The back page of the March 2006 issue of Inc. Magazine, the Grist column by Adam Hanft, is entitled “Every Business Needs a Nanny.” The article notes that employees don’t always comply with even the simplest directives and the author suggests that perhaps businesses need a nanny, like those famous television nannies that manage to transform the screaming, uncooperative child into the model of deportment.
After watching one of those nanny television shows, Hanft had what he calls a revelation, “I’m not managing a team of highly creative, highly skilled professionals. I’m managing a gang of unruly children. And I need to think less like Jack Welch and more like Nanny Stella.” He claims that strategies that work for parents also work for employees – strategies like “be consistent” and “don’t make promises you can’t keep.”
The article got me to thinking about one thing I’ve said for quite some time, and that is that often, being the managing partner of a law firm is a lot like being a parent. And perhaps a look at some parenting rules is a good way to approach running your practice.
I was curious about the ’11 commandments’ Hanft discusses in his article, so I went to the Nanny 911 website. I thought the commandments translated well into running a law practice, and although some of them overlap to a degree, I’ll be reproducing all 11 (modified somewhat for a law practice) over the next several blog posts:
1. Be Consistent – No means no. Yes means yes.
The larger the firm, the more difficult this is to follow, but the more important it becomes. Too often, law firms make exceptions that end up swallowing the ‘rule.’ This undermines the credibility of the firm leaders, reduces morale, and creates confusion. The rule followers resent the rule breakers and often lose respect for the ‘boss’ and for the rule itself. The incentive to do the best possible job is gone. If the firm policy is that an employee is entitled to take a sick day for a spouse’s medical issue, then enforcement must be consistent for all employees – the firm cannot allow one employee to take a sick day and charge another employee for a vacation day.
Even more confusion is created when the rules themselves – as opposed to their application – are inconsistent. Sometimes the specific way that something is done isn’t as important as doing it the same way every time. The way your firm names its documents isn’t as important as ensuring that everyone is naming them consistently. Deciding one day to electronically file documents by the client’s last name and the next day by the plaintiff’s name is bound to cause problems. Pick one method and stick to it.
2. Actions Have Consequences - Good behavior is rewarded. Bad behavior comes with penalties
I’ve worked with (and for) law firms that consistently forget this basic tenet. Failing to follow this rule is another way to ensure that morale in your firm takes a nosedive. It’s also a good way to ensure that bad behavior will increase and good behavior will disappear.
For example, if lawyers are supposed to turn in their timesheets at the end of the week, a repeated failure to do so by a few lawyers, without consequences, is likely to cause resentment in those who stay late on Friday night to ensure that their timesheets are turned in on time. And there's no incentive for the non-compliant to become compliant.
Conversely, if serving on committees, being active in the community, mentoring and marketing are activities that the firm wants to encourage, a compensation system which penalizes those who participate in these activities and/or rewards only those with the highest billable hours is likely to discourage those who participate in the non-billable, but valuable, activities.
Simply put, reward the behavior you want to encourage and penalize the behavior you want to discourage.
3. Say What You Mean and Mean It - Think before you speak, or you’ll pay the price
In some ways, this commandment builds on the two that precede it. If you’re going to set a ‘consequence’ for a particular action, be ready to follow through with it, regardless of who the individual offender turns out to be. Similarly, if you decide that particular behaviors or activities are to be rewarded, everyone who engages in that behavior or activity must be rewarded. But perhaps most importantly, if you have no intention of following through with anyone on that particular consequence (whether positive or negative), don’t articulate it in the first place.
Communication is a key factor in building a successful law firm. You’ve got to learn to communicate honestly and openly with those around you, whether they are your partners, associates or staff. That doesn’t mean that you have to tell everyone everything – it just means that when you do communicate, you must be authentic and communicate exactly what you mean. Most employees can see when you aren’t being genuine. They know when they’re being given a ‘line,’ and they don’t appreciate it.
As a young associate, I was often frustrated when the senior partner would tell me that something was going to happen, and yet it never did. One firm I know tried to put a ‘team’ system in place on a number of different occasions over the years. They would call special meetings to discuss the ‘new’ team system, create teams and pass out the list of the teams with team leaders. They told the associates that the teams would foster working together, would help mentor and train young associates and would give senior associates a better outlet for passing down lower value work. It backfired every time. It sounded good, but it never got off the ground because the partnership didn’t really mean it – the partners weren’t committed to making it work. It kept getting abandoned and re-instituted, but nobody took it seriously because the partners didn't take it seriously.
Don’t be like the boy who cried “wolf.” If you announce an initiative, set a consequence or create a procedure, make sure you really mean it. Otherwise, like the villagers in the story, your employees will stop believing you.
Comments