Charlie: Welcome to the CMO Series Podcast and to our special Thanksgiving edition. As we celebrate this season of gratitude, this episode shines a light on the people and moments that shape trust, collaboration, and meaningful leadership inside law firms. We want to offer a massive thank you to the incredible guests who joined us for this conversation. Their insights on building stronger teams, supporting one another, and recognizing the mentors and colleagues who make a real difference, have added so much to the series. We're truly grateful for their time, honesty, and their willingness to share what gratitude looks like in their world this Thanksgiving.

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Charlie: So without further ado, let's hear from this year's incredible cohort of legal marketing leaders, starting with Angela Pandolfo Roy, CMO at Gibbons.

Angela: So, my firm Gibbons recently announced a merger with Frost Brown Todd, and on January 1st we'll become FBT Gibbons, a national law firm with close to 800 lawyers. So this is an exciting opportunity for all of us, but it's also very new for us. But the leadership of each firm has gone above and beyond to be transparent, responsive, and caring throughout the announcement and now transition period. They've gone out of their way to explain why we're embarking on the merger, but also why each of us is critical to the transition and to the new combined firm. I'd like to shout out Gibbons COO, June Inderwies, who personally visited every single non-attorney at the firm to answer questions, thank everyone for their unique contributions, and remind us all that our best days lie ahead. 

Maura: Hi, I'm Maura Brandt. I'm the Chief Marketing Officer at Crowell & Moring. Crowell’s culture is one that is truly defined by collaboration and what we like to call, low walls. Whether an initiative is large or small, focused on supporting our clients or our Crowell community, we believe that bringing together lawyers and business professionals with not only relevant experience, but a diversity of perspectives and insights, helps us to provide fresh thinking and deliver better results. Speaking through the lens of the marketing department, so much of what we do is greatly enhanced by our collaboration with other departments, from IT and innovation to finance, practice management, recruiting, and inclusion. We deliver greater value to our lawyers and clients because of that intentional teaming. Starting with firm leadership and across our growing platform, we encourage and empower our community to share new ideas and identify ways that we can improve both what we do, and how we do it. We believe in the art of the possible, and that drives our culture of trust, collaboration, and innovation. On a final note, I wanna give a shout out to the legal marketing community. I've been a CMO for more than 35 years, and at every step I have been so grateful for my colleagues at my firm and across this amazing industry of talented and passionate professionals who break new ground, and advance meaningful change every day. Thank you legal marketing community. 

Sarah Kempsey: Hello, I'm Sarah Kempsey, and I'm the Chief Marketing and Business Development Officer at Montgomery McCracken Walker & Rhoads. In order to bring people together and build a culture of trust and collaboration, we've really made an effort to find ways to come together outside of your typical practice and client meeting. We try to find ways to be more social and create space for networking and deepening those internal relationships that are oh so important. You know, collaboration really grows from genuine connection and shared purpose, so for example, we host various business of law and practice of law training throughout the year that typically end with a wine and cheese networking reception. We are really intentional about creating spaces where people can really feel seen, heard, and valued. We've really made an effort to break down any of those silos that exist and really encourage our attorneys and professionals to bring their full, full ideas, full selves to the table. We really reimagined how we communicate as a firm, we host regular, you know, open forums and feedback sessions that ensure every voice throughout our firm helps shape who we are and where we're going. We share firm news, wins, and milestones through an internal monthly newsletter, where we also make sure to spotlight various attorneys and business professionals throughout the firm. Ultimately, building trust is about consistency and care, showing up for one another, celebrating our wins together, and learning together when things don't necessarily go as planned. It's been really inspiring to see how that spirit of collaboration has strengthened not just our culture, but our client relationships as well. We really live by our firm tagline of ‘collaboration is our best practice’.

Michael: Mike Huntsman, I'm the Chief Business Development and Marketing Officer at Bilzin Sumberg. So I think Bilzen Sumberg is doing a great job right now of, and historically have, of doing a lot of community events and a lot of, donating a lot of charity organizations. I think that we're in a real period right now of need, and the firm really, really organizes its folks around supporting a lot of great causes. And they do that throughout the year, it's not just during, you know, November, December, when, you know, the needs are certainly increased. But, you know, throughout the year I've been fortunate to have joined such a wonderful place that really dedicates a significant amount of time, energy, and finances behind building a community of, you know, trust, not just within our organization, but amongst the greater, you know, south Florida community and wider. And then I think we do a great job of making sure people get out and show up. I think that that helps us build trust internally, and I also think that that also helps us collaborate on finding the greatest needs within the community that we live and work in. I always like to shout out staff, and I know that it's somewhat of a catchall, but I really think that the folks that dedicate their time, certainly from a staff level, are dedicating it because they truly want to show up and care. You know, they're not getting anything extra, they are there because they want to be, and they recognize the importance of doing something that's somewhat greater than themselves and helping uplift everybody. So my shout out is to the staff that, you know, certainly at Bilzin Sumberg, as well as, you know, the staff around. Those are the folks that set the tone, those are the folks that are kind of the cornerstone of culture at a lot of firms, and it's one of the things, and one of the groups that certainly makes me happiest to come to the office every day.

Phill: Hello, I'm Phill McGowan and I run a marketing consultancy called Phill McGowan Marketing. So what's one of the greatest things a firm can do to bring people together and build a culture of trust and collaboration? If you're in charge, listen and act. Listen to your people, reach out to them, do not abide by an open door policy where you put the onus on your people to come to you. Turn it around. Exercising leadership is an essential ingredient to building trust on teams. Listen to your people about the challenges they face, the resources they need, the fires that need to be put out. In my experience, that goes a long way to getting your teams aligned and productive, and focused on the things that really matter within a business.

Alexandra: Hello, I'm Alexandra DeFelice, I'm the Chief Marketing and Business Development Officer of Jeffer Mangels Butler & Mitchell LLP, also known as JMBM. Something I really value about JMBM is that not only do we have numerous firm-wide celebrations throughout the year, but each department is allocated a budget to have a holiday appreciation lunch, plus a couple of team building events. Three quarters of my team has been with the firm for less than a year, so when the newest employee finally passed her 90 days, we all went bowling after work. It was so much fun to cheer each other on, even though most of us were pretty awful. Every member of my team interviewed all the candidates before we hired them so that they felt that they contributed to forming the team, and that they vibed with them because at the end of the day, they all need to support one another. They all were so appreciative of being included in the process, even though they had not been with the firm for that long. As a result, I witness the camaraderie between them every day, it's really rewarding. The firm as a whole goes beyond the quote unquote open door policy, it's more of a ‘walk in your office at any time’ culture. From the Founder and other named partners on down, our firm truly believes in being available for all their colleagues day and night, and that openness fosters the culture of collaboration and trust. 

Vanessa: Hi. I am Vanessa Crocetto, the Chief Marketing Officer at Butzel Long in Detroit, Michigan. This year we've tried a couple new ideas, but as far as collaboration within our attorney ranks, the one thing that has really stood out to me is during our all attorney retreat, we forced people to go to dinner with folks they might not otherwise know. We put everyone in groups of 10 and sent them to a restaurant that they didn't know they were going to go to. We had a lot of apprehension, a lot of people that were a little bit nervous about it, but it ended up being the highlight of our attorney retreat and people had a great time getting to know their colleagues that they wouldn't otherwise know. But the thing that we do year over year, that is among my favorite Butzel tradition, is our children's holiday party. Every year we can really deck out our conference center with balloons, and Santa, and snow globes, and games. Just a great time, and we invite all of our employees to bring their children. We also invite all of our clients to bring their children. It's just a great place to hang out, celebrate the holidays, everybody gets to meet Santa, and everybody gets to have a great time. 

Douglas: Hey everybody, Doug Gold, Chief Operating Officer at Mitchell Silberberg & Knupp. I'm sure that we're doing a few things that a lot of people are doing, but I think there's one thing I'd like to talk about that is perhaps a little bit more on the unique side. I kind of see those two words, trust and collaboration, tied together and I think it's actually difficult to build trust without collaboration, and it's difficult to have collaboration without happiness. And my personal view has always been that happy cows make good cheese, so if you focus on the happiness quotient, you're actually creating an atmosphere where collaboration can occur. And so here's the challenge though, I think we're facing headwinds on happiness because we operate in a less than ideal combination of long, stressful hours, and for many, too much caffeine, lack of sleep, and unhealthy meals on the go. The list goes on and on. None of these things in the long term provide for a healthy gut, and when I say gut, I mean your stomach. And we believe that based on scientific research around the gut brain connection, that creating a healthy gut is where you start the journey towards happiness. Now, how did we do that? We actually built a health and wellness program with gut health as the cornerstone to the initiative. We created a first of its kind initiative that delivered some transformative results for the participants, both attorneys and staff. We offered comprehensive metabolic testing, personalized fitness and nutrition coaching, mental health resources, along with monthly engaging group wellbeing experiences. And the comradery and the cultural connection that was built was overwhelming, which results in trust, which obviously results in the trusted relationships that get formed from those interactions. Our pilot program of 25 people was enormously successful, both qualitatively and quantitatively. So much that last week, American Lawyer actually gave us the award for the best corporate culture and wellbeing program. And now the pilot program has expanded, doubling in size, and we intend to keep rolling with this throughout the entire firm because healthy gut, healthy mind, happiness, that all equals better service to each other and to our clients.

Danielle: I'm Danielle Paige, the Chief Marketing and Growth Officer for Nixon Peabody. The work of cultivating a culture of trust and collaboration really begins with listening. We believe that good leaders need to be strong listeners first, and that cascades throughout our culture. We cannot make the difficult decisions that this job requires unless we truly hear the people that we serve. Our CEO and managing partner, Steve Zubiago, sets this tone for us. He is a CEO in conversation, he's always seeking to understand individual perspectives and how they inform our collective goals. We create an environment where people can thrive, grow, and do their best work. We encourage them to feel a sense of ownership in our firm's success, because every success that we have, every milestone that we reach, is because of the talent and dedication of our people. We know that peak performance and personal wellbeing go hand in hand. So when our people are thriving, we know that our firm is really strong. Recently, we hired Carla Lempera, our first ever Director of Engagement and Performance Optimization. She's helping us to build a firm-wide strategy that supports both high achievement and wellbeing. We're really one of the first law firms to offer this kind of in-house support and resource, and it's proving to be a game changer for our people and for our clients. We recently conducted an internal engagement survey, one of the most interesting findings is that 91% of our people said that they are proud to work at Nixon Peabody. That is the best sign that our efforts to build a culture of trust and collaboration are working. 

Lindsey: Lindsey McReynolds, I am the Chief Client Relations Officer at Schwabe Williamson & Wyatt. We really believe that relationships, whether it's at work or outside of work, are built on the same foundation. So that's faith, trust, and honestly a little bit of magic and fun. It's a sentiment that always reminds me of the Peter Pan quote that my kids love, that all the world is made of faith, trust, and pixie dust. And so at Schwabe, faith is the reliance that we have on one another, knowing that we're all playing a part in the same team sport. And then of course, trust is a bedrock of what we do. It's the bedrock of our collaboration, and transparency, and respect, and then of course, a shared commitment to each other and serving our clients. And then this is the part that I really think makes Schwabe unique, it's the magic. And that's the spark that happens when everything starts to coalesce, when the ideas flow and connections deepen and we see the impact of what we're all doing together. And so at Schwabe, we've worked really hard to create a culture where this magic can thrive, and the one way we do this, the main way we do this, is through our in-person gatherings, whether it's our retreat or our celebration. And so we step away from the day-to-day grind and we connect as people, and it's those moments of fun and shared experience that remind us why we do what we do and who we're doing it with. And Schwabe, we have a saying, ‘take our work seriously, but not ourselves’, and that really shows up during these moments. And those moments can't happen without the right people in the room, the right attitudes. And so I think the real unsung heroes at Schwabe are the people who are open to that magic every day. They're the ones who show up with curiosity, who listen deeply, who see the potential in others and bring it out. And they remind us that collaboration isn't a process, it's a mindset. And so they're not always in the spotlight, their openness and generosity is really what makes our culture of trust, and fun, and collaboration possible. So when I think about the people at Schwabe, the unsung heroes that I really wanna call out, it's those people that show up and help us create those moments that keep us all connected with one another and able to serve our clients.

Rebecca: I'm Rebecca Wissler, I'm with Ice Miller, and I'm the Chief Marketing and Business Development Officer. We've gone through a lot of change this year as I've come on board at the firm, and Britt Samuelson, she's a Senior Manager of Business Development on our team, has rolled with practice group changes and so much fluidity since she joined the firm and she does it all with a smile and excellent feedback from our lawyers. And without such a solid rock on our team this year, I don't know what I would do and she's helped my onboarding so much. There's one more person on our team, Claire Wiltfang. She's a Business Development Coordinator who works with our proposals group, and this is Claire's first job out of college. She's a recent grad of Indiana University and she is just nailing everything. She's maybe the quickest study I've ever seen in legal marketing, learning the intricacies of our practices, and I've never seen her grumpy or complaining and, you know, how some of our days are, and she's just a shining light and it's been a joy to watch her learn our industry and this profession and be intrigued by it. So she drives energy, and is just such a hero that doesn't get the credit that she deserves on our team and she affects it so much more than I think she realizes. It has been a year. So especially in our industry and for big law firms, I have been thrilled about what I've seen. We have a new incoming Chief Managing Partner named Josh Christie, and he's been working with Myra Selby, our Chief of Engagement and Belonging, and they have redesigned the way that we're engaging with our affinity groups and they are prepping for a town hall tour at the beginning of 2026. And as he's thinking about how he's going to take on Chief Managing Partner, I have been thrilled that that was one of the first things that he's decided to address and tackle with Myra. So they've reevaluated affinity groups at the firm, inclusion there, making sure that everyone who wants to be a part of any of these groups knows that they are welcome, and we're putting a lot of energy and resources into engagement as far as those smaller groups are concerned across the firm, and how they help everyone to feel like they're really a part of something bigger than themselves. And after this year, I think that's one of the most important things that our law firms can do. 

Charlie: That's the wrap on this special episode. A huge thanks to all of our wonderful guests, both today and throughout the year. It's a privilege to learn from such an inspiring community, and we wish you all a very warm and happy Thanksgiving holiday. Thanks for listening, and we'll see you next time.