Law Firm Coach Blog

Law firm leaders come in all shapes and sizes and they may not necessarily be the person who has the biggest share of the firm. Anyone can be a positional leader. That is the person who tells people what to do and it gets done because he or she controls the environment. This is a fear driven leadership.

Good leaders tend to be one of three roles though it is not uncommon for leaders to switch back and forth among the roles.

• The TRAILBLAZER is the leader who is usually analyzing the field for trends. This person will be clear about the vision of the future and translate that vision into objectives. The Trailblazer communicates the boundaries, interfaces with others and encourages risk-taking.

• The ARCHITECT builds social and technical systems and sees how they work and makes them better. The Architect will write processes and align systems to the vision. The Architect builds a culture. This leader sets benchmarks for others to learn from.

• The COACH motivates and develops people. This person will normally have dynamic communication skills. The Coach sets the standards for performance, empowerment and is usually the mentor. The Coach is constantly encouraging people to go beyond themselves and is developing other leaders to help drive the vision of the firm.

Great leaders have a driving passion to realize the firm's vision. They will not allow events or circumstances to dictate what will happen to them. Leaders build and maintain relationships based on trust.

In working with people within firms from lawyer owners to associates to paralegals to legal secretaries and the management staff and support staff we have found time and time again that people are not working to their full potential. Leaders within a firm should be creating opportunities to help everyone in the firm be more tomorrow than they are today.

I have always said that the best leader is the person in the room you don't notice right away. That person is helping others to be leaders. They don't seek recognition. They don't want praise. They are glad when others are able to be leaders.

Nothing I believe creates more of a difference of opinion than when I ask what is extraordinary client service. Frankly some lawyers get it and some don't. Those that do in my opinion will withstand the test of time. In today's competitive market, the only thing that makes a difference is the way the client is treated.

Client Service is more than just talking to the client. It begins with the first phone call and it never ends. If you have done your job the client will feel a connection with your firm even when the case is concluded. This is client relationship marketing (CRM) at its finest.

Where law firms used to hire people who had the necessary legal skills to do the job they are now hiring employees who have people skills. Soft skills are now more important than hard skills. Why? Because if you can't keep the client or you can't get referrals or repeat business it doesn't matter what your legal skills are.

I work with many law firms in the area of client relationship development. The hardest hurdle to get beyond is to make everyone in the firm from the top to the bottom understand that the client gets head of the line privileges. I personally believe that if a client calls they deserve to talk to who they asked for. And yet I have many lawyers tell me this is impossible. It only is impossible if you don't make the leap that if the client comes first then the client comes first.

I had a law firm implement the We love our clients philosophy. All phone calls had to be taken when they occurred. No one went home unless all calls were returned. If a call couldn't be taken the truth was told but the call returned the same day. If an attorney was truly out of the office the entire day someone else took the call and provided temporary assistance until the acting attorney returned. All new client callers got to talk to an attorney immediately. Two things occurred which were documented statistically.

The first was the amount of phone calls from clients began to decrease. I believe this was because their answers were being provided immediately and the clients felt secure with the firm.

The second was that new cases increased. This is obviously because new clients want to talk with someone right when they call and be seen within a twenty-four hour period. Their case is important to them and if you don't help them someone else will.

I was at my daughter's law firm this past year and realized that within one firm she had a 21 year old and a 73 year old working side by side. (And by the way the 73 year old beat everyone in the fitness competition in 2008). And I thought of the different thought philosophies that are now within firm management. Learning to work together is perhaps the hardest professional skill to master. Is it important? You bet it is! Are we as good as we should be, probably not. And just about the time we think we have down all the skills we need to be a true team player and we have taken every training course known to human kind on work environment, we are now thrown another curve ball.

For the first time in the history of our country, four generations are working side by side. This means that the person setting next to you probably does not think like you, act like you, or even want to be like you. All of a sudden getting someone's cooperation or understanding takes on a whole new set of skills we have never needed before. And to complicate matters you are probably working with some one who doesn't even know the very songs you are humming to yourself during the day.

And while we have been studied and analyzed for all types of factors in our work environment we have failed to take into account generational differences when attempting to understand each other. From Traditionalists, Baby-Boomers, Generation Xers, and Millennials, each of us have our own thought patterns defined by what we were exposed to growing up.

In an article I wrote for Soaring Eagles, I told the story of my 89 year old father in 2008 who was very ill. I went to visit him a couple of months before we lost him and my baby-boomer sister showed up with the new game called Wii (I assume everyone but me and Dad knew what this game was about). And this 89 year old man got up with his oxygen tank and played a virtual reality video game and beat everyone. Was he playing for enjoyment like my baby-boomer sister? Absolutely not. He thought it was a good way for him to get exercise! And I came back, immediately bought a Wii game so I could become a sports jock, took two make-believe steps at bowling, tossed the pretend ball, and pulled a muscle to the degree I had to see a doctor, thus becoming the first Traditionalist in history to have a sports injury from a video game.

The point simply is this. We have so much we can learn from each other that are more than professional skills. The skills we learn from each other, no matter the generation, are about life and about how to live life. Each generation brings something to the work force whether in knowledge, advice, or plain old know-how. There is more than one way to skin a cat and each generation can show the other. To survive in tomorrow's workplace you are going to have to have a greater understanding of the person sitting next to you and frankly even those you work for or manage. Communication begins with understanding.

And when you have an understanding among generations and you take the very best of each this translates to a positive work culture where each person is valued for who they are not what you want them to be. And your job becomes just a little bit easier.