IMPROVING YOUR COMMUNICATION SKILLS PART 2: the Clerks’ Room

Setting boundaries, giving feedback and building professional relationships | Dr Anna Colton | Survive & Thrive and the Talent Retention Working Group

Tuesday 4th of June 2024 | 17:30 | Middle Temple

Effective and constructive communication is essential in the workplace, it is the foundation for good teamwork, professional growth and an inclusive culture.

We are delighted to have enticed Dr Anna Colton back to continue our series of events on how we can create more successful and enduring relationships at all levels by improving communication. This session will focus on communication between clerks and barristers.

The relationship between a clerk and a barrister is a vital element of practice and yet is one that we often do not take enough time to nurture. Our event will explore the essential tools required to build a successful working relationship, including how to express working preferences, how to give and receive feedback, be it clerk to barrister, or barrister to clerk, and how to manage these professional relationships in the long term. The event will include demonstrations of best practice and will be moderated by Lady Justice Whipple.

We will host a reception with drinks and nibbles after the session.

Members and students from all four Inns of Court, non-members, and guests are welcome to attend the event. 

Non-Middle Temple members can book by calling the Treasury Office at 020 7427 4800 (line is open 10:00 – 16:00). Middle Temple members can book through the website, Tickets for this event cost £15. Online attendance costs £7 – click here to see the event page. We look forward to seeing you there!

Dr Anna Colton is a chartered clinical psychologist and executive coach with many years’ experience in both the NHS and private practice.

Anna works closely with the Bar and law firms. She consults to Institute of Barristers’ Clerks and sets of barristers’ chambers on wellbeing mental health, delivering talks, running regular surgeries and advising on, or writing, wellbeing policies. She runs Mental Health First Aid training and assists with setting up effective and robust wellbeing teams within chambers and law firms so that difficulties are spotted early and intervention accessed quickly and effectively so that crises are pre-empted and avoided. She also coaches solicitors, barristers, clerks and other high performers on one-to-one basis.

In addition to her practice in the legal world, Anna has particular expertise in performance anxiety and stage fright in high performers (in all fields, the law, business, sport, the screen and stage). She has worked with the leads in many West End shows, works with the British Association of Performing Artists and Musicians (BAPAM), is the psychologise on Matilda the musical and consults to theatre companies.

Finally, she can often be seen or heard on the TV and radio, discussing a range of topics, advocating for early intervention in mental health.