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GSPM in the News
WASHINGTON POST
Class Notes: Lobbying PMGT 230.10
Spring 2006 2020 K St., Room 23 Wednesdays, 7:10 to 9:40 p.m.
Wednesday, March 29, 2006; Page A17
The students were learning to be lobbyists, but a few already had mastered one aspect of the job: staying behind the scenes.
A half-dozen of the 20 men and women, most in their twenties, quickly figured that they had little to gain from having their faces in the newspaper. They moved to seats in a corner of the windowless classroom beneath K Street that, by agreement, was to be a haven from the lens of a visiting newspaper photographer.
Jack Abramoff should have been so lucky.
If lobbyists are made, not born, then one of the mills of the influence industry in the nation's capital is a series of five courses on lobbying offered by George Washington University's Graduate School of Political Management.
The classes have such jazzy titles as "Lobbying," "Managing Government Relations" and "Advanced Lobbying Strategy." In them, those who aspire to one of Washington's most lucrative -- though hardly most loved --
professions learn about shepherding appointees through confirmation hearings, lining up federal dollars for favored programs and advancing the strategic interests of corporate clients and trade associations in Congress and the executive branch.
In an era in which "lobbyist" has become a dirty word, the Abramoff scandal so far has not diminished interest in the field, said Julius W. Hobson Jr., the chief lobbyist for the American Medical Association, who has taught GW's introductory lobbying course for 11 years. Instead, what scares off young would-be lobsters is the same thing that always has -- hard work and the need to pay your dues on Capitol Hill, he said.
"What a lot of students think -- wrongfully -- is that after they take my class, they can go get hired as a lobbyist for $150,000 a year," Hobson said. "And I rain on that right away. You've got to go do your time. And your 'time' is you've got to spend time on the Hill. I usually say at least two years. I think it gives you a greater understanding of how the institution of Congress works."
In the meantime, Hobson imparted what knowledge he could in a bare-walled classroom not even plush enough to pass as a cloakroom at the fancy-pants restaurants that successful lobbyists are known to frequent.
Working from a stack of notes as big as a phone book, Hobson paced for the better part of two hours in his thick-soled black wingtips (good for walking those marble halls) as he lectured on prepping witnesses for congressional hearings and lobbying the budget process.
Hobson, a genial lecturer whose dark beard is being overrun by gray, discussed the value of celebrity witnesses (not great, because they can outshine your issue). He advised thinking about how a witness will look on camera, citing former baseball star Mark McGwire's disastrous appearance last year at a House hearing on steroids. ("Six hours of 'I'm not here to talk about the past' -- boy, did he look bad!") And Hobson stressed the importance of researching the backgrounds of committee members and other witnesses to prepare your client for what's coming.
"A hearing is a play," Hobson told his students. "It has a beginning, a middle and an ending. And the thing is, you should know the ending. As a lobbyist, you should never be surprised. . . . Surprises are for somebody else."
One surprise: Not every student wants to be a high-priced corporate lobbyist, the sort who, though pilloried, has great sway in Washington.
"I'd like to be able to effect change," said Bess Kozlow, 29, a former grass-roots lobbyist for the American Bankers Association. She wants to lobby for a nonprofit advocacy group such as the Human Rights Campaign, NARAL Pro-Choice America or the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.
"Being an advocate for issues that are important to me is a way to make the world a better place," Kozlow said. "I don't think it's the people who work for the organizations that I want to work for who actually run the town, unfortunately."
Sarah Gontijo, 27, who came from Brazil, wants to be an international lobbyist, plying her trade at the European Commission and in South America.
"In Brazil, they don't see lobbying as a profession," she said. "In the U.S., they do. . . . I'm looking to be able to lobby on any issue. As long as you know the techniques of lobbying, it does not matter what issue you are lobbying on. Hopefully something I agree with, of course."
Class Notes is an occasional peek into the classrooms of current and former government officials as well as Washington insiders teaching the next generation expected to join their ranks.
