Boutique Law Firms, Small Law Firms

Always Be Training

Formal training is necessary for staff at every level, but this formal training cannot replace the kind of daily training you must ensure that all staff at all levels receive.

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john-balestriereFormal training is necessary for staff at every level. However, this formal training cannot replace the kind of daily training you must ensure that all staff at all levels receive, which managers must ensure is part of their firm culture.

When I nearly completed my first year as an assistant district attorney in the 1990s, I entered what senior members of my trial bureau affectionately (or, perhaps, gleefully/mockingly) called “the Summer of Hell.” By that time, the first-years had completely taken over the misdemeanor docket from the then-second-year lawyers and were completely responsible for manning all the court parts that handled more than four-fifths of all docketed cases (even if the first years represented well under 10% of all lawyers in the office). Giuliani was mayor and there was simply an ocean of misdemeanors we had to wade through and resolve. The hours were very long, generally more than 12 a day, six days a week. Most of us were just out of law school with very few commitments, so the job wasn’t too difficult as this was all we did. We had a blast working with one another. We learned a tremendous amount every day as we encountered all kinds of new work and made a frightening number of errors on a weekly basis.

That was a significant contrast to the previous September, my first month as a prosecutor, where all the new lawyers took a three-week-long, full-day training program. Not only do I not remember now, many years later, what I learned that September; I think I barely retained what I learned that September because of that subsequent Summer of Hell.

This is the problem with formal training: while necessary, to a degree, without the context of doing actual work, it can be hard to incorporate what we do learn in class into our work. Weaving training into the work is the best way to train and continue to develop in any profession.

At our firm, the lawyers obviously comply with their continuing legal education requirements. All of our lawyers are members of the Second Circuit bar association (somewhat remarkably called THE Federal Bar Council—as if there are no other bar associations of federal court practitioners outside the Second Circuit), which provides frequent, high-quality, and short CLE courses just blocks from our office. Good in-class training (especially if short) makes sense and is part of general training.

Our lawyers receive most of their training, though, by doing their work. I’m not advising an easy way out here, where you simply say you get your training by doing your job (though that is the truth) and leave it at that. You can and should impose some structure on how staff learns while doing their work. For example, when senior lawyers edit the writing of more junior lawyers at our firm, the editor does not simply enter the documents, make changes, and send it off. While we frequently do not work with actual paper and more with tablet or other electronic annotation programs, the editor will return the document to the primary author with edits which the junior writer must put in. This forces the junior writer to see what the senior lawyer thought needed to be changed, and most junior lawyers can figure out why (though the editor and junior lawyer will frequently discuss anyway).

Another training method we use, nearly every day, is a brief post-mortem on just about anything. After a minor court appearance, a senior lawyer will ask others, “Any observations or questions?” It’s a simple question, but it makes great use of that time immediately after court on the walk back to the office when everyone who attended a court appearance will likely have some response to what has happened. We do something similar after complicated conference calls, or new client intake meetings, or just about any of the dozens of activities that make up our day.

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These are just some examples, but this kind of everyday work training—like what I learned every day during the Summer of Hell, and unlike hours and hours of class training—sticks. More importantly, it helps all lawyers develop a habit of daily development. I like to think that I’m a much better lawyer now than I was six months ago, and I hope to keep saying that every six months until they put me six feet under.

However, this continued development doesn’t come from attending some interesting CLE course. It comes from working, every day, to develop myself further as a lawyer, and to maintain my obligation to develop junior lawyers and other staff in the same way.

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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