It’s Not Lawyers and Staff – It’s a Firm

Published July 22, 2008

A basic business truism is that average managers treat all their employees the same. Great managers discover each individual’s unique talents and bring these to the surface. Lawyers, like managers in every profession, trade, and other commercial endeavor, must make every effort to bring out the best in their firm’s staff. Failure to do so will cause conflict, disharmony within the firm and, worst of all, poor client relations—the stuff of malpractice actions and bar disciplinary complaints.

Pay attention to your most important asset in the firm, your human capital. It walks out every evening. You need to make sure that it returns in the morning, willing and able to do what’s needed for you and your clients. A sure way not to accomplish this is asking for achievements that you are not willing to do yourself or that are beyond your staff’s reach because you don’t provide them with the necessary resources. That type of behavior creates anger—and an angry law firm is one doomed to failure. It’s far better to be open and honest about what your firm needs to achieve, and to work as a team with everyone having the same agenda, using sufficient resources to achieve agreed-upon goals.

Certainly in terms of professional responsibility there are distinctions between a lawyer and an assistant or paralegal, but firms should not use this as a cover for creating artificial barriers. For example, I learned recently of a law firm that indicated it was being investigated for including paralegals along with attorneys on its web site under the category of “attorneys.” The problem is not one of giving paralegals public recognition, it’s merely a matter of labeling. If you label a category “attorneys,” everyone in that category must be an attorney. The solution is not to remove paralegals from the website, it’s to create a separate category under the heading of staff—or better yet, separate categories for “paralegals” and “staff.”

Including staff on a web site gives clients additional contacts to help them, particularly since these are people who wouldn’t expect to issue a bill for the service. Of course, this is only effective if everyone in your office receives client service education training each year. Teaching everyone in your office—including staff and paralegals—the necessary skills to provide better service and enhanced performance to your clients involves them in the financial and organizational life of the firm so that they understand and appreciate their role and look forward to the future. Even something as simple as giving everyone a business card recognizes that they exist and are part of your team. Inclusiveness will produce more harmony for all, increase productivity, and in turn, profitability of the firm. It’s not “we” and “they,” it’s US!

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Audience type: Large Law Firms, Small Law Firms