The Reality Of A Comic Strip

Do any other lawyers besides me read the cartoon strip Dilbert?

Scroll through some recent ones online on the website. They are hilarious and spot on about the vagaries of the corporate business world. Has anyone known a Catbert, the evil human resources director? What about the Pointy-Haired Boss? Ever known anyone like that? What about Wally, who carries around a cup of coffee while avoiding work? Have you known him? I’ve known them all.

Whether you’re a Dilbert fan or not (and you should be), Scott Adams, who pens Dilbert and worked at PacBell years ago, must eavesdrop on every single conversation and act that occurs in the corporate world. His strips hit close to home.

I think we practice law in a Dilbert world. Whether you are in Biglaw, in-house, or a firm of any size, Dilbert characters abound and not in a good way. Dilbert comic strips are mini-textbooks about how not to treat people at work. A recent strip about lack of positive reinforcement (self-promotion v. leadership) has prompted this rant.

When I was in-house, I was always amazed at the complete lack of management training that the client gave to employees when they were “promoted,” and I use that word as a term of art. Far too often the “promoted” employee was rewarded with more work, management responsibilities, and a salary increase that was so small that, after taxes and other withdrawals, there was bupkis left for the employee to celebrate beyond a trip to a fast-food restaurant (Dutch treat of course).

The problem was that the new “manager” did not know how to manage her staff in any way, shape, or form, and lack of management knowledge usually led to Catbert’s involvement, an ominous sign.

For those lawyers who think that an in-house position is Shangri-La, I will share a not-so-secret secret: In-house jobs are not what you think they are. Yes, some corporate law departments do not require timesheets (hooray for them) and that is definitely a perk.

However, there is little upward mobility, and colleagues who have such aspirations find themselves bumping up against a ceiling, not made of glass, but of concrete, and competing with others in the department with a similar mindset. Occasionally, one in-houser will break through, but it’s not that often, as promoting from in-house is not often done. (The CEO knows someone who knows someone who would be simply perfect for the position, which consists of herding cats and routine daily legal work, along with scooping litter left from bad decisions.)

One big, ugly task of managers is writing and giving performance evaluations. Whether you’re the evaluator or the evaluatee, it’s not fun. The employee thinks that he is doing just fine, that he shines at his job, that he has either made money for the firm or saved money for the company, or both, and that his performance is stellar. Catbert, the evil HR director, accompanies the manager to the evaluation meeting (for corroboration purposes, among other things), and the two of them wait to pounce on the unsuspecting employee who expects an evaluation well above average, a decent salary increase, and a good bonus.

To the contrary, the employee, once at the meeting, is handed a written performance evaluation that is not only not stellar, but just “meets expectations,” aka the “meh” evaluation. Talk about a disconnect.

The “meh” evaluation can take several forms:

1. The supervisor is new, just settling into her new position, and she doesn’t know enough about what the employee has done over the past year. Has she spoken with any of the clients about how the employee is doing? Has she done anything to inform herself about work product, and other things she could ask? Of course not.
2. The employee is doing his job, and so, of course he is meeting expectations, because if he weren’t, he’d be rated lower. Stack ranking anyone? Grading on the curve? Rank and yank?
3. Whose expectations? The manager? The department head? Have expectations ever been put in writing? Just what expectations need to be met to receive an “exceeds expectations” review?  Or a “walks on water” review? Employees would like to know how to succeed.

The issue of “sandbagging” — not the kind to prevent flooding — is the one that prompts the most complaints of unfairness from employees at evaluation time. The complaint is that no one ever told the employee that work was not up to what the manager wanted, that there was a failure to communicate those expectations. This setting forth of them should be a “sitdown” between manager and employee and not just an exchange of emails. It’s especially true when there’s a new manager and the employee previously received “walks on water” or “almost walks on water” reviews and now receives, for the first time, a “meh” review. Lawyers aren’t accustomed to being told that their work is less than stellar; our egos bruise easily.

The manager’s job is to let employees know how they are doing on a continuing basis, not just at the scheduled review time when salary increases and possibly bonuses are on the line. So, for those lawyers aspiring to achieve management positions wherever they are or wherever they might want to be, regardless of setting, understand that your responsibilities go beyond just making sure the work gets done for the care and feeding of clients. It’s also the care and feeding of attorney staff, the paralegals, the legal assistants, and everyone else who makes the legal world go round. Read Dilbert for management advice on what not to do, on how not to behave. Knowledge can come from the most unlikely sources.

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Jill Switzer has been an active member of the State Bar of California for over 40 years. She remembers practicing law in a kinder, gentler time. She’s had a diverse legal career, including stints as a deputy district attorney, a solo practice, and several senior in-house gigs. She now mediates full-time, which gives her the opportunity to see dinosaurs, millennials, and those in-between interact — it’s not always civil. You can reach her by email at [email protected].