Originally published in The Legal Intelligencer
Are you solving the right problems? This query is the title of a 2017 article (and subsequent book) by Thomas Weddell-Weddellsborg, and the consummate question when discussing virtually any persistent challenge. It also holds a profound lesson for law firms today. As detailed in the first article of this series, leaders are fast becoming overwhelmed with the weight and impact of over two years of imposed change. The pandemic, global unrest, political extremism, the war for talent and more are placing a great burden on today’s law firm leaders, leaving many feeling burnt out and underprepared. Daily inquiries persist about how and whether to enforce return-to-office, what hybrid work model will best maintain culture, when and on what issues the firm should publicly take a stance, and more. These are not simple questions.
Nor are there simple answers. Yet an elevated level of awareness can help leaders initiate positive change. Part 1 of this series explored self-awareness (how leaders’ understanding of their own strengths, perspectives and vulnerabilities empowers them to be more effective), and “other awareness,” such as empathy. Situational awareness is the third frontier.
Cultivating situational awareness
On the surface, awareness of organizational problems seems straightforward. Low engagement, high stress, “quiet quitting,” and low office attendance have visible manifestations. Those attune to their talent will see evidence of these in how people interact and engage with each other and their work (note: if billable hours are the only indicator being reviewed, these signals can and will be missed. Productivity does not always decline even while work quality slips or a departure is imminent). Many law firms are responding to these challenges – deploying vacation policies, wellness programs and social events. These solutions, however, rarely address the underlying issues or root causes. They are band-aids – good to ease the pain but ineffective at preventing further harm. Moreover, what is causing duress for one professional may vary considerably from what is sparking disengagement in another.
Consider, for example, two partners reluctant to come into the office. One, an outgoing Latina partner, reports she was subjected regularly to off-color jokes, spurring her to actively avoid certain co-workers. Remote work has provided her with the feeling of safety and control over the people with whom she regularly interacts. She continues to interact with high energy in her work and with clients, Associates and other partners. Her team adores her. Another, a shy junior partner, prefers the quiet of home and the solitude remote work affords him. The office environment, for him, was wrought with social anxiety and noises that distracted him from his work. He makes plans with clients and prospects for one-on-one meetings and continues his business development efforts. He feels more productive at home and perceives his productivity as his primary badge of honor.
Situational awareness demands leaders delve deeper. Just as self-awareness requires one to ask difficult questions and explore their own motivators and values, situational awareness entails soliciting input to understand the “why behind the why”. Both partners are not coming into the office. Leaders want to encourage them to return more often. The distinction between the two partners’ experiences highlights why the solution for one partner may look different than for the other. There is no one-size-fits-all. The key to situational awareness, then, is to “seek first to understand.” Only then will leaders have the right information to define appropriate organizational changes – policies, processes – to truly alleviate persistent challenges.
Fortunately, there are several organizational approaches law firm leaders can deploy to boost clarity, enhance organizational awareness and ensure better alignment between individual needs and firm initiatives.
Conduct a cultural assessment – a cultural assessment is a formal measurement of the underlying norms and mindsets that determine how people believe they need to act within an organization to be successful. A firm’s culture reveals how people engage, what pressures they may experience and, perhaps most importantly, what types of behaviors they would like to see more of within the firm. Many law firms display characteristics of “look good” or performance cultures. These cultures often emphasize outcomes, prize perfectionism and condemn mistakes. Consequently, they struggle with innovation, change and experimentation (the exact qualities demanded right now to create a roadmap for what an effective hybrid work model will look like in a law firm). A cultural assessment serves to elevate situational awareness (understanding of root causes) and empowers firm leaders to devise firmwide and individual opportunities to shift from unwanted behaviors to constructive actions (e.g., less emphasis on autonomy, more emphasis on supporting collaborative efforts).
Provide role clarity – role clarity is a common term in cultural work used to describe how well individuals understand what is expected of them and how they can improve and elevate within an organization. While many professionals within law firms enjoy role clarity, Associates and Partners often complain of unclear parameters for promotion or compensation, inconsistent messages and a disconnect between what they hear and what they see being rewarded. This lack of role clarity is associated with poorer outcomes including lower employee satisfaction and higher turnover. Clear expectations help to create certainty. They alleviate anxiety and create constructs for performance conversations. They can elevate importance of the harder to measure attributes firms value (e.g., development of others) and, alongside performance management (see below) help to empower firms to reward positive contributors (and, conversely, address underperformers more effectively).
Establish regular feedback practices – formal feedback loops are rare in law firms. Yet feedback does not have to be formal or “firm-approved” to be effective. Providing individuals – lawyers and professionals alike – with the tools and training to effectively give and get feedback is one of the most powerful ways a firm can elevate its situational awareness. When feedback is a habit, it is rare for an organization to be blindsided by a sweeping exodus. Open lines of upward and downward communication and willingness to provide and offer feedback helps to support psychological safety within the organization. It demonstrates vulnerability, particularly when leaders openly and willingly share feedback on themselves to exemplify the value of learning from mistakes. This mindset is a hallmark of a growth or “do good” culture – one of the most consistently high-performing cultural types.
Improve performance management – complaints about underperformance, failure to progress, ineffective succession planning and lack of leverage permeate law firms. Some perceive their leadership as “too soft” or management “too nice.” These firms pride themselves on slow drops in compensation (without acknowledging the effects on those slow to rise). Others experience rainmakers who feel their contributions are not adequately rewarded. Lawyer leaders grapple with how to best manage these issues and most spend an inordinate amount of time quibbling over how to set partner compensation. These situations, unfortunately, are almost entirely linked to the fact that for most firms, the compensation process is the de facto performance management system.
A distinct, well-designed performance management system may be one of the most powerful – and underutilized – tools at law firms’ disposal to begin to tackle every one of these issues. Historically, law firms have done a poor job of clearly delineating what is expected of partners (besides promotion requirements) and an even poorer job establishing formal performance reviews – evaluation against a clear, established set of objectives and metrics tailored to each individual’s highest and best use. As law firms continue to evolve and establish more sophisticated mechanisms to manage and evaluate performance, they will find a potent ally in the war for talent and in their ability to effectively identify and manage organizational challenges and outliers.
Of course, for law firm leaders to accomplish these lofty objectives to build situational awareness, they must first prepare themselves. As mentioned in the first part of this article series, leadership training in law firms in sparse, with just 2/3 of firms offering any leadership training to lawyers and under 1/3 providing dedicated leadership courses (with those who do averaging just 11 hours per year!). Providing leaders with what they, as individuals, require is, in many ways, more critical than deploying any of the organizational shifts outlined above.
That said, there can be benefit in taking a parallel track. Begin the work to measure culture or define clear expectations while simultaneously providing incoming and current leaders the tools, skills and resources they need to adequately and effectively help the firm move toward its ultimate goal. What that goal is will be for each firm to decide. The legal sector has the potential to navigate current tensions and negativity and be an example to the broader world. By investing, mainly in time and energy, in curating self-awareness, empathy and organizational shifts, leaders can redefine how law firms operate and make them better places for all.