Boutique Law Firms, Partner Issues, Small Law Firms

Almost Always Hire Only Eventual Managing Partners

According to columnist John Balestriere, when you're deciding whom to hire, you should almost always ask whether the person could be running the place someday.

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Hiring is one of the most important things a law firm manager can do. When deciding on whom to bring on to your firm, at pretty much any level, virtually always ask whether the person could be running the place someday.

The old saw that sharks must keep moving or they will die is apparently not entirely true. But virtually any organization needs to keep moving forward, else it will stagnate and, eventually, die. Law offices – private, government, non-profit — are no different. Those that run them need to make decisions regarding the types of matters they handle, the technology they use, and so forth, all to maintain a vibrant, energetic law office that serves, does justice, and creates satisfying, challenging jobs for those who work there.

The most obvious and important way to ensure that law office managers maintain a thriving law office is by keeping the right staff – hiring right, training right, supporting right, and, when necessary (and it absolutely is sometimes), firing right. I plan to spend a good deal of time in this column about law firm staffing for what is, again, the obvious reality that we really are our people. It’s not like who the employees are at Google or Apple or Fiat or Time Warner does not matter. But unlike those companies, we do not have technology or an industrial plant that distinguishes who we are: great law offices employ great people, period.

In deciding, then, who comes into that law office to become part of the team, one rule we employ at our firm is that, in almost all circumstances, do not bring on anyone, even a student intern, unless you can say that they might be managing partner someday. There are – very limited – exceptions to this. Our firm chief of staff is not a lawyer and not going to become one. Someone like him, who has a primarily administrative role (and always will have a significant administrative role), is judged by a different standard. But the potential hire – student intern, legal analyst (like a paralegal position, but more), and certainly any lawyer – should not join the team unless, over time – maybe years from now – such person could be running the place. Not everyone becomes a managing partner. But ask whether the potential hire at least could be that firm leader.

This is not the standard way people make hires at law offices, at least from what I can tell when speaking to colleagues that have management responsibilities at law firms, large and small, or in government. Instead, the norm appears to be to have a restricted view of a given role – senior lawyer, junior associate, paralegal – and find someone who fits that, grab them, then move on. This is a mistake. We can be very thankful as lawyers that our work demands that we be creative, in most cases rely on colleagues, and that we be guided by devotion to service and the public good (maybe it’s not the Navy, but it’s supposed to be more than just a job). As professionals in a law office, we are not simply filling tasks. When deciding whom to hire, then, we should not simply just find someone who can fill given tasks. We should only bring on those who, to use the word we do when making hires, fit.

Many criteria go into that, and at our firm the factors include, to list just a few, whether they can take the work very seriously while not taking themselves too seriously; are they not simply willing to learn but personally require an environment in where they are constantly learning; and, particularly with younger staff, are they not afflicted by that disgusting disease afflicting more young Westerners than did the bubonic plague in 1348: entitlement.

One simple question we ask ourselves is: could this person run this place someday? A lot goes into that: if this is a lawyer, is this work, at our firm, something that the potential hire may care to do for a long time? If this is a legal analyst, might they come back here after law school and fit in? Do they have leadership potential? Whatever their age, do they appear mature for their age? Do they appear to have the skills – most of which are admittedly God-given – simply to be a great lawyer?

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I’m not saying that when someone 21 years old applies for a legal analyst position they are ready to run our law firm. The point is that if managers force themselves to ask these questions, they keep in their minds the future of their own law office, which must continue to thrive (whatever exactly that means to a given law office), and force themselves to ask whether the potential hire can fit in and lead that law office. If the answer is no, move on. If the answer is yes – and the person otherwise fits what should be a detailed list of requirements (more on that in a future column) – then bring them on to the team.

John Balestriere is an entrepreneurial trial lawyer who founded his firm after working as a prosecutor and litigator at a small firm. He is a partner at trial and investigations law firm Balestriere Fariello in New York, where he and his colleagues represent domestic and international clients in litigation, arbitration, appeals, and investigations. You can reach him by email at john.g.balestriere@balestrierefariello.com.

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