'Get The Coach On The Phone!'

Methods of professional development in a law firm can take many predictable, innovative or cooperative paths. A motivational “best” for a paralegal may not be effective for an attorney, administrative staff member or a marketing professional. In a “one size fits all” world, law firms need to consider a more tailored approach.

When was the last time your firm invited an industry specialist or union representative to be on a question and answer panel at a departmental luncheon meeting? Candid opinion sharing can stir the creative problem solving mindset of both client and staff. Who says meetings such as this need only directly benefit the firm? Firms should always be on the lookout to expand their client base, no matter the method.

Does your firm offer pro bono or litigation opportunities to corporate attorneys and vice versa? Corporate, employment, real estate and intellectual property attorneys can all benefit from courtroom and case management experience. Do your firm's litigation attorneys ever draft contracts? A well-rounded staff portends marketable potential and assures growth opportunities for the firm. Your firm's diversity need not just be demonstrated by way of separate individuals.

Examine Your Firm's Culture

What if loyalty to your employees is one of the most important values you offer to your firm's staff? What if your firm needs an innovative approach to grow the firm's business while cashing in on the talents, loyalty and creativity of your current staff? What if you have run out of fresh ideas on how to make that growth dynamic happen?

One of the most important skills for a successful leader in any organization is the ability to create maximum performance teams. Does your firm need employees with better leadership skills, better functioning teams and more change-capable departments?

Employees under pressure can have very unrealistic expectations of less experienced staff. While partners and senior lawyers can, and do, mentor newer attorneys in the firm, sometimes it makes more sense to hire a coach from outside of the firm. The reasons might include the following:

• There are difficult or sensitive supervisory matters best handled by an impartial outsider;
• There may be neither time nor expertise inside the firm to handle the firm's personal development needs;
• The attorney (or staffer) has requested assistance from someone external; and
• Help is being sought by an individual seeking new, career enhancing challenges or opportunities.

Firm management's most critical role is that of “change agent” to improve results, and to create the resources that permit people in an organization to change the way work gets done.

Coaching Defined

Career coaching is one of the fastest growing professional service fields in the country. The U.S. Department of Labor reports that the number one employer in 2010 is likely to be “self.” As people transition into new careers and seek new meaning in their work, they will need career coaches to help light the way through difficult passages. Law firms are no different.

Just what are career coaches? They've been compared to personal trainers for your life, your champion, cheerleader, advocate, partner and sounding board. Coaches have helped untold numbers of individuals to get their careers on track and live their passions.

How Coaching Consultants Differ From Legal Advisors

• Coaching consultants work on many different problems for their clients. Attorneys work on legal problems for their clients.
• Coaching consultants are recognized interpersonal experts in their chosen field. Attorneys are recognized as experts in the field of law.
• Coaching consultants are expected to develop a personal bond. Most attorneys and clients keep their personal lives and legal issues very separate. Attorneys normally try to avoid dealing with the personal lives of their clients unless they have to, and then they refer them to others for help.
• Coaching consultants work on problems or tasks that involve the personal growth of their clients. Legal problems rarely involve the personal growth or improvement of clients, and if they do, most attorneys only focus on the legal aspects.

These are two very different and necessary approaches. Consequently, it is rare to have an attorney capable of mentoring to all of the components of professional development.

How Staff Can Gain Insight
From the Coaching Process

No professional sports team would consider putting their players on the field without the skilled expertise of the best coach they could hire. No team, regardless of their cultivated talent, can work effectively without the watchful view of someone on the sidelines observing skills, and helping the players make the necessary adjustments to improve performance. Perhaps a good coach, without all of the administrative responsibilities of human resources, is just what your team needs.

Since no team is ever “perfect,” coaches can teach support employees a variety of strategies and encourage them to utilize new tools to enhance the productivity and success of any team in achieving its mission. New tools can include software (don't forget the training!), not generally thought of as legal specific. Consider asking a secretary to create a marketing brochure or seminar announcement for his/her department. Consider asking a paralegal to create a graphics presentation for a departmental meeting. Without a coach, would you meet profound resistance or a remarkable eagerness and acceptance of these requests?

Coaching and Conflict Management

Healthy debate and discussion are crucial to create a learning environment and to produce the best possible outcomes. However, disagreements that are not understood and managed well can become highly confrontational and counterproductive. There is an art to disagreeing without injuring relationships. Everyone has a different way of handling conflict, and it is important to become more adept in dealing with the whole range of these styles.

Coaches examine the subject of accountability and teach participants productive ways to channel conflict to improve overall team results. It is important to understand the impact of diversity on team results. Part of building employee commitment includes selling the need, listening for resistance, and encouraging employee involvement. Planning for change is often overlooked and conflict is the result.

Coaches clarify what assumptions we may be making, even unconsciously, when we work with or talk with others. Coaches develop or refine employees' interpersonal skills, such as observation, listening, engagement, and managing conflict, which are so crucial in effectively advancing change.

Coaching Supervisors & Managing Partners

No part of a legal education teaches attorneys how to supervise support staff, or their fellow attorneys. The future of any law firm is highly dependent upon a firm's ability to attract, hire, train, and retain the best talent. One of the primary reasons that attorneys leave their places of employment is an unsatisfactory relationship between the lawyer and his or her supervisor. Later in their career, lawyers must know how to raise the level of their associates' skills, delegate and evaluate work, and eventually assess the performance of those that report to them. Some of the basic work must be delegated. But how many of us have watched senior attorneys hold on to aspects of their work that would offer a junior person a great opportunity for development?

Coaching can help attorney supervisors assess and evaluate their supervisory style, to determine how to fill voids in their employment management education, to encourage better results from their associates, and to create working teams that best meet clients' needs.

Being the managing partner of a firm, chairing the management committee, or supervising a department requires strong leadership skills, finesse, savvy, and the ability to negotiate as a counselor. Having an external coach can assist an attorney in developing a strategic plan, better define roles and responsibilities, best utilize diverse professional expertise in the firm, and learn to work effectively with strong, independent peers.

Paula Campbell is a partner of NPD Computer Concepts, Inc., a firm specializing in legal-specific software technical training. She has spent over 15 years observing the diverse cultural, economic and personnel aspects of law firms. Ms Campbell can be reached at [email protected].

Methods of professional development in a law firm can take many predictable, innovative or cooperative paths. A motivational “best” for a paralegal may not be effective for an attorney, administrative staff member or a marketing professional. In a “one size fits all” world, law firms need to consider a more tailored approach.

When was the last time your firm invited an industry specialist or union representative to be on a question and answer panel at a departmental luncheon meeting? Candid opinion sharing can stir the creative problem solving mindset of both client and staff. Who says meetings such as this need only directly benefit the firm? Firms should always be on the lookout to expand their client base, no matter the method.

Does your firm offer pro bono or litigation opportunities to corporate attorneys and vice versa? Corporate, employment, real estate and intellectual property attorneys can all benefit from courtroom and case management experience. Do your firm's litigation attorneys ever draft contracts? A well-rounded staff portends marketable potential and assures growth opportunities for the firm. Your firm's diversity need not just be demonstrated by way of separate individuals.

Examine Your Firm's Culture

What if loyalty to your employees is one of the most important values you offer to your firm's staff? What if your firm needs an innovative approach to grow the firm's business while cashing in on the talents, loyalty and creativity of your current staff? What if you have run out of fresh ideas on how to make that growth dynamic happen?

One of the most important skills for a successful leader in any organization is the ability to create maximum performance teams. Does your firm need employees with better leadership skills, better functioning teams and more change-capable departments?

Employees under pressure can have very unrealistic expectations of less experienced staff. While partners and senior lawyers can, and do, mentor newer attorneys in the firm, sometimes it makes more sense to hire a coach from outside of the firm. The reasons might include the following:

• There are difficult or sensitive supervisory matters best handled by an impartial outsider;
• There may be neither time nor expertise inside the firm to handle the firm's personal development needs;
• The attorney (or staffer) has requested assistance from someone external; and
• Help is being sought by an individual seeking new, career enhancing challenges or opportunities.

Firm management's most critical role is that of “change agent” to improve results, and to create the resources that permit people in an organization to change the way work gets done.

Coaching Defined

Career coaching is one of the fastest growing professional service fields in the country. The U.S. Department of Labor reports that the number one employer in 2010 is likely to be “self.” As people transition into new careers and seek new meaning in their work, they will need career coaches to help light the way through difficult passages. Law firms are no different.

Just what are career coaches? They've been compared to personal trainers for your life, your champion, cheerleader, advocate, partner and sounding board. Coaches have helped untold numbers of individuals to get their careers on track and live their passions.

How Coaching Consultants Differ From Legal Advisors

• Coaching consultants work on many different problems for their clients. Attorneys work on legal problems for their clients.
• Coaching consultants are recognized interpersonal experts in their chosen field. Attorneys are recognized as experts in the field of law.
• Coaching consultants are expected to develop a personal bond. Most attorneys and clients keep their personal lives and legal issues very separate. Attorneys normally try to avoid dealing with the personal lives of their clients unless they have to, and then they refer them to others for help.
• Coaching consultants work on problems or tasks that involve the personal growth of their clients. Legal problems rarely involve the personal growth or improvement of clients, and if they do, most attorneys only focus on the legal aspects.

These are two very different and necessary approaches. Consequently, it is rare to have an attorney capable of mentoring to all of the components of professional development.

How Staff Can Gain Insight
From the Coaching Process

No professional sports team would consider putting their players on the field without the skilled expertise of the best coach they could hire. No team, regardless of their cultivated talent, can work effectively without the watchful view of someone on the sidelines observing skills, and helping the players make the necessary adjustments to improve performance. Perhaps a good coach, without all of the administrative responsibilities of human resources, is just what your team needs.

Since no team is ever “perfect,” coaches can teach support employees a variety of strategies and encourage them to utilize new tools to enhance the productivity and success of any team in achieving its mission. New tools can include software (don't forget the training!), not generally thought of as legal specific. Consider asking a secretary to create a marketing brochure or seminar announcement for his/her department. Consider asking a paralegal to create a graphics presentation for a departmental meeting. Without a coach, would you meet profound resistance or a remarkable eagerness and acceptance of these requests?

Coaching and Conflict Management

Healthy debate and discussion are crucial to create a learning environment and to produce the best possible outcomes. However, disagreements that are not understood and managed well can become highly confrontational and counterproductive. There is an art to disagreeing without injuring relationships. Everyone has a different way of handling conflict, and it is important to become more adept in dealing with the whole range of these styles.

Coaches examine the subject of accountability and teach participants productive ways to channel conflict to improve overall team results. It is important to understand the impact of diversity on team results. Part of building employee commitment includes selling the need, listening for resistance, and encouraging employee involvement. Planning for change is often overlooked and conflict is the result.

Coaches clarify what assumptions we may be making, even unconsciously, when we work with or talk with others. Coaches develop or refine employees' interpersonal skills, such as observation, listening, engagement, and managing conflict, which are so crucial in effectively advancing change.

Coaching Supervisors & Managing Partners

No part of a legal education teaches attorneys how to supervise support staff, or their fellow attorneys. The future of any law firm is highly dependent upon a firm's ability to attract, hire, train, and retain the best talent. One of the primary reasons that attorneys leave their places of employment is an unsatisfactory relationship between the lawyer and his or her supervisor. Later in their career, lawyers must know how to raise the level of their associates' skills, delegate and evaluate work, and eventually assess the performance of those that report to them. Some of the basic work must be delegated. But how many of us have watched senior attorneys hold on to aspects of their work that would offer a junior person a great opportunity for development?

Coaching can help attorney supervisors assess and evaluate their supervisory style, to determine how to fill voids in their employment management education, to encourage better results from their associates, and to create working teams that best meet clients' needs.

Being the managing partner of a firm, chairing the management committee, or supervising a department requires strong leadership skills, finesse, savvy, and the ability to negotiate as a counselor. Having an external coach can assist an attorney in developing a strategic plan, better define roles and responsibilities, best utilize diverse professional expertise in the firm, and learn to work effectively with strong, independent peers.

Paula Campbell is a partner of NPD Computer Concepts, Inc., a firm specializing in legal-specific software technical training. She has spent over 15 years observing the diverse cultural, economic and personnel aspects of law firms. Ms Campbell can be reached at [email protected].