Reinventing The Law Business: The First Mission -- To Attract, Train, Retain, And Inspire Talent
Why is talent management so important to a law firm? Bruce Stachenfeld, founder and managing partner of Duval & Stachenfeld, explains.
Ed. note: Please welcome our new columnist, Bruce Stachenfeld of Duval & Stachenfeld LLP.
What is a law firm? Unlike a lot of businesses, there are really no assets except the lawyers and (in some instances) the brand name. For most law firms — especially newer firms and start-ups — there is no brand name; that leaves the lawyers as the only assets. And for brand-name law firms, if the talent starts to leave, eventually the brand dies.
As one of my partners once said to me: “Bruce, all of the assets of this business go down the elevator every night. Your job is to get them to come back up in the morning.” He just said it casually, but it hit me strongly later on as I realized he was completely right. The entire point of running a law firm was to keep the lawyers in the firm. You can always get more clients if you lose them, but without the lawyers, you have nothing to sell and it is game over.
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Accordingly, to answer the question posed at the outset as to what a law firm is…. it is a collection of lawyers who are together because they wish to be together. If they don’t wish to be together any more, then they leave, and that is the end.
And what is a great law firm?
A great law firm is a collection of highly-talented lawyers who are together because they wish to be together. This evolved into the mission statement of our law firm:
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To Attract, Train, Retain and Inspire Talent!
If you think about it and if you, as management, focus on this mission as the most important thing of all, you are about 90% “there” in the mission to be a truly great law firm. Indeed, as I like to say sometimes: “I am not in the law business — I am in the lawyer business.” It reminds me of what I need to focus on every day; namely, keeping my lawyers thrilled and inspired to be at the firm.
I emphasize this here since I believe most law firms are misguided in what they think their core mission is. I believe that most law firms think that they have to be “client-focused” as their number one goal, and I think that is just wrong.
It is not that you don’t have to be client-focused — of course you do — you have to treat your clients incredibly and even ridiculously well, and make sure that they know that nothing is too good for them. But, in your role as managing partner or firm management, it is not about “you” — it as about the team. And then you have to ask, why should Toby Jones, your highly-talented team-mate, go crazy to service a client — what would motivate him to do so?
Well — first — he has to be on the team in the first place — he has to have been “attracted” to your law firm.
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Second — he has to be “trained,” or he will not be able to do a great job for the client.
Third — he has to be “retained,” or he will leave and likely take the client with him.
Fourth — he has to be “inspired” to do whatever is needed to service the client.
So ultimately it becomes clear that the first mission has to be getting Toby into the position where he can — and wants to — achieve amazing service to the client. If you can attract, train, retain and inspire Toby, you will have nothing to worry about — for Toby, and your other colleagues, will do incredible things for your clients. And your clients will be incredibly happy.
Focusing on our lawyers as our first mission — this little twist of the dial in a different direction from the mainstream — has been the key to our success.
By the way, I am not out on a limb here if you are wondering. Consider how Starbucks (vastly touted for its amazing customer services) does it:
- Employees first
- Customers second
- Shareholders third
It has worked for Starbucks. It has worked for us. It can work for you too.
My next article will talk about how exactly you pull this off, i.e., how do you in fact attract, train, retain and inspire your talent.
Bruce Stachenfeld is the managing partner of Duval & Stachenfeld LLP, which is an approximately 70-lawyer law firm based in midtown Manhattan. The firm is known as “The Pure Play in Real Estate Law” because all of its practice areas are focused around real estate. With over 50 full-time real estate lawyers, the firm is one of the largest real estate law practices in New York City. You can contact Bruce by email at [email protected].
