find the answers.
For the two-thirds of Lobby School students who don’t hire contractors, I’ve removed “Contract Lobbying” from the 8-hour Arlington, Virginia May 25 How to Successfully Lobby State Legislatures all-day training. Practice manuals 2, Glossary of Legislative Concepts and Representative Terms (softcover, 85 pages); 3, How to Successfully Lobby State Legislatures (softcover, 300 pages); and 4, Winning with Lobbyists, Readers edition (softcover, 235 pages) are included in the revised seminar.
For contractor-hiring Lobby School students, the May 24, 4-hour training Managing Contract Lobbying focuses on job performance evaluations; one for contractors and the second for clients. I gave a well-received 7-hour version to 40 participants in Arlington last December. Practice manual 5, Winning with Lobbyists, Professional edition(hardcover, 488 pages) comes with the class.
Finally, because you don’t have a law until the implementing agency says you have a law, and you don’t know what a law means until they tell you what it means, the revised 4-hour How to Successfully Lobby Executive Branch Agency Rulemaking will be presented on May 26. Rulemaking creates 90% of the body of law affecting your principal. This course comes with Manual 6 Guide to Executive Branch Agency Rulemaking (softcover, 287 pages) written by Sacramento lobbyist Chris Micheli and myself.
By becoming a better client you will get better results for your principal, contractor, and career advancement with your current and future employers.
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