In-House Counsel

The Road Not Taken: The Art Of The Possible

Office politics: the much maligned nebulous description of human interaction and informal power dynamic prevalent at most workplaces.

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Office politics: the much maligned nebulous description of human interaction and informal power dynamic prevalent at most workplaces. Many people claim to hate “playing the game” and would rather just go into the office, do their job, and not have to worry about dealing with the drama. Office politics, however, are not always a negative. In some environments, politics is how things get done well and can result in stronger bonds and feelings of goodwill among colleagues.

One of the secrets of moving from a firm to in-house is that the silent power positioning that happens in law firms is different in a corporate setting. The categories of people jockeying for position are fewer than those in a business setting of any significant size. At a law firm, there are lawyers of varying echelons, administrative and support personnel, and miscellaneous folks.

When you are in-house, you have people in business, operations, administrative, sales and marketing, human resources, compliance, legal, and any number of additional roles that make the business run.

At a law firm, the formal hierarchy is usually easy to understand and manifests as some variation of a linear progression from partners to mail room staff. The linear structure means these formal categories are generally self-contained, or if they do intermingle, it is most likely from a top-down direction.

In-house, unless you are working for a smaller than medium-sized organization, both the formal hierarchical power structure and the informal power structure have just as many vertical implications as they do linear. What precisely do I mean by “vertical” implications? That means that people in organizations that do not report to Legal, or are not even directly related to your department (or you) can impact your success.  This is true for most everyone who works at a large organization: you never know what the future holds. Organizations change structure regularly and the formal hierarchy can upend overnight. Furthermore, individuals can move within an organization and the person you thought was nobody yesterday could be your boss tomorrow.

At law firms, the organization exists to support clients. The lawyers are the face of that direct support, and the entire respiration of a firm is to support the lawyers who support and bring in clients. When a lawyer goes in-house, he stops being the breath and becomes part of the respiration. The purpose of a business organization is to conduct business. Lawyers are not the direct face of that purpose. This means the relationship of a lawyer with his colleagues in a corporate organization is different than that in a law firm. This is a subtle change in dynamic, where your colleagues are your “clients,” your partners, and your subject matter experts. Your success as an in-house attorney is heavily dependent on your relationship with your colleagues.

Add to this the wrinkle that your colleagues are not paid by you or paying you. All you are is another demand on their time that will likely result in more work for them and may result in someone questioning how well they did their job two years ago. Legal doesn’t usually show up and engender warm feelings. We bring omens of doom, risk, and obstacles that contaminate the optimistic opportunities ready to be plucked. We ask questions, demand documents, and require proof of competency. Unless your company has a strong formal power hierarchy in place, you have to rely on the informal power hierarchy: office politics.

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An in-house lawyer has to walk the tightrope of maintaining credibility while being solicitous of others’ opinions, abilities, and most importantly, remaining mindful of territory. This skill somewhat falls under the description of emotional intelligence, but political sophistication is more than just understanding and relating to others. Being a good office politician requires that you build goodwill with all your colleagues so you can call upon that goodwill when you need it (which will be often).

Next week, we’ll talk about what to keep in mind when playing the Game of (Office) Drones.

Celeste Harrison Forst has practiced in small and mid-sized firms and is now in-house at a large manufacturing and technology company where she receives daily hugs from her colleagues. You can reach Celeste directly at C.harrisonforst@gmail.com.

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