Here's where it all comes together. As an owner (or co-owner) of a firm, it's your responsibility to actively lead your organization. The firm's direction must be clearly established and its culture nurtured. Governance structures must be attended to. Compensation satisfaction must be monitored. People and projects must be managed. Meetings must be run productively. Decisions must be made confidently and executed well.
If all that sounds daunting, you're not alone. Directly related to the 7th SuccessTrack Fundamental (Personal Growth), the development of organizational leadership skills is often the toughest challenge law firm owners face. It also brings the biggest payoff, however — especially when coupled with a commitment to embrace the other Fundamentals. And whether you currently think of yourself as a leader or not, you CAN grow in this area if you set your mind to it.
AREAS OF FOCUS
- Guide Your Firm's Direction and Culture
- Promote Effective Governance
- Embrace Change Management
- Supervise People and Projects Confidently
Guide Your Firm's Direction and Culture
Find an organization that's atop its market and you'll find a business that is focused on its direction and its culture. Leading your firm is not about meaningless mission statements. Rather, it's about knowing where you and your firm are going. It's about knowing what you're striving to accomplish, and why — and actively working ON your business (rather than just IN it) to achieve your goals.
Far too many firms limit their goals to the mere rudimentary: they want to get up to X number of lawyers, or they want to gross X in revenues. But what if you don’t possess a vivid imagination or are so immersed in present and near-term objectives that big-picture thinking might include lunch? What if you have no clear mental picture of where your firm will be in three, five, ten, or twenty years? Are you leaving this to a colleague, a graphics designer, your accountant? Is this vital aspect of your firm’s energy and direction being left to someone else, or worse, to no one at all?
When you're truly leading your firm, everyone will be perfectly clear on the firm's specific goals and what his or her role is in achieving them. As direction and purpose become deeply rooted in your firm's culture, both clients and staff will feel inspired by your distinctive way of doing things. And you'll unleash invaluable energies to drive your business.
Promote Effective Governance
Poor decision-making processes and unclear chains of authority are at the root of untold frustration for many law firm owners. It's common, for example, that partners will informally discuss a procedure or policy and think they have reached agreement on substance and process, only to find they each thought the other was going to follow up with the rest of the firm. Some people hear of it, some don't, or they hear different things, or they go to different people to get answers . . . and confusion ensues.
When things are going fine, governance and decision making are easy topics to ignore. It's when things get dicey that they come to the forefront. From big-picture issues such as succession planning to daily operational issues like work assignments, the more trusted the decision-making process in terms of how these issues are handled and communicated, the more solid the firm.
Stepping back to look at your decision-making processes and organizational structure can reveal where seemingly good initiatives are getting stuck or lost. It can uncover staff frustrations, which, when addressed effectively, can significantly improve productivity and morale.
Embrace Change Management
The adage "failing to plan is planning to fail" presupposes that change is inevitable. Why would you bother planning at all if change was not a given? But how do you bring successful change to your firm? That the field of law is undergoing rapid change is clear. Electronic discovery and filing, tort reform, pre-paid legal services — all are forcing changes in the way you have to do business, and the way you and your people have to work.
Yet, we've all heard countless times that change is hard. Well, it is hard for the vast majority of people, because change, whether big or small, is disruptive. So, failing to plan for change, both external (as a result of changing market conditions) and internal (to help your people adapt to changing processes) is, in a word, crazy.
By embracing change management, you'll be able to assess in advance the risk factors that will likely arise in a given initiative. How fast should you implement a change (whether it's a staff change, a tech change, a procedural change)? Should you test the change first or roll it out all at once? How do you generate buy-in? Who's likely to resist the change and what's the best way to manage them?
Successful organizational change requires solid analysis, personal determination, an effective framework, and good planning. It's a process you can learn and even come to enjoy.
Supervise People and Projects Confidently
By not giving your people the proper supervision they need (and yes, want) you're actually making more work for yourself and limiting your firm's capacity to improve. Your employees, in general, want to do a good job for you; they want to grow in their roles, and they want positive contact with you as the boss. Though it may seem counterintuitive, your making time available to meet regularly with associates and staff will actually ease your stress, not increase it. It will raise everyone's motivation and productivity and, thus, make your job easier.
This is a difficult shift to make, as you may feel that A) there are way too many other pressing things to take care of, and B) you're not organized enough to make that meeting time productive. So how do you gain confidence in your ability to supervise people and projects? The best way is to spend 15 minutes each week with your key staff. (That may well be everyone if your total staff is under 10, or four to six people if you have more than 10 folks.)
We repeatedly see this process revolutionize our clients' firms: set up a simple 3-ring binder with a tab for each employee and a template agenda to take notes on each "weekly check-in" meeting. The starting prompt can be as simple as "What's the most important thing on your plate for the coming week and how can I or someone else help you with that?" Once you've established the routine, your employees will take it as seriously as you do, and with the increased rapport that develops, you'll naturally become a better supervisor and leader.
