Rainmaker
When I was fresh out of law school, I was hired as an associate attorney by a three-member firm, all partners. I was responsible for developing my own client base, often through court appointed representation. But I would also get clients from the partners, who would typically have me handle a simple matter for one of their existing clients, or often a new client of theirs would be handed off to me because they had other matters.
The client came into the firm not because of me, someone with little experience…but because of the veteran attorney, the senior partner. And often when I met with that handed-off client, the partner would stick his or her head into the meeting to say hello and ask how things were going…basically to send the signal that the partner was still involved, so that some of their aura could rub off on me in the client’s eyes.
That’s not at all uncommon in law, to some degree medicine, and in various business contexts. We may not have discussed anything other than the weather when the partner was there, maybe no business at all…but the client still got the message that the senior member of the firm was involved if only by name.
I thought of that yesterday when hearing reports of some Biden family business meetings. Hunter would call and put Joe on speaker phone…maybe discussing nothing other than the weather, and nothing specific about business…but are we to believe that something that happened 20 times was simply a coincidence?
Or was it a not-that-subtle way for Joe as the senior partner to make sure the family business had clients?
In the law office and in business, that senior person is called the rainmaker, because their name at the top brings in business that showers down for everyone’s benefit.
And from what we can tell, they certainly made it rain…with all popular culture connotations of that.
