Firms are placing their futures at risk if they cannot identify, develop and empower the next generation of leaders.  So it is no surprise that more law firms are investing in leadership development.  For example, according to PaLAW 2009's 14th annual Managing Partners Survey, cited in the November 23, 2009 issue of The Legal Intelligencer, the number of firms surveyed that provide leadership training at any level increased from 40.5% in 2008 to 67.7% in 2009, almost a 60% increase. 

What does it take to be a good leader?  And do we lawyers have what it takes?

There are numerous theories about the best style of leadership--see  Primal Leadership (2002) by Goleman, Boyatzis and McKee for an informative evaluation of 6 major styles. Apart from style, Richard Daft, author of The Leadership Experience, cites numerous studies that have sifted out five recurring personal attributes of successful leaders: openness to experience, emotional stability, conscientiousness, agreeableness and extroversion.

If you look around for potential leaders in your firm, chances are few of your colleagues possess all five of those attributes.  While conscientiousness is something lawyers tend to have in spades, openness to experience (also known as risk tolerance), emotional stability (or emotional intelligence) and agreeableness (aren't we hired NOT to be agreeable?) are all factors that in various studies lawyers tend to fall short on. Certainly, we have clear and robust data that most lawyers (over 70%) are introverts, rather than extroverts. 

So can introverts lead?  Successfully, that is?

There seems to be some hope.  If the concern is that introverts tend not to be charismatic, outgoing personalities, Jim Collins's book Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap . . . And Others Don't provides some comfort. Collins discovered that glitzy, dynamic, high-profile CEOs are actually a hindrance to the long-term success of their corporations. Charismatic leaders are attractive to others, but they may be less effective in drawing people to the mission and values of the organization itself.

Collins contrasts Lee Iacocca, Chrysler's leader and spokesperson in the 1980s, with Colman Mockler, the CEO of Gillette from 1975 to 1991. While Iacocca almost single-handedly steered his car company away from disaster and put it on the road to prosperity, after his retirement Chrysler's profits faltered, and the company was sold to a German rival five years later. Apparently Iacocca had done little to invest in his successors or build a culture that would ensure the longevity of Chrysler.

In sharp contrast, Mockler made personal sacrifices and took substantial risks for the long-term success of the company and the profits of the shareholders, and he was so effective that $1 invested in Gillette in December 1976 was worth $95.68 in December 1996 and eventually earned a significant premium when the company was sold to P&G in 2005. Laconic and reserved, Mockler labored in relative anonymity for a big-time executive; he was a man who prioritized the success of his company over ego gratification.

Mockler and executives like him are examples of what Collins calls "level 5 leaders," those who are modest, self-effacing and understated, and display a workmanlike diligence—more plow horse than show horse, they set up their successors for even greater success in the next generation.

Leadership guru Peter Drucker goes further to say that "charisma becomes the undoing of leaders. It makes them inflexible, convinced of their own infallibility, unable to change."

So maybe we introverted lawyers, likely to be low on the charisma meter, may have some hope of mastering leadership. Certainly being people who think before we act and listen before we talk can be useful in leadership roles.

Successful leadership may also be enhanced by introspection--a natural for introverts. Leaders who scrutinize every aspect of their leadership and personality (and that of others) may be able to find internal motivations and assumptions that contribute to dysfunction and inefficiency.

Another way that introverts may be able to surpass the traditional leadership attributes is in their ability to "make sense." Wilfred Drath and Charles Palus at the Center for Creative Leadership explain that "most existing theories, models and definitions of leadership proceed from the assumption that somehow leadership is about getting people to do something."  Essentially cheerleading.  That is an effort that requires relish for and persistence in being extraverted.

But Drath and Palus reimagine leadership as "the process of making sense of what people are doing together so that people will understand and be committed." Leadership, in this view, is a matter of providing interpretation. Leaders can give people a lens and a language for understanding their work and experiences in light of larger purposes. They can help shape the mental frameworks of others so that those people see themselves as making contributions to the mission and direction of their organization, working in community for a common purpose.  Here is an opportunity for the thoughtful introvert to make his or her mark.

In the corporate world over the past decades, leaders have produced greater organizational efficiencies by employing advanced analytics and defined metrics and systems. But most organizations that have successfully manipulated these resources are finding it difficult to extract even greater efficiencies from them over time. Many are turning to their human capital as the next source of growth.  Yet many businesses are realizing the difficulty of identifying and developing leaders, particularly those who can lead this kind of productivity growth.  For example, the 2008 IBM Leadership Survey found that over 75% of CEOs lamented their ability to identify and develop leaders to succeed them.

Law firms should take note. 

Leadership involves not just leveraging the collective knowledge and expertise of an organization. Leadership is also about cultivating and nurturing human capital, particularly in such a talent-dependent industry as ours.  Leaders who recognize the perennial needs of individuals to be appreciated, to be part of a community and to feel they are contributing to the greater good are more likely to be able to raise the productivity of their troops.

And even introverts can do that.
 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments (2)
• Trackbacks

Muir led an inter-active limited-attendance roundtable on Law Practice Management for Current and Prospective Law Firm Leaders at the 12th Annual Meeting of the Association of Patent Law Firms (APLF) in Chicago, Illinois on Thursday, September 17, 2009.  Topics discussed included the distinction between managers and leaders, the importance of values-driven firm identity, the role of practice group leaders in moving the firm forward, and transitioning from consensus-led management to more executive approaches.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

Muir is leading an inter-active limited-attendance roundtable on Law Practice Management for Current and Prospective Law Firm Leaders at the 12th Annual Meeting of the Association of Patent Law Firms (APLF) in Chicago, Illinois on Thursday, September 17, 2009.  For more information or to register, go to http://www.aplf.org.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

Here's some more data that puts into question our reliance on high scores and law school credentials in determining which lawyers we want to populate our firms with.

LSAT Scores

According to a chart prepared by the Tax Prof Blog, math or physics majors are likely to score the highest on their LSATs, theoretically making them the best candidates for law school and the best lawyers.

Or maybe not. As one blogger commented, "At a prior AmLaw 100 firm, I was chastised for not getting the chair of the IP department 'out there more,' writing, doing press. My response, 'The guy has an undergrad in chemistry, then went off to law school. I’m lucky if he opens his door.'

But this blogger goes further: "The BUSINESS of law, and the success of any given individual lawyer, is becoming more dependent on the development of personal relationships, the ability to reach out and promote one’s self, and SALES, [so] we need to remove the barriers that keep those who are so predisposed out of law school."  Or, as one article recently proclaimed: "Emotional Intelligence a New Hiring Criterion."

Following that prescription--matriculating and then hiring candidates based on something other than hard scores or law school credentials--would require a much more sophisticated method of discriminating, such as personality testing, as part of law school entry requirements or firm recruitment considerations.  Are we ready for that? 

We know that rainmakers and managing partners show a different array of personality traits than most lawyers--they are more social, more extroverted, more resilient, more empathic and more persistent--in total, more emotionally intelligent.  Should we be populating our firms from the bottom up with more of those traits?  Particularly now that one of the survival strategies for practicing law requires successful marketing, business closing and relationship building? And if so, what are the best procedures to insure that we identify a high percentage of the kinds of lawyers we want to hire?

Screening for these rarer combinations of traits might also require firms to look at a broader range of law schools than they typically have--at the very time that the pendulum appears to be swinging back to hiring only from the most prestigious schools. 

Premier Law Schools

A recent study entitled "After the JD" by the American Bar Foundation points out some of the benefits of broader recruiting.  The study concludes that graduates of non-elite law schools who work at the top 200 firms are happier than their colleagues from top-tier schools and also last longer in their jobs.

Why would that be?  It makes sense that lower-tier law school grads would work harder to nail the few BigLaw positions available to them, and, as a result, would be both more grateful for their jobs and also likely to have fewer opportunities to leave.  Other pundits have suggested that student who opt for regional law schools are more likely to have stronger family and community relationships that they want to maintain.  And that they are also more likely to have financial considerations that militate in favor of attending a less expensive law school with the possibility of working part or even full time.  Strong relationships, financial savvy, self-regulating drive--maybe our kind of candidates?

But regardless of how good it is for us, recent market pressures may in any event make firms drop the broad-barreled recruiting approach.

As Aric Press in The American Lawyer points out: "I fear that we will look back at the exuberant spree of the last few years as the high-water mark of non-elite law school hiring. There simply weren't enough bodies to go around, so the Big Law machine was willing to expand its recruiting pool. The fact that some of those hired performed well, or were happier with their lots, or possessed the drive and emotional intelligence that clients crave will not be enough to change old habits. When it comes to preserving the prestige patina, sometimes the rules of cognitive dissonance are suspended."
 

Press also reminds us of the opportunity these kinds of findings afford those firms who are thinking about their future and trying to insure its success--"an opportunity for the firms wise enough to seek first-class talent no matter what brand is on a diploma. Putting that attitude into practice would be an important part of an effort to take hiring more seriously, of not relying on admissions officers to do the work of hiring committees, to actually define attributes that firms and their customers need--and then try to recruit for them. Rather than retrench, this is a moment to put your partners to work on the future of your firm. As it happens, they have plenty of time to devote to the project."

Informal Survey

Let us know what you and your firm are doing in two areas of recruiting: 

1. Have your target law schools broadened or narrowed and why?

2. Have the attributes you are looking for changed?   In which ways?  And how do you identify those attributes in candidates? 

Stay tuned.

 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments (2)
• Trackbacks

In the current stressful marketplace, the rate of lawyers' incidence of impairment has been ratcheting up from high (see, for example, our September 5, 2008 entry "The Depression Demon Coming Out of the Legal Closet") to even higher.  See "Employment Woes Fuel Uptick in Lawyer Depression."  Firms suffer losses in productivity, morale and recruitment because of impaired lawyers, and also risk client desertions, losses to their reputations and malpractice liability. 

Firms can take several approaches to both assist their lawyers and protect their bottom line.  Thomas & Knight attorney Peter Riley, as managing partner, instituted an extensive program to address lawyer stress caused from depression, substance abuse, anxiety, etc. in order to provide help fast, without worrying about insurance authorization or long waits for appointments, and with complete confidentiality.  Even with the costs of the program, Riley finds it cost-effective to the firm.  "When a lawyer or lawyer's child or spouse is in crisis, that is going to be the focus of their attention," he says.  "If we can provide assistance for them quickly, we have not only done the right thing for our lawyers, we have done the most economic thing.  It's the perfect intersection of what is right and what is profitable."

Let us draw from our extensive experience in this area to help you spot and support critical talent confronting personal distress.  We can assist on an individual-by-individual basis or by helping you set up a confidential, effective program attuned to your goals and budget.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

Ronda Muir will be a featured panelist at the annual general meeting of the Attorneys' Liability Assurance Society (ALAS) in Quebec City, Quebec to be held June 25-26.   ALAS is the premier provider of professional liability insurance for large law firms in the United States, currently insuring 237 firms.  Muir will discuss lawyer personality, firm culture and other aspects that impact risk particularly in the context of mergers and lateral hires. Over 250 loss management and managing partners are expected to attend. 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

An article by psychologist Amy J.C.Cuddy in the February 2009 issue of the Harvard Business Review reports that we make fast assessments of people on two bases:  their intentions and their competence.  And more importantly, we assume one is related to the other.  This response is evolutionarily linked, she argues, to the advantage of quickly determining whether an unknown person 1) is friendly or hostile and 2) can follow through on their threats or promises. 

Unfortunately our assessments are often marred by biases that produce faulty judgments.  For example, we have a bias towards the elderly as being incompetent but non-threatening.

In the business world jungle, these instant assessments can carry long-term consequences, particularly if they are inaccurate because of poor perception skills (a common problem area for lawyers) or individual biases.  Inaccurate assessments can lead managers to trust untrustworthy associates or undervalue potentially important people.  They can also undermine efforts to build effective teams and retain valuable employees. 

Which One Are You?

For our work with lawyers, the more important finding of the research is that people see "warmth" and "competence" as inversely related:  a surfeit of one ("She's SO nice") is believed to imply a deficit in the other ("She probably can't stand up to a board").  For example, employees who are  consistently perceived as "warmer" are also viewed as less competent, with the practical result that employees who are mothers are often demonstrably underpaid and under-promoted.

While lawyers as a group are not usually at risk for being rated high on the warmth scale, leaders who know the importance of interpersonal relationships, and particularly women, often struggle with portraying to clients and colleagues the "right mix" of warmth and competence, fearing, just as the research tends to show, that too much of the former undercuts the perception of the latter. 

There is some trepidation in telling lawyers not to be too warm--certainly there are those who would argue there is little risk there.  Yet, particularly at a time when, rightfully, the legal world is exhorted to value and praise and build relationships, knowing how to do that practically without impairing the legal product produced, either in actuality or in the perception, is important.

Our advice has long been to bifurcate these two parts of leadership:  warmth is important and should be directed toward individuals, while critical analysis should be directed toward issues, not people.  

Whether with clients or colleagues, inquire about the kids, rib them about their  diet and praise them for their recent efforts, but when you review the business product, do not stint on hard analysis.  In both conflict resolution and decision-making research, similar findings make it clear that too pervasive an effort to build cohesion can overwhelm the validity and productivity of the underlying endeavor. The hard but important work of critical give-and-take can be mortally blunted by attempts to be "nice."

In order to improve our judgments and others' perceptions of us, Cuddy suggests that we also spend time working to reeducate ourselves and our employees away from the savannah influence:  don't be too quick to make judgments in these two areas, and do not assume that kindness and competence are mutually exclusive.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

In a February 8, 2009 New York Times op ed column entitled "Mistresses of the Universe," Nicholas Kristof notes that senior staff meetings of Wall Street types resemble “a urologist’s waiting room” and suggests that "Wall Street could use an infusion of women as well as cash." 

Having more women in financial services might counter some of the risk-taking and competitive urges fostered by high levels of testosterone and would improve decision-making, according to the research Kristof cites.  In addition to suffering from testosterone-overload, men are also found in the studies he cites to be “particularly likely to make high-risk bets when under financial pressure and surrounded by other males of similar status. Women’s risk-taking was unaffected by this kind of peer pressure.” 

Of course, women managers also have their Achilles heels. The January 2009 Harvard Business Review includes a 360-degree feedback study by Herminia Ibarra and Otilia Obodaru that finds that female leaders are perceived to be strong in traits such as tenacity and emotional intelligence, but trail men in one important aspect: their superiors, peers and subordinates say that women leaders lack vision.

Better Performance in Diversity. Regardless of our specific gender strengths and weaknesses, the data on the advantages of having diverse management is piling up. Two separate studies in 2008, one by Catalyst, an organization that supports expanded opportunities for women at work, and the other by management consultant McKinsey & Co., looked at gender in management and found that companies with more female executives perform better. 

Why would that be?  University of California-Irvine professor emeritus Judy Rosener says brain scans prove that men and women think differently. Rosener says she's concluded that a company with a mix of male and female leaders, with their differing attitudes regarding risk, collaboration and ambiguity, will outperform a competitor who relies on the leadership of a single sex.

Women aren't better, Rosener says, but they bring to the table something that men don't.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

On February 18, 2009 Muir will lecture students at Northwestern University's Business Institutions Program on how to improve management decision-making. Based in part on the article "Promoting an Effective Board or Management Group," the discussion will explore, among other subjects, optimal personality traits for good decision-making, constructing effective teams and avoiding extreme decisions.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

The news is out:  "Law is becoming more of a business."  That was the headlights line by David Lat, founding editor of AboveTheLaw.com, in a January 25, 2009 New York Times article about the salary freezes, layoffs and dropping profits in the legal marketplace. Lat adds, "And you will see more of an emphasis on results than in the past."

Surprisingly enough, that realization seems to be downright radical, and a gathering consensus to that effect may mark a tipping point, pushing the conception of legal practice into a brave new future.

Certainly some firm managers will respond by taking out their calculators and trying to quantify their way to results--slashing salaries, reducing pencil-count.  Jones Day partner Mickey Pohl advocates refocusing legal services on providing "business-focused solutions." The job of a law firm is not to solve "a legal problem," he contends. "It's to approach a client's legal situation with an eye toward the overall health and strategy of an ongoing business, a business that has to worry about remaining in existence; satisfying customers, shareholders, and stakeholders; staying acceptably profitable; protecting its reputation; and resolving litigation disputes in a cost-effective manner." In short, brilliant legal strategy, at least in isolation, can make for poor business solutions for a client.

We counsel both our law firms and individual lawyers that "getting the right answer" is only a small factor in the successful practice of law.  Getting it right in a timely manner, getting it right in a way that best serves the client from a holistic viewpoint, getting it right so that the client understands and appreciates the answer, and getting it right in the method of delivery and followup are other critical parts of providing valuable professional services.

According to a pundit at Law and More, "there is a downside to recognizing that law is a business and that it should be focused on the business of its clients. For one thing, the specialness of this profession ends... it loses its protective aura... Instead, it stands out there like, well, any other brand, competing for attention...In addition, lawyers, even the most legally adept, will be called upon to put a human face on new business development, ongoing client interaction, and being influential with all other constituencies, be they judges or government agencies."

"Yet, this [skill] remains alien to many prominent lawyers...They address me in legalspeak or, worse, in the top-down tone and content of those who know far more than I but are patiently taking the time to bring me along. They lack more than a conversational mindset. They are downright deficient in Emotional Intelligence [EI].  Boosting EI of the individual lawyers, the law firm, and the classes in law schools seems like it's job-one in the business of law." 

The data demonstrating the challenge most attorneys face in emotional intelligence is already in. Fortunately, emotional intelligence, unlike IQ, can be improved through training, but most law firms have not considered it worth the investment.  But not only will the type of interpersonal style described above fail to obtain, keep and develop business, we also know that it clearly risks alienating the client to the point of litigation. Research shows that more than 80% of malpractice lawsuits against doctors can be predicted by examining not the doctor's education or skills, but simply the tone of the doctor's interchange with his/her patient:  a tone of "dominance" places the doctor at extremely high risk for a lawsuit.  And who but lawyers know how to pitch dominance to an off-the-charts level.

We are being pushed to explore taking bold new steps on every front that has historically defined our profession.  Compensation is being overhauled, partnership structure is adapting to the demands of the times, the billable hour is under siege, real estate is being reevaluated and leverage is under scrutiny.  But perhaps one of the most radical steps that may come from considering legal practice to be, after all, a business is the one that pushes us to educate ourselves and our attorneys in the fine, perhaps once known but now lost art of providing service.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

What does behavioral science and our expertise about lawyers tell us about President and Mrs. Obama, who are both Harvard-educated lawyers?

Assessments.   A number of assessment tools give us a profile of what a typical lawyer's attributes are. Lawyers on average score one or two standard deviations higher on IQ assessments (i.e. 115-130) than the general US population.  Using the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, lawyers are likely to have the following personality types:  "introversion" (need for time alone to think and recharge), "intuition" (greater comfort with concepts than with details), "thinking" (decision-making based on objective reasoning rather than empathic compassion) and "judging" (a work style that methodically charts out and completes goals).  According to the Caliper Profile, compared to the general population, lawyers generally have high levels of skepticism and strong abstract reasoning skills, highly prefer autonomy ("I am the boss of me"), exhibit a strong sense of urgency, show low resilience in the face of setbacks (and criticism), and are often uncomfortable and/or unskilled at forming and building relationships ("sociability").  Of the five conflict resolution styles, lawyers tend to use only two:  competing ("I want to win") and avoidance, compared to the collaboration that business people often prefer.  Lawyers also have on average lower (by one standard deviation) emotional intelligence than the general US population and are much more pessimistic.

Handedness. President Obama, as he recently pointed out when signing his first Executive Order, is a lefty. Mrs. Obama is right-handed.

Humans--while not the only species to exhibit handedness--are and have been for over 5,000 years the only one with a consistent, strongly preferred handedness. Ninety-three percent (93%) of humans are right-handed and a higher proportion of males than females are left-handed.

The left hemisphere of the human brain processes things in parts and sequentially, and is usually the center for language, science, mathematics, and logic. When the left side of the brain is dominant, it controls the right side of the body, making these individuals right-handed.  The right side of the brain synthesizes and is a source of dreams, fantasies, art, music, and feeling, and is dominant in left-handed individuals.  Almost half of left-handers also use their right hemisphere for language.  Lefties are therefore more likely to mix emotion and language, vision and feeling.

Is it better to be left-handed?  Research on handedness tends to place the abilities of left-handers at the extremes--over-represented among both the gifted and the mentally challenged.  And a number of miscellaneous attributes are reported to be associated with being left-handed, including higher instances of allergies, alcoholism, epilepsy, eczema, thyroid problems, and a shorter life-span by an average of nine years.  Also, a significantly higher portion of male lefties than righties are homosexual. 

What makes someone left-handed?  Premature birth, prolonged labor and breech births seem to correlate with babies who become left-handed. While there is no conclusive explanation for handedness, one theory suggests that the male hormone testosterone might be responsible. Large amounts of this hormone slow left hemisphere development in the male fetus and might explain the clear predominance of males among lefties. 

The hormonal theory also seems consistent with differences that have been found in cognitive performance at the intersection of handedness and gender.  For example, overall, males perform better than females on spatial tasks (a left hemisphere and therefore right-hand dominant task), while left-handed males perform poorer than right-handed males on those tests (and right-handed women perform poorer than left-handed women).  As to verbal abilities (a right hemisphere and therefore left-hand dominant task),  left-handed males out perform right-handed males (and, by the way, right-handed females out perform left-handed females).  So the picture that emerges is that left-handed males are most like right-handed women in their cognitive approaches. 

Analysis of career choices show, as would be expected (and I predicted in a college paper too many years ago to admit to), that a disproportionately high rate of left-handed males, consistent with their superior verbal abilities, are lawyers.  Similarly, I surmised (and as to which I can now claim vindication), right-handed women should also be over-represented among lawyers.

Blood Type.  Okay, we are starting to get a little far out here, I admit, but several theories contend that blood type relates to specific personality clusters, a result of metabolism and other organic forces that mold leaders, followers, bean-counters, risk-takers.  In Japan and other Asian countries, a resume often includes blood type to bolster the applicant's qualification for the job.  In any event, the Obamas' blood types do not seem to be publicly available and Barack Obama's mixed racial heritage (as well as some mixed race heritage on Michelle Obama's side) make assumptions based on race difficult.  Nonetheless, people of African ancestry are most often Type O, the original blood type.  According to Eat Right for Your Blood Type by Dr. Peter. J. D'Adamo, Type Os tend to be hardy and strong, are best fueled by a high protein diet and need heavy physical exercise.  Type Os also have a strong drive to succeed and often exhibit leadership qualities, including a willingness to take risks and, concomitantly, a high degree of optimism.  Former president Ronald Reagan, to whom Obama has been compared, was a Type O, as is Queen Elizabeth II and Charles, the Prince of Wales.

Education.  Moving on to nurture.  Some contend that a lawyer's law school affects how he/she approaches and resolves issues. Noam Scheiber of The New Republic contrasts the differences between the chaotic early days of Clinton's presidency with Obama's smooth and "brutally efficient" transition, concluding that part of the explanation for the difference "lies in the elite institutions that socialized them -- namely Yale and Harvard, their respective law schools."

According to Carolyn Elefant in the Legal Blog Watch, "Scheiber contrasts the rigor and competitiveness of Harvard Law School with the somewhat more relaxed environment at Yale. At Yale, class attendance wasn't required, and professors engaged students in broad policy discussions. By contrast, Harvard classes focused more tightly on legal issues. Likewise, at Yale, the law review conferred little prestige, because anyone could join, whereas at Harvard, law review participation depended upon grades and a writing competition. As a result, Harvard Law review editors like Obama stood a good chance at a coveted Supreme Court clerkship."

Brian Lauter at The Shark goes further to say that it is college that provides "the more formative experience. Personal identity, at least partially formed during the college years, guides the way we approach decisions and situations" -- including one's choice of law school.

Ultimately, Elefant agrees "that our personalities matter much more than where we attend school -- undergraduate or law school. Had Bill Clinton attended Harvard, he probably would have chafed against the rules and formalities with his less-disciplined personality, but I doubt that Harvard would have changed him. Likewise, if Obama had gone to Yale, it's not likely that the relaxed atmosphere would have encouraged him to drop his work ethic."
 

What's Different About the Obamas.  Of course we have more information about the Obamas than just that they are lawyers, what schools they went to and their handedness.  Some of the other information out there can help us piece together a more specific read on their personal work styles. 

First, the fact that both Obamas left the traditional law firm track makes them more likely to be exceptions to the average lawyer profile rather than the rule.  Lawyers who are high on extroversion, sociability, compassionate decision making, and optimism are often the ones most uncomfortable in law firm culture and the first ones to go.

Continue Reading...

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

This is the time of year when many of us take stock of our direction and goals and make plans to step up our effectiveness.  This particular year, 2009, many lawyers are facing an extremely difficult once-in-a-century marketplace for which no one has been truly prepared.  So we may also find ourselves questioning our ability to successfully grapple with the challenges ahead.  

How to acquire the skills that will improve your practice and advance your leadership in such a disorienting environment?

The old adage of two heads being better than one is born out by the data available on the results of coaching.  According to a January 13, 2009 article by Susan Letterman White in The Legal Intelligencer, "a research report by Diane Coutu and Carol Kauffman in the January Harvard Business Review found that coaching is a business tool most often used to develop the capabilities of high-potential performers or facilitate leadership transitions," and one which produces quantifiable benefits. "The Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology has reported that coaching leads to higher interview ratings for individuals. Telecommunications Weekly reported in November that a change program, which included coaching, improved customer satisfaction by 10 percent and call resolution rates by 56 percent at Motorola. And according to a 2008 article in The Chronicle of Higher Education, coaching of university faculty improved the writing process of professors who were under pressure to publish."

As Ms. White states, "coaching is to a lawyer what organizational development is to a law firm; they both foster intentional change toward particular goals through a collaborative process. The goals are those that move the client to a higher level of professional effectiveness...Most importantly, a good coach is paid to ask the right questions."

In addition, a good coach is one who listens.

Sheryl Axelrod of Hepburn Axelrod & White, a Philadelphia firm, was quoted in the article as extolling the benefits of coaching in a law firm context. "We worked with a coach who had an uncanny ability to not only listen to our needs, fears and desires for our firm, but our own internal dilemmas and concerns about each other."

Of course, after listening, a coach must also be able to help coachees arrive at and implement beneficial changes.  And those changes are sometimes unexpected.  In the Hepburn Axelrod case, "one of our partners...reach[ed] the difficult decision to leave the partnership."

But the proof is in the pudding.  "The result of the coaching is that our firm, on our own, and our former partner, on his own, are each thriving in a market in which most firms are doing worse, not better, than the year before, " Axelrod said.

Quantitative evaluations of coaching are rare, but those that have been done demonstrate conclusively its effectiveness and bottom-line contribution.  In an evaluation by MetrixGlobal of an executive coaching program provided by the Center for Performance Excellence in 2004 to Booz Allen partners and principals, results indicated that "all leaders readily applied what they gained from their coaching experiences to make significant strides in self-development, while over half (53%) made significant improvements in their relationships with peers and team members and some  leaders (19%) went on to significantly improve client relationships; gaining greater clarity about how their behavior impacted clients and being better able to respond to client issues."

Of eight business areas senior leaders expected executive coaching to impact, "two were found to be positively impacted by at least half of the leaders who were coached: teamwork (58%) and team member satisfaction (54%). Three other areas were selected by 31% of the leaders as having been impacted: quality of consulting, retention and productivity."

Monetary benefits were rigorously documented in this evaluation. "The total monetary benefits were $3,268,325 with four impact areas each producing at least a half million dollars of annualized benefit to the business: improved teamwork ($981,980), quality of consulting ($863,625), retention ($626,456) and team member satisfaction ($541,250). Given a total, fully loaded cost of the coaching of $414,310, the ROI was 689%."

Coaching can provide to all lawyers the simple but valuable assistance of a supportive yet out-of-the-law-firm-box perspective that can be critical when steering through dangerous waters--and that can positively impact the bottom line. That perspective can help you become a more effective  partner, develop individual business, expand your expertise, master management responsibilities and otherwise plan and implement the next step in your career (whether you are motivated to do so proactively or reactively).

At RRR, we offer confidential high-performance coaching programs of six to eighteen months that are tailored to your objectives and your schedule.  Contact us for a consultation on how we can help you achieve your goals in 2009.

Happy new year!

 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

What do you know? Narcissists--big personalities with big egos who like to exert control and reject collaborative decision-making--are the ones leading many law firms through these perilous times. 

"Narcissistic leaders are distinguished by their big ideas...and general indifference to the opinions of others,” according to Douglas Richardson of Altman Weil. “They resolutely reject the status quo, thus affronting all those tied to tradition and cautious about change. They want to reshape the world to their vision. They don’t much care if others label them vain and self-centered; they count on the power of their vision and their personal charisma to drive them to the top during periods of great upheaval or change. Their style is at best despotic, and often coercive.”

Such leaders tend to be nonreflective and poorly attuned to the needs of differing individuals, Richardson writes. The results are high lateral partner movement and high attrition among younger lawyers for whom money and status are not primary motivators.

Richardson says such leaders may display genius and vision, but they are at their best when they know their limits—or when someone can point them out. He suggests hiring an outside coach “with plenty of candor, a tough skin and a strong mandate from the firm to help with top team-building.”

 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

At a time of roiling emotions in the legal and financial sectors, successfully charting a path to the future may be impacted by how we perceive and respond to those emotions in our organizations.  A recent article entitled "Associates Should Keep Their Emotions in Check" advocates guarding the emotions associates experience in the law practice setting. 

"We can't be distracted by crying about our recently fired colleagues when we have to depose the CEO of a multinational conglomerate," it explains. "Being in touch with--and in control of--your emotions is key to success at Biglaw."

Lawyers at all levels--not just associates--often score poorly on emotional intelligence assessments because of their reduced ability to do just that--be in touch with and in control of their emotions.  So that advice looks good on first impression, but the body of the article, while often tongue-in-cheek, makes it clear that ignoring or suppressing emotions have historically been the real keys to law practice success.  That advice, in black and white, is not only disarming but also not well suited to the trials lawyers and law firms have before them.   

Historical Emotions and the Wave of the Future

Of those emotions historically expressed in law firms and law departments, certainly some have been much more prevalent, and welcome, than others. Joy, for example, is not an emotion that lawyers have exhibited readily.  OK, it's all right to strut your stuff after a critical win:  a big jury verdict, or the final go-ahead from the FTC.  You should also be able to feign your way through an evident appreciation of your client's or supervising partner's adventure stories.  But neither of these is really joy--more like pride and socially sanctioned deception, respectively. 

Joy is what is felt when you're in that great limitless zone of both doing what you are good at and feeling there is value and meaning to what you do.  Joy is in short supply in legal practice these days and when it arises, it is too often squelched by the pessimists who view it as evidence of not working hard enough (so as to be appropriately worn down) or not taking seriously the heavy risks associated with the job (so as to be appropriately worn down).

Sadness, joy's opposite, has not been very evident in law practice either, often viewed as a sign of weakness.  Drag around about your spouse leaving you or your dog dying and, in this climate, you risk losing your job because of being perceived as not up to it.  The irony is that sadness, in particularly the serious kind that develops into depression, is in fact up to ten times more prevalent among lawyers than any other profession--so even if you can't always see it, it is there.  And the characteristic pessimism that puts lawyers in good stead in the courtroom and boardroom makes it harder in these difficult times for the sad to see the light at the end of the tunnel.  So sadness in the office may be on the rise.

Fear is also one that we lawyers eschew to avoid looking weak.  But fear may be an emotion that is more in evidence these days too: fear about everything from the global economy down to the mortgage payments no one is going to bail you out of.  And those fears, the full range of them, may well be what is motivating strategy at a number of firms now.  Combined with pessimism, fear is a motivator that can hijack the deliberative process, sacrificing long-term health for a short-term salve.

Perhaps the one emotion with which lawyers are openly familiar is anger.  One of the few raw emotions long allowed to flow freely in law firms, it seems most accepted in senior lawyers. Screaming, slamming the door, cussing out opposing counsel on the phone--these are often taken as evidence of practicing hardball in a high-pressure, high-powered job.  The anger that is not embraced is the one simmering among the stressed-out associates, who don't appreciate being taken from personal or family time to perform mind-dulling document reviews, or the anger among junior partners trying to maneuver the compensation and power game without turning irate senior partners against them.  And senior partners are angry because, having jumped through all the hoops and put in their time, they are watching as the promised fruits evaporate before them.  What can erupt is a conflagration of anger that can blow up the firm.  Which is also on the rise.

Responding to Emotions

So how do we handle the emotions of these times?  The massive changes in the financial climate and the likelihood of similarly massive changes in individual firms' fortunes have confronted some law firms and law departments with the same grieving process that individuals go through after a death or other personal tragedy.  Dr. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, the pioneer in grief theory, posited five sequential stages:  denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance, which are commonly referred to as the "grief cycle".   Only by getting to acceptance--finally realizing and accepting that many of our dreams and aspirations are no longer part of the current reality--are we able to move on to the possibilities that remain, and how best to achieve them. 

Our advice to firms caught in this emotionally spiraling time is to create a climate that allows your lawyers to experience their feelings and individually arrive at the best method to cope with them.  Allow the community to grieve--to deny, be angry, bargain and be depressed.  Before acceptance, these stages must be navigated.  For their part, management can regularly hold firm meetings that recognize the fear and anger and lost dreams, but that also point out the realistic dimensions of the situation.  More, not less, information on the state of firm finances and what the firm intends to do, and specifically how each lawyer can help, can bring the firm together.  Even honestly reporting that a strategy is still being decided on is better than deferring to the rumor mills. 

Maintaining and even expanding measures that bring cohesion to the firm and reinforce its culture is also critical.  More than one exiting Heller Ehrman lawyer said they would have stayed even with reduced compensation and prospects if the firm had held true to its culture, the culture that they had initially embraced and repeatedly committed to.  The reason for staying with that particular firm, regardless of its financial condition, evaporated when it lost its defining culture.

 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

At the meeting of the American Bar Association's Law Practice Management section today in Tucson, Arizona, Muir was presented with the 2007-2008 Law Practice Magazine Edge Award for Bronze Feature Article for her article in the July/August 2007 issue of the magazine entitled "The Importance of Emotional Intelligence in Law Firm Partners." The Edge Awards are sponsored by Edge International, and each year recognize excellence in writing for the magazine.

 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

The American Bar Association has announced that Ronda Muir's cover article in the July/August 2007 issue of Law Practice magazine, entitled "The Importance of Emotional Intelligence in Law Firm Partners,"  has been awarded the 2007-2008 Law Practice Magazine Edge Award for Bronze Feature Article. 

The Edge Awards are sponsored by Edge International, and each year the awards recognize excellence in writing for the magazine.

Muir will be presented with the award at the Tucson, Arizona October 16-18, 2008 meeting of the Law Practice Management section.
 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments (1)
• Trackbacks

The keynote speaker at the opening of the 2008 International Conference on Emotional Intelligence this week was Jim Kouzes, coauthor of the award-winning best-seller The Leadership Challenge, executive fellow at the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Leavey School of Business, Santa Clara University, and, according to The Wall Street Journal, one of the twelve best executive educators in the U.S.

What did he have to say that is of interest to the legal world? At a time when we are struggling, in spite of the economy, to retain both young lawyers and more senior attorneys with books of business, Kouzes revealed what makes people committed to their organizations: values.

According to Kouzes, the first step in earning employees' commitment is the clarification of organizational values. His research indicates that people who are clear about their organization's values (and also their personal values) are significantly more committed to the organization than those individuals who are clear about their personal values but unclear about the organization’s values.

All leaders must, therefore, he contends, be crystal clear about what they stand for.  The lynch pin for making this approach effective, however, is that leaders must be credible—the troops have to sincerely believe that their leaders not only say their values, but also do what they say.

Tony O'Reilly, CEO of H.J. Heinz, said it this way:  "Nothing energizes an individual or a company more than clear goals and a grand purpose. Nothing demoralizes more than confusion and lack of content."

The concept of "organizational values" are often viewed with suspicion by lawyers, who smell something akin to partisanship or other lack of objectivity.  Values are not one of those protected statuses under Title VII.  You can legally proselytize (and hire and fire) "what we believe in."  But you have to start out knowing what that is.  And living it. 

Ahhh.  There's the rub.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

The use of assessments worldwide is rapidly expanding and lawyers are still lagging at the back of the pack--way back. 

An article by Lisa Belkin in yesterday's New York Times notes that there are 2,500 "profiling instruments" that companies rely on more every year when deciding whom to hire or promote. Sixty-five percent of companies surveyed reported using assessments in 2006, up almost double from the 34 percent reported a year earlier, according to Staffing Industry Report, a human-resources newsletter.

To paraphrase her article, the content of tests has stayed more or less constant for three decades. What has changed is the workplace. The cost of losing experienced employees now represents a tremendous lost of investment.  "Employers want a guarantee that a new hire will stick — and the best way to do that is to make sure that job and candidate are a good fit in the first place."

Globalization that separates performance and accountability/review across continents has further complicated the process of finding and training the best person for the job. So offering on-line testing across those continents makes these assessments not only appealing but also fast.  

I am often asked by potential clients, particularly those who have been in corporate settings, if we either offer or recommend simple, cost-effective assessments for them to use in attorney recruitment, training and development.  While we can recommend and administer a number of good assessments that can be highly useful -- Myers Briggs Type Indicator (the most popular test in the country, used by 89 of the Fortune 100 and taken by 2.5 million Americans each year), Caliper's Personality Profile, Birkman Method, MayerSaloveyCaruso Emotional Intelligence Test, Thomas Kilmann Conflict Instrument, among others--they are not inexpensive and they are not targeted to lawyers. 

A recent college graduate friend took a Johnson O'Connor aptitude assessment, a common test for teens and young adults to help determine career possibilities.  Since her father and grandfather are lawyers and she is considering going to law school, she was surprised to find that "lawyer" was not one of her designated career possibilities.  She was told that a few years ago Johnson O'Connor stopped offering "lawyer" as an option for any of their test-takers.  The reason?  They are no longer able to reliably correlate attributes or aptitudes with the successful practice of law.

And therein lies one of the problems with assessing attorneys.  While research has indeed identified a number of attributes that lawyers exhibit to a greater degree than others-- for example, high pessimism, skepticism, urgency and autonomy, and low resilience, sociability and collaboration-- the problem lies in the data that shows the impact these characteristics are having on practitioners.  These very attributes present in so many lawyers are also the attributes contributing to the dissatisfaction and distress that the legal profession exhibits:  astonishingly high rates of depression and other mental illness, substance abuse, suicide, and divorce, for starters. High rates of dissatisfaction that are also contributing to the staggering drop-out and attrition rates.

In addition to the challenge of identifying what makes for a good (as well as well-adjusted lawyer), there is also the expense of doing that well.  The testing often done at corporations is highly individualized, developed after an extensive review of what attributes in fact produce productive and satisfied employees at that particular company, and sometimes at that particular location.  Google hires over 10,000 new employees each year and enjoys the amazingly low attrition rate of 4%, but to accomplish that.it invests in a highly detailed questionnaire and assessment that is developed from extensive employee data   That process is not inexpensive. 

Not only is it the individual lawyers who have complex and sometimes hard-to-read attributes.  Law firms and law departments, often in spite of their studied denial, also have "personalities."  Understanding those personalities is critical in determining the type of person who will thrive or fail there. 

Our unique expertise in understanding the attributes of individual lawyers, as well as each legal workplace, makes us ideally suited to help you enter the challenging world of 21st century attorney assessment, development and retention.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

Of the gallons of ink dedicated to analyzing the eye-popping follies of Eliot Spitzer, by far the most trenchant view is contained in the March 14 New York Times OpEd piece by David Brooks. Permit me to quote whole sections of his article.

"Our social structure seems to produce significant numbers of people with rank-link imbalances. That is to say, they have all of the social skills required to improve their social rank, but none of the social skills that lead to genuine bonding. They are good at vertical relationships with mentors and bosses, but bad at horizontal relationships with friends and lovers.

[In school,] they rack up great grades and develop that coating of arrogance that forms on those who know that in the long run they will be more successful than the beauties and jocks who get dates.

Then they go into one of those fields like law, medicine or politics, where a person’s identity is defined by career rank. They develop the specific social skills that are useful on the climb up the greasy pole: the capacity to imply false intimacy; the ability to remember first names; the subtle skills of effective deference; the willingness to stand too close to other men while talking and touching them in a manly way.

And, of course, these people succeed and enjoy their success.

They treat their conversational partners the way the Nazis treated Poland. They crush initial resistance, and the onslaught of accumulated narcissism is finally too much to bear.

[But] then, gradually, some cruel cosmic joke gets played on them. They realize in middle age that their grandeur is not enough and that they are lonely. The ordinariness of their intimate lives is made more painful by the exhilaration of their public success. If they were used to limits in public life, maybe it would be easier to accept the everydayness of middle-aged passion. But, of course, they are not.

And so the crisis comes...

These Type A men are just not equipped to have normal relationships. All their lives they’ve been a walking Asperger’s Convention, the kings of the emotionally avoidant. Because of disuse, their sensitivity synapses are still performing at preschool levels.

So when they decide that they do in fact have an inner soul and it’s time to take it out for a romp ... . Well, let’s just say they’ve just bought a ticket on the self-immolation express. Some desperate lunge toward intimacy is sure to follow, some sad attempt at bonding. Welcome to the land of the wide stance."

 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

On February 12, 2008 Muir is scheduled to discuss with students at Northwestern University's Business Institutions Program how to improve decision-making.  Based in large part on the information contained in "Promoting an Effective Board or Management Group," the discussion will explore, among other subjects, optimal personality traits for good decision-making and how to avoid extreme decisions.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

In a report released October 1^st, Catalyst, a New York consultancy, found that Fortune 500 companies with at least three women on their boards strongly outperformed those companies with fewer or no women. Based on a study of four years of corporate results, the correlation was found to be so direct that the more women who serve on a board, the better the bottom line. 

The companies with the highest percentage of women on their boards had equity returns 53% higher, returns on sales 42% higher and returns on invested capital at least 66% higher than those companies with the least number of women board members. Higher returns kicked in once at least three women served on the corporation’s board, the study found, with companies having only three women board members raising each of those returns an average of 5% over corporations with fewer women.

Why would female board participation produce such concrete financial results? Various consultants and academics speculate that women are better able to understand the customer base, particularly of consumer goods companies, and that showcasing women on the board helps attract and retain women employees throughout the company. 

Another reason may well be women’s often strong collaboration skills, empowering them to better resolve conflict and move boards through the thorny discussions necessary to make and carry through critical decisions.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments (2)
• Trackbacks

Growing future leaders at our best business schools increasingly involves teaching "softer" skills, and often using personal style assessments. One of the more rigorous and long-standing low-residence courses at Harvard Business School is the nine-week Owner President Management Course (OPM), which spans three years.  Roughly 120 business owners, only half of whom are usually from the US, are enrolled in this course.

Last year, one of the course professors, Dr. Linda Doyle, included The Birkman Method in her "Leadership and Organizational Effectiveness" classes for the OPM, a class that examines leadership styles through case studies.  The Birkman Method is a personal style assessment that identifies a number of traits, and also how those traits manifest in an organization and morph under stress.  Using the Birkman assessment, OPM participants are able to identify and analyze their own authority styles, and the strengths and problems that might develop from those styles.  Harvard has decided to continue the use of the Birkman in this course and is considering including it in other MBA courses.

Yale School of Management has also introduced personal style assessments into its curriculum.  All MBA candidates are now required to take an assessment to help identify leadership styles, strengths and potential problems.

Heidi Brooks, Director of the Leadership Development Program at YSOM and a lecturer in Organizational Behavior, is convinced that these assessments are avenues to self awareness and interactional intelligence that can only improve management effectiveness.  Since most major corporations hire and promote at least in part on the basis of similar types of assessments, having MBA candidates familiarize themselves with the testing process and the information it provides also gives them an early advantage. 

Besides Harvard and Yale, Dartmouth University's Tuck School of Business, University of Southern California's Marshall School of Business, Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Sloan School and Stanford's Graduate School of Business are among the business schools that have heard from alums and companies across the country that it is the softer skills--communication, brokering compromises, managing conflict, developing relationships and leading groups--rather than strategy or financial analysis that are missing in MBA graduates.  And are doing something to address those weaknesses. 

Stamford's B School revamped its leadership-training curriculum this fall, now requiring all first-year students to take personality tests, participate in teamwork and management-simulation exercises and critiques of their people skills.  Professional executive coaches will watch the simulations and offer advice.

At Tuck, the leadership-development program, modeled on corporate programs, that was launched in 2004, puts all first year students in teams of five.  The groups complete coursework together, help each other with assignments and then rate themselves and each other on how well they operate in a team, including how well each of them "solicits feedback and acts on it" or helps "manage conflict."  Reports on their performance are used to inform the coaching sessions the students attend and to design personal development plans.

Says Warren Bennis, professor at USC's Marshall School:  "It isn't just nice--these interpersonal skills.  It's the stuff that's necessary to lead a complex organization."

It is only a matter of time, as they say, before law schools recognize the impact of "people skills training" and follow suit.  Not only are lawyers less educated both in school and in the workplace on the importance of developing these skills and the methods of doing so, the data shows that they are as a group psychologically and behaviorally more challenged  in achieving results.  Which makes this sort of training--whether at law school or on the job-- even more critical.

 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

A recent article in the New York Times on young 20-something Internet mega-millionaires quoted one as saying “You ask yourself, ‘Why am I not happier given how lucky I’ve been?’”

While we as lawyers, being supremely circumspect, would rarely verbalize this sort of “squishy” sentiment out in the open, given the levels of unhappiness in our profession, it is a question we should be asking ourselves. 

So here are some of the findings about "happiness," which has exploded as a subject of research over the last few years. Let’s start with the data on the current state of happiness in the US.

Recent surveys point to a relatively high “happiness quotient” these days:

·             86% of Americans are content with their jobs (General Social Survey)

·             76% are satisfied with their family income (Pew Research Center Survey)

·             62% expect their personal situation to get better over the next five years vs. only 7% who expect it to get worse

·             65% of Americans are satisfied over all with their own lives—one of the highest personal satisfaction rates in the world.

As the query of that Internet mega-millionaire illustrates, happiness is not correlated with financial resources or even political stability: countries like Nigeria, El Salvador, Columbia, Mexico and Puerto Rico (along with Switzerland, Denmark and Canada) register higher rates of happiness than the US in the World Values Survey. Other countries, such as Romania, Russia and other former Soviet countries, consistently score at the bottom.

This fairly rosy picture in the US becomes decidedly darker when we factor in the “happiness” data on lawyers:

·             Lawyers generally have one of the highest dissatisfaction rates with their work of all industries/professions, with 65% of young associates surveyed by the ABA last year intending to change professions within two years.

·             Lawyers also have the highest “personal distress” rates of any industry, exhibiting dramatically higher incidences of suicide, mental illness, divorce and substance abuse than other industries. 

Women lawyers seem particularly effected by these developments:

·             Fewer women are seeking law degrees: from 1963 through 2001 female enrollment at law schools climbed nearly every year, from 3.7% to a peak of over 50%; since 2002, however, the percentage of women in law schools has declined each year, currently down to 46%.

·             At a time of very high attorney turnover generally (over 20% leave their jobs every year), the highest drop-out-of-the-profession-entirely demographic is women.

·             In spite of many years of women in the "pipeline," only a small proportion of women stay to become partners in law firms (17%) or senior legal counsel in corporations (18%).

The message seems to be that, in spite of Americans' general glee, few lawyers are happy living the lawyer's life.

What Makes Us Happy?

As it turns out, over the last few years a wave of books on happiness, primarily written by academics, have been published. Among them are:

The Pursuit of Happiness, by David G. Myers

Happiness, The Nature and Nurture of Joy and Contentment by David Lykken

Happiness, A History by Darrin M. McMahon

Authentic Happiness by Martin Seligman

The Art of Happiness by the Dalai Lama and Dr. Howard C. Cutler

The Happiness Hypothesis by Jonathan Haidt

Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert

Happier: Learn the Secrets of Daily Joy and Lasting Fulfillment by Tal Ben Shahar

Most of these books are based on David Lykken's findings that there is an individual “set point” of happiness to which most people revert, regardless of their life circumstances—illness, financial concerns, family problems. Lottery winners and paraplegics, those both accepted and rejected as partners or general counsel, all on average return to their baseline levels of happiness within a year.

If health and other circumstances don't impact our happiness, what does? Jonathan Haidt compares our emotional life in The Happiness Hypothesis to a small, conscious monkey riding a large, unconscious elephant: in many ways we are estranged from the great bulk of our own inner feelings. The running commentary in our minds about what we feel and why is often simply wrong, he contends. For example, research subjects unknowingly hypnotized to react in a specific way to a cue quickly come up with rational, and in their mind truthful, “explanations” of why they acted that way, even though those explanations are causally entirely beside the point: their reaction was programmed in their unconscious by the hypnosis. 

Not only are we not able to access a great part of our inner feelings, evidently we are not very good at analyzing the happiness data that we do have access to. Daniel Gilbert in Stumbling on Happiness explains that we are very bad at remembering what made us happy in the past and in predicting what will make us happy in the future, often overestimating the bang we will get and how long it will last. For example, people often list children as a source of happiness, yet the data indicates that children in fact are "extremely negative," "mildly negative" or have no effect on overall happiness. (More about this later.)

Could We Be Happier?

Continue Reading...

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

What is the most important attribute to be looking for as you groom your young lawyers for management? 

A 2006 study reviewed in the Leadership and Organization Development Journal assessed the relationship between emotional intelligence and managerial effectiveness, confirming what you might expect.  A total of 38 supervisors (37 males and 1 female) and 1,258 subordinates from a large manufacturing organization participated. Data analysis found that the total MSCEIT score (an emotional intelligence assessment that I consider most reliable) displayed a strong positive correlation with supervisor ratings; that is, the more emotionally intelligent the supervisor, the more effective and productive s/he was rated by others in the organization.

First, I would point out that this study doesn't tell us whether these emotionally intelligent supervisors who were rated more effective actually were more effective than their lower EI colleagues.  All we know is that they were perceived to be more effective.  The implication being that even if those high EI supervisors weren't quite so great in the accomplishments department as advertised, their loyal team still saw them in the best possible light.

This distinction is particularly important in environments such as law firms and law departments, where dramatically high skepticism (averaging in the top 10% of the American population) creates hurdles that make it hard for managers to establish rapport and trust, much less garner appreciation for a job reasonably well done.  Second- and third-guessing is often standard procedure, regardless of how demonstrable  the accomplishment might be.  While emotionally intelligent managers may be in fact most effective, this and other studies demonstrate that they are in any event going to have the interpersonal skills to align legal staff and professionals on the same side.  Given the challenge of creating supportive cultures for growth and accomplishment in law organizations, identifying these kinds of leaders becomes imperative.

Two major subscores make up the MSCEIT total score.  In the study above, Experiential EI, which includes perceiving and using emotions, was found to be very highly correlated with high supervisor ratings, whereas the Reasoning EI subscore, which includes understanding and managing emotions, displayed no significant correlation.

Our study of emotional intelligence and lawyers (also using the MSCEIT) indicates that lawyers' scores in EI are generally a standard deviation below the general population (that is, 85 compared to 100).  In addition, lawyers score significantly lower on the Experiential subgroup than on the Reasoning one.  Their ability to "read" their own and others' emotions is notably low compared to the general population, and they also are not facile at "using" emotions, i.e., moving from a less appropriate emotion to a more appropriate one.  Their Reasoning scores are usually significantly higher than the Experiential ones, lawyers being evidently well-suited to logically analyze even the emotional realm.  The problem is that weakness in reading emotions creates a garbage-in, garbage-out result when that reasoning horsepower is applied to inaccurate information.  So lawyers often get blind-sided by what they hadn't originally correctly perceived .

This finding as to the importance of Experiential EI to effective management can be critical in the case of managing lawyers.  Not only should we be grooming our young lawyers to be emotionally intelligent managers, but we should also be specifically rewarding those who are expert at recognizing and using emotions, an item I would bet is not currently on any evaluation form.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

"We evaluate 'courage' as a behavioral characteristic of our lawyers, and we link this evaluation to compensation," says John P. Donahue, Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary of Rhodia Inc., in the July 2007 issue of InsideCounsel.   Rhodia has "embraced professional objectivity of its in-house lawyers as a core value" and Donahue wants to make sure that "our lawyers can deliver bad news to clients," with whom they are often closely aligned. 

Valuing Courage

Given the data we have about the strong tendency of lawyers to avoid rather than confront conflicts (yes, even those feisty litigators, oddly enough) (see my article "The Unique Psychological World of Lawyers"), Donahue's goal is one that can't be lauded enough.  Hospital administrators contend that a ratio of 1 conflict avoider in 4 employees results in a "dangerous workplace"--think:  "I don't want to get so&so in trouble over reusing needles" or "Maybe she'll start writing down dosages after she gets used to our procedures". 

Left to their own proclivities, lawyers' much higher rate of avoidance than hospital workers risks being just as dangerous.  Avoidance not only fails to resolve firm and client issues, but at the extreme, failure to report and confront violations of Sarbanes-Oxley, insider trading and discrimination laws, to name a few, can not only crater a career, but also a firm or a company.  Add in malpractice, fraud and the range of criminal possibilities (see, for example, Enron and other corporate demises and the unfolding saga of Milberg Weiss Bershad & Schulman) and silence should never be considered golden.

Hence Donahue's laudable efforts to support and promote courage.   

Which is where our thought for today could end.

Evaluating Courage

But Donahue goes further than suggesting putting in place environmental supports like "constantly talking" about maintaining objectivity, creating a culture that embraces bearers of bad news and rotating lawyers among client departments. He wants his lawyers' courage to be evaluated and then to compensate them accordingly.

Evaluating courage or any other personal characteristic as it relates to their work is a radical idea to many lawyers. Basing compensation on that evaluation is outlandish.  They don't know what a "behavioral characteristic" actually means, don't trust the evaluation process, and certainly don't think their compensation should be linked to so un-rigorous a process.  They are, after all, good lawyers, and good lawyers average in the top 10% on the characteristic "skepticism" in personality assessments (see again my article "The Unique Psychological World of Lawyers").

In this case, they should get over it.  Whether Donahue is using structured assessments or more unstructured evaluation techniques, these behavioral and personality evaluations are likely to be the key for law firms and law departments to break their recruitment and retention quandaries and, as icing on the cake, help solve the diversity dilemma.  (See my January 5, 2007 blog entry "KPMG Model Delivers Risk Management, Teamwork, Client Satisfaction and Diversity Too," reporting on KPMG's use of the Birkman Method assessment to revamp its business model and achieve retention and diversity goals.)

This is not a new position, at least for me.  (See my article "The Case for Assessment: Using Discrimination for Better Hiring," which outlines all the uses of assessments in the non-law firm world and how law firms might profit from them.)  And now the tipping point is in sight as more law departments and law firms inch towards greater use of evaluations and assessments-- and trumpet the benefits.

General Counsel Scott Terrillion, of Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals Inc, uses an "evaluative selection method" to find the best attorneys for his company, with diversity being a natural consequence.  Roland Dumas, director of diversity for the legal recruiting firm Major, Lindsey & Africa, points out that "if a law firm screens candidates based on what law school they went to and how well they did there, it won't achieve much diversity.  There simply are not enough African-American and Latino law students in the top law schools who would survive the 'top quarter' cut."  Instead, Dumas recommends "capabilities" interviews, which use rich conversations to probe candidates to find those who have the talents the firm values. 

Struggling to complete with bigger firms, Kansas City, Mo.-based Blackwell Sanders developed a system for selecting and assessing associates that is more behaviorally evaluative than most firms use, and it found that using these behavioral evaluations, starting with the initial interview, enabled the firm to spot talent it might otherwise miss. The firm has documented its efforts in a handbook, From Classes to Competencies, Lockstep To Levels, which, according to the foreword by Ida Abbott, is "an act of remarkable candor and leadership ... [that] will enable law firms to expedite the design and implementation of competency-based evaluations and performance-based advancement."

The proof, as they say, is in the pudding.  Blackwell Sanders doubled the total number of minority associates, tripled the number in recent incoming classes, and increased by 22% the number of females associates.  Perhaps even more notable, a "high" minority attrition rate declined to "0" within four years. 

Jeffrey N. Berman, managing partner at Berman Fink Van Horn, says that for the last 10 years his firm has taken an even more radical step--using individually administered psychological assessments as part of their hiring process. Determining assessment traits important to the firm has given the firm "a handle on the type of attorney that is going to be happy and successful here," Berman says.  

The firm tells all prospective hires, lawyers and staff, that they will be required to take a personality test if an offer is made.  Contrary to the fear of many hiring partners, Berman reports that no one has ever objected to the assessment or refused to proceed, in part, he believes, because everyone in the firm has participated and also because it has been so accurate in predicting success.   "It never ceases to amaze me how accurate the testing is," he adds, noting that it has never proved inaccurate with anyone they've hired, even when the results contravene the impression of interviewers.

So diversity is not the only benefit firms can expect from the targeted use of evaluations and assessments--law turnover and high satisfaction and performance result as well. 

Our firm offers law departments and law firms state-of-the-art advice on identifying the characteristics that produce happy, productive lawyers in your environment and designing evaluations and assessments to use in hiring and promoting those candidates.  Don't be left in the backwash.  This is a wave that can do much to move you forward.

 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

According to Steve Davis, it all went pretty smoothly and quickly: negotiations in July and August, a preliminary agreement the last week of August, votes last Wednesday, September 26, and on Monday of this week, he became chairman of Dewey & LeBoeuf, the newest megafirm in the global law firm firmament, with 1300 lawyers, 26 offices in 12 countries, and a billion dollars in revenue.

So what accounts for this dramatically better outcome, compared to the Dewey/Orrick debacle-in-the-making that first hit the press last year this time? 

For starters, Davis credits the two firms’ long-standing familiarity with each other. No East Coast/West Coast mystique to decipher and reconcile in this case: the two firms were only two floors apart at 140 Broadway for years and had dealt with each other on myriad matters. With good relationships long established, people at both firms, Davis contends, “quickly understood the underlying strategic rationale” for a combination. 

Davis also believes Dewey & LeBoeuf enjoys another advantage that other recent megamergers did not. Both Dewey and LeBoeuf had high concentrations of lawyers in the same key markets—New York, London and Washington D.C. That’s an advantage? The beauty of the Dewey/Orrick merger was thought to have been little overlap, promising to produce that far-flung “globalness” instantly. Overlap, Davis contends, works in the firm’s favor. Unlike the “Noah’s Ark” that some combinations are left with—two of everything, with 1 in LA and 1 in Boston--Dewey & LeBoeuf’s geography is more likely to force the people and cultures at each key location to mesh.

D&L's executive committee of 22 is composed of 11 partners from each firm, and includes Morton Pierce, Dewey’s Managing Partner, with Davis in the chairman’s seat. After the Dewey/Orrick talks failed, Pierce’s management style was the subject of some bruising commentary, with particular notice given to the fact that he billed 3300 hours that year. See our February 7, 2007 entry “Talking to the Troops.” 

So what will management at Dewey & LeBoeuf be like? Davis is often described as managing “like a CEO,” a role which, perhaps in a reflection on the famous independence of lawyers, one LeBoeuf partner characterized as an “elected dictator.” 

Continue Reading...

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

One of the requirements of the Sarbanes-Oxley rules for publicly traded companies is that they demonstrate that they are promoting an "ethical culture" in the workplace.  What does that mean?

"The Manager's Book of Decencies:  How Small Gestures Build Great Companies" by Steve Harrison, chairman of Woodcliff Lake, N.J.-based Lee Hecht Harrison, the employee outplacement arm of Adecco Human Capital Solutions, a division of Adecco SA of Glattbrugg, Switzerland, is an attempt to answer that question.

Mr. Harrison's contends that an ethical culture is the result of many small, and sometimes large, gestures made over a long period of time, with the driving force coming from the top.

"Being decent isn't about being nice... or spending more money-- it's about treating people fairly," Harrison claims. He also believes that good role models at the top have certain common traits. Those Harrison acknowledges as outstanding role models are Colgate-Palmolive Co. chairman Reuben Mark, Nucor Corp.'s former CEO Kenneth Iverson (who died in 2002), Campbell Soup Co. president and CEO Douglas R. Conant, Southwest Airlines Co. chairman Herbert Kelleher, and Dial Corp.'s former president and CEO, Herbert Baum. 

These five leaders exhibit what Harrison calls a high level of "moral intelligence," which is marked by humility and honesty during both good times and bad.

If employers can pay attention to the issues that matter to their employees, "like finding some kind of fulfillment in the job they come in to day after day...then they're on their way to creating a culture of decency which is critical to attracting, retaining and engaging employees."

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

As a woman, a lawyer and a consultant who specializes in emotional intelligence among arguably one of the most challenged professions of our species-- lawyers-- I cringe every time I see articles such as "Brilliant Women Last in Love," published August 18, 2007 in Australia's Herald Sun. The premise-- leave it to self-critical, self-effacing women to propagate it about their own kind-- is that lower long-term marriage statistics for women who are smart, well-educated and/or successful in their work are evidence that these women are more likely than other women to be emotionally deficient in some way.

Of course, demanding work, of whatever kind, can create stress for both genders, including vis-a-vis their partners and families. And so can over-reliance in personal relationships on any professional strength, no matter how valuable that strength may be professionally.  

In addition to those challenges, women have traditionally born the brunt of supporting families-- housework, food preparation, social connections, child and parent care, etc. So those women who also have demanding careers are often more challenged/stressed than their male counterparts, who are more likely to enjoy minimal expectations in these areas.  Compounded stress, as we all know, can wear down even the best of relationships.

However, there is no evidence that professional women are less likely to have good emotional skills than other women or than the men they are working with.  What the research is absolutely clear about, consistent for years, is that married men are the happiest in our population and married women are the LEAST HAPPY, with single women and single men, in that order, in between. 

Therefore, it is just as likely, and I believe probably more likely, that the statistics about smart, successful women and marriage reflect the fact that these women are smart enough to realize and acknowledge the unequal and unhappy role marriage often plays in their lives and are also empowered enough personally, and successful enough financially, to do something about it.  In the process they are likely to propel themselves up from last to second in the "happiness" stakes.

There is ABSOLUTELY NO REASON TO BELIEVE that the less smart, less educated, less successful women are glued to their marriages because they are so happy or so adept at relationship building. The female depression rate, highest among married women, should easily dispense that myth.  Nor is there reason to believe that professional men, less burdened by family obligations and often enjoying the career and personal support of their spouse, are any better equipped to deal with the kinds of stress that professional women cope with. 

I study emotional intelligence in both men and women, using the Myers Salovey Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test (MSCEIT), the only EI assessment that is abilities-based, i.e. does not rely on self-reports ("Why, yes, I am indeed emotionally intelligent.") but rather requires participants to react to scenarios.

The results of that assessment show very little difference (women enjoying a slightly higher average score) in emotional intelligence between the sexes--a result many women find surprising. There are a number of other assessments, however, that show clear gender differences, including the Myers Briggs Type Indicator, which reveals women to be much more likely to base their decisions on what is good for relationships than on logic. 

But emotional intelligence is in fact fairly gender neutral. If the theory of this and other stories is that leading with your head can negatively impact your personal life, it is a problem that bedevils both sexes-- brilliant men ever as likely as brilliant women.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments (1)
• Trackbacks

Behavioral science is not often invoked in the halls of law departments, but maybe it should be.  Two recent articles highlight the importance to a GC's success of understanding why people think and act as they do.

General counsel are in the position of having to reconcile two jobs: being both a business partner in the management of the company's business and the guardian of the company's integrity.  One aspect of their work requires creativity, risk-taking and far-sightedness.  The other requires careful scrutiny of every corporate action in the short and long term for potential regulatory, liability and just plain reputation pitfalls.  Achieving high productivity with high integrity might strain even Superman's talents.

An article in Corporate Counsel by Ben W. Heineman Jr, former GE senior vice president-general counsel, entitled "How GCs Can Avoid Being Caught in the Middle" recites some of the recent scandals that attest to how difficult that balancing act can be:  the fraudulent financial practices at Enron, the pretexting at Hewlett-Packard Corp, and the wave of options backdating.

Perhaps what chilled GCs to the bone most recently were the guilty pleas by Purdue Pharma L.P., its president, GC and former chief medical officer to misleading the public about the drug OxyContin's risk of addiction.  They have agreed to pay a total of $634.5 million in fines.  Rather than relaying focus group concern about potential for abuse, Purdue Pharma gave false information to its sales representatives that the drug was less addictive than other painkillers.

Heineman mentions a number of attributes that can help GCs successfully straddle their two roles.   Vis-a-vis the other corporate managers, the GC must have the ability to stand his/her ground on clear illegalities and to make sure he/she has enough time to assess those situations that are not clear cut.  And GCs must be able to take those stands in the pressure-filled environment of a board meeting where the CEO is likely to be a ferocious skeptic and many board members will side with the CEO.  See our July 18, 2007 entry on Promoting an Effective Board about the importance of personal attributes in good decision-making.

The Texas Lawyer article "It's All in Your Head:  Cognitive Theory Can Help GCs Lead Organizations to Better Decisions" by Michael Maslanka, a managing partner at Ford & Harrison in Dallas, contends that a GC's real power--the ability to influence decisions-- comes from understanding the way people think, which requires tapping into cognitive science.

Maslanka lists a number of biases that people in general and managers specifically can suffer from if they aren't on the alert: 

• The bias that there is only one cause when something bad happens
• The tendency to focus on conclusions and generalities instead of specifics
• Hardwiring that makes it easy to believe accusations and hard to disbelieve them
•  A confirmation bias, which only admits facts that support our beliefs (and further reinforces our belief bias)
• Overreliance on what is first heard
• Resistance to change that can only be overcome with practice, practice, practice

Maslanka encourages GCs to be open to all possibilities and to question rather than dictate.  Heineman also points out the importance of maintaining within the law department a culture that welcomes, even requires, lawyers to raise concerns about financial, legal, ethical or reputational issues.  We refer to this as a "culture of dissent"-- one that invites concerns, follows up on them and does not punish anyone for raising them, but rather praises them.  See our March 16, 2007 entry on the article Handling Conflict and Dissent in Law Practice (and Life).

While it may not be mind reading, being cognitively aware of your own personal attributes and biases, as well as others', can help steer you toward that Superman performance to which all GCs aspire.

 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments (1)
• Trackbacks

An article by Ronda Muir entitled "The Importance of Emotional Intelligence in Law Firm Partners" appears in the July/August 2007 issue of the ABA Law Practice Management Section's Law Practice Magazine. 

Among the attributes that emotionally intelligent partners bring are better judgment, higher productivity, enhanced business development skills and better client relationship management.  Most importantly, high emotional intelligence fuels the kind of leadership-- one which promotes collaboration and teamwork-- that is critical to excellence in the 21st Century, and that can provide firms with a competitive edge.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments (1)
• Trackbacks

Oddly enough, where it is most needed, Boards and other management groups may be the last frontier for achieving enhanced performance management. 

Historically, the perceived advantages of relying on a managing group, instead of one individual, include access to the group's collective wisdom –"several heads are better than one"–as well as the ability to spread an increasing management workload over a number of people. 

A recent Center for Creative Leadership study identified an additional advantage. Effective management these days requires the resources of several people, rather than the lone hero, in order to meet the global challenges of collaboratively connecting across boundaries of all kinds—geography, language, culture and expertise.

Avoiding "Extreme" Group Decision-Making

Yet there is a well-documented propensity for groups to drift toward "extreme" decisions, that is, a committee often makes a decision that none of the individual members of the committee, acting alone, would make. These group decisions can be extreme by being either extremely risky or extremely conservative, and you see lone Directors routinely disavowing their cohorts’ actions after the fact. There seem to be a number of reasons for this tendency:          

Diffusion of Responsibility. An individual's part in a group's decision evidently weighs less heavily on him/her than an individual decision would, the implication being that not as thorough an evaluation of the issues is made when the decision is attributed to the group.

Ignoring the Lone Voice. Often groups do not properly take into account the most relevant expertise in the room.   Most small groups tend to make decisions based on the information all members share about a topic, overlooking important facts that one or several people bring. Although management committees are usually looking for creative, out-of-the-box strategies, a solitary opinion is often taken lightly or ignored in the flow of debate within the group.

Social Pressure. The more bonded the group, the more committed they are likely to be to reaching a decision, particularly one that pleases most of the members, even if a decision should be delayed or a less pleasing one would in fact be best. 

Competition. When committee members agree on the parameters of an issue, individuals may try to one-up each other by suggesting more and more extreme solutions, then promoting their solution as the best.

Stress. Groups under pressure act very much like individuals under stress, only more so. They often procrastinate, calling for further information, or become committed to bad decisions primarily to protect themselves and each other against criticism. This effect may account for the popular notion that committees tend to "split the baby," resulting in a less controversial solution that does not in fact work very well.

Seeing What Others Say

The impact of psychological factors on group decision making may go even further, to actually alter each person’s perceptions. A study using advanced brain-scanning technology shows that, in effect, group members often in fact see what the group tells them they see. In an exercise involving mentally rotating images of three-dimensional objects to determine if the objects were the same or different, subjects were assured of an incorrect conclusion by confederates and then agreed with those wrong answers 41% of the time. The brain activity of those who went along with the group was markedly different from those who took independent positions. When subjects concurred with wrong answers, activity increased in the area of the brain devoted to spatial awareness, meaning that their actual perceptions were being influenced. Those who made independent judgments showed activity in the region of the brain associated with conflict management, signifying an emotional toll for going against the group's perception.

Based on the results of this study, one of the potential major advantages of a group decision—"several heads are better than one"—can disappear if the group successfully, even if unintentionally, co-opts individual insights. The most problematic aspect of these results is that not only does the group lose the "lone voices," but also the lone voices lose their very awareness of their differing perspectives. The change in their perception makes them incapable of raising their idiosyncratic flags.

Continue Reading...

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

Ronda Muir, Senior Consultant, led a two and a half day retreat at the end of May for UNICEF's 22-person Armenia office to help them better serve the country's children.  She was engaged to improve teamwork, communication and conflict resolution and to assist in the office's preparation for upcoming reviews and its transitioning to potential structural and policy changes. 

Through the use of individual and team MBTI work style reports, personal conflict style assessments, emotional intelligence tests and a confidential office-wide survey, Muir assisted the team in identifying personal and office strengths and challenges and in determining strategies for improved communication, conflict management and change management.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

Should lawyers “do the right thing” in addition to “being right”?  

A favorite cartoon depicts two lawyers at a desk evidently discussing strategy. One lawyer says to the other: “Is it right?… Is it fair?  Get a grip, Carlton—we’re a law firm!”

Integrity

In an interesting study issued recently, the Consortium for Research on Emotional Intelligence found that financial advisors who demonstrated high levels of “moral and emotional competency” nearly doubled the S&P 500 return on their client portfolios in the years 2001 through 2004, delivering an average return of 25%. 

Of the various attributes studied, integrity had the single strongest impact on client returns. “Results showed that Integrity was the key behavioral competency which predicted the most positive returns for clients." 

Integrity was defined as acting consistently with what one says is important, in other words “walking the talk.”  An example was an advisor willing to give up a lucrative client rather than compromise his/her principles, such as ultimately recommending that a client seek advice from another advisor because the advisor could not in good conscience implement a plan believed to put the client at significant financial risk.

Ethics

In the process of updating his 1996 book The Honest Hour: The Ethics of Time-Based Billing by Attorneys, William George Ross determined that lawyers in 2007 are significantly more likely than a decade ago to pad their bills with unnecessary hours or bill two clients for the same time. Almost 55% (up from 40%) of associates and partners surveyed report performing unnecessary work, and 35% (up from 23%) say they bill two clients for the same time. The number of lawyers who believe double billing is ethical also rose from 35% in 1996 to 48%, and more than two-thirds of lawyers say they have specific knowledge of bill-padding by others.   

Morals

In a May 2, 2007 Law.com article entitled “From Moral Partners to a Moral Firm”, Gregory S. Gallopoulos, the managing partner of Jenner & Block, suggests that the integrated enterprise model that many successful law firms are adopting now, in which strategy and vision belong to the entity as a whole rather than to individual partners, risks producing a vacuum in the area of firm morals. 

Continue Reading...

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

Ronda Muir, Senior Consultant, has been asked by UNICEF's Armenia office to lead a two and a half day retreat at the end of May to help improve teamwork, communication and conflict resolution. Through the use of individual and team MBTI reports and emotional intelligence assessments, Muir will help the team identify personal and office strengths and challenges and determine strategies for improved communication and conflict management in order to better serve the country's children.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

In connection with the 129th annual International Tradmark Association meeting in Chicago, Ronda Muir, Senior Consultant, presented a program on Wednesday, May 2, at Robin Rolfe Resource's Women's Power Breakfast for seventy senior corporate and law firm women in intellectual property.   Her presentation focused on what makes lawyers, and women lawyers, different from other professions and how to use those differences to make good lawyers better.  This year INTA welcomed over 8,500 registrants from around the world.

 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

Give yourself the advantages that insights from sophisticated behavioral science tools and informed collaboration can produce.  Out of ideas for how to motivate your team?  Can't take another day with a difficult boss or colleague?  Strung out from too many committments and not enough time?  Looking for a meaningful way to both practice law and live your life?

Achieve improvements in your professional and personal life, including progress in leadership and management skills, work/life balance, conflict management, business development and time and resources management. 

Our experienced lawyer coaches use their expertise and assessments to give you the tools to maximize your strengths, raise your emotional intelligence and social IQ, as well as benefit your bottom-line results.  You choose the program that best suits your needs and schedule.

For further information, contact RMuir@RobinRolfeResources.com. 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

Ronda Muir, Esq., Senior Consultant at Robin Rolfe Resources, was featured as a speaker at a conference on Risk Management for the Modern Law Firm, sponsored by ARK Group. The conference was held in Chicago on April 17 and 18, 2007. 

Muir's presentation was on the risks that arise in managing a law firm's greatest asset: its people. She pointed out the ways in which lawyers are different from all other professionals, the challenges and risks that those differences pose to management, and how to use those differences to make good lawyers better. 

Participants raved:

• "Innovative, new information!"
• "Excellent, new material of real value.  I would love even more detail and time on this topic."
• "Great presentation!" 
• "Great speaker!  Knowledgeable and forward thinking."

ARK Group also lauded Muir's participation: "Your involvement was pivotal to the success of the program… and brought a fresh perspective to the agenda."  

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

See Muir's article for guidelines on making your law practice (and life) more innovative, creative and collegial.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

Firms of Endearment: How World-Class Companies Profit from Passion and Purpose
by Rajendra Sisodia, David Wolfe and Jagdish N. Sheth contends that companies with more emotionally intelligent employees have stronger bottom line performance than those who don't.  David Wolfe can be a controversial adviser, and some have suggested that being recognized as a good corporate citizen should be sufficient reward for conscientious organizations, without having to convince themselves that both their individual psyches are above par and that their bottom line improves as well.

Regardless of the sniping, the underlying research makes the FoE claims believable.  High EI clearly hits the bottom line. Ninety percent of top individual performers across industries have high EI whereas only 20% of low performers do. Those who raise their EI are roughly 25% more productive than before.   Insurance agents who score high on EI sell twice as much in policy premiums as agents who score lower. Managers at American Express Financial Advisors who complete a training program focusing on one's own and others' emotional reactions achieve significantly higher rates of growth in funds under management than their untrained peers.

Plus, data suggests that employees who are emotionally intelligent are more likely to access and profit from feedback, helping them achieve more over time.

So the logic of companies who have more emotionally intelligent employees out-performing their lower EI brethren (and sisters) certainly makes sense.

The application to law firms and law departments, where checking one's emotions at the door is standard procedure, is obvious-- more emotional intelligence--whether hired, trained, or promoted-- will not only improve culture but produce bottom-line results.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments (2)
• Trackbacks

Carol S. Dweck, a Stanford University psychology professor, is the author of the recently published "Mindset: The New Psychology of Success," which documents how people with a "growth" mind-set who believe they can improve themselves out-perform those with a "fixed" mind-set who believe their capabilities are fixed.  "The growth mind-set person recognizes that you're not good at something before you're good at it," Dweck points out. 

In one instance, Dweck found that when people experience a blow to their self-esteem, those in a fixed mindset repair their self-image by trying to feel that they are better than others, which n a business setting might take the form of blaming or taking things out on a colleague. Those in a growth mindset recover their self-esteem by trying to improve themselves and correct their deficiencies.

While it's gratifying to see the impact of personal belief documented so clearly, parts of this thesis are hardly new-- optimists outperform pessimists across all industries and job descriptions (except in law), in part simply because they believe they are capable of effecting change.  And the success that this sense of empowerment generates in any arena leads to the expectation of and achievement of success in others.  Optimists are also more resilient--understanding that specific setbacks are just that, and not a referendum on their personal worth, which makes them more likely to persevere.

Which brings us to lawyers, the least optimistic of any career, for whom Dr. Seligman has documented that pessimism is in fact a career enhancer, and who consistently score low on resilience.  For lawyers, the new psychology of success begins with systematically training themselves to confine their pessimism to their legal analysis and to bolster their resilience and optimism in the rest of their lives, including management.

In any event, Dweck's overall assertion that rigid thinking benefits no one, least of all yourself, and that a change of mind is always possible, is welcome.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments (1)
• Trackbacks

A recent study conducted by the Center for Creative Leadership found that effective leadership has changed over the last five years. Eighty-four percent (84%) of those polled said leaders today are valued for collaboration skills, such as building and mending relationships, rather than solitary heroics, the standard five years ago. Specifically important is being able to "enhance co-worker relationships." This change is due, according to those surveyed, to the more far-flung demands of leadership, which often go beyond an individual's capability, creating a need to work interdependently with others across boundaries—geographic, language, cultural, and expertise.

Law firm and law departments would do well to take note of this study-- "leader" is often a designation born out of unrelated circumstances-- a lawyer has extra time, was good at revenue production so will maybe be good at this too, or is simply senior, none of which relates to his or her ability to build a collaborative organization that supports individuals and teams. 

In a recent interview, Daniel Goleman, author of Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More than IQ and more recently Social Intelligence, commented on the error many make in choosing leadership:  "Too many organizations are rather naive about the ingredients of leadership and make the classic mistake of assuming that someone who is an outstanding individual contributor would therefore be an outstanding leader. If they're an outstanding individual contributor, keep them as an individual contributor. Give them a raise," he says emphatically.

This study brings that point home in spades.

 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching summarizes its two-year study of the North American legal education system by concluding that "law school provides the beginning, not the full development, of students' professional competence and identity.  At present, what most students get as a beginning is insufficient."

The report recommends "a dynamic curriculum that moves [students] back and forth between understanding and enactment, experience and analysis," integrating traditional classes with clinical approaches to legal education.  Yale Law School, City University of New York School of Law and NYU were recognized for having balanced curricula.

Given the recent changes in a number of law schools' curricula, one commentator asked whether this "problem" wasn't already on its way to being solved.  Others asked why the Foundation had not addressed the perennial questions of improved ethics and relationship training and whether law school could be shortened to two years.

In an essay in the January 8, 2007 edition of the National Law Journal, Stephen J. Friedman, dean of Pace University School of Law, and formerly commissioner of the SEC, general counsel of The Equitable and E.F. Hutton, and co-chairman of the corporate department at Debevoise & Plimpton, finds law graduates to be "ill-equipped to be effective beginning lawyers" and wants curriculum at law schools to be "more purposeful, more focused and more integrated."  He notes that rising legal fees discourage over-the-shoulder training and rising salaries push young lawyers towards early specialization in order to be more productive.  He advocates a third year of broad and interrelated training that heps students learn how to function, as well as think, like lawyers.

Shortening law school to two years would produce a larger number of graduates to feed the maws of Wall Street and perhaps reduce tensions in the retention wars.  But more "personal relations" and "client management" types of course targeted to raising the emotional intelligence and relationship skills of law graduates would be the most direct and dramatic route to both increased attorney productivity and increased attorney and client satisfaction. 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

In a study conducted last fall of managing partners, general counsel, and other legal leaders, Altman Weil identified five key market trends and critical concerns.  It noted that people management was one of the highest priorities on everyone's list, with one partner saying that he goes to sleep "never knowing who might be leaving tomorrow."  The limited pool of quality law graduates, the "free-agent mentality" of lawyers from new associates to rainmakers, Gen-Xers emphasizing work-life balance and achieving diversity were all cited as challenges to people management by this august group. 

To my mind, the other four critical areas identified-- growth, competition, client service and even pricing-- are also each dependent on achieving effective people management.  Growth requires wrestling with "cultural, office and practice integration," competition is felt most dramatically in the "war for talent," with quality people, superior client service skills and strong training and development programs giving firms the competitive edge.   Client service requires superior communication and relationship, among other, skills, and "improved project staffing." (See our entry today on KPMG's success with their staffing model.)  Even pricing is acknowledged as a function of the quality of a firm's work and service-- which general counsel have consistently linked to people skills.  (See our entries Do You Know Why You Were Fired? dated November 8, 2005 and Companies Unhappy with Their Law Firms dated December 20, 2006.)

So why do law firms and law departments not take advantage of the extensive body of expertise available on hiring, retaining, developing and motivating people?  Maybe, as David Maister has suggested, it is the herd instinct that keeps them from going for the glory-- rather go down as a group than risk a "new-fangled" approach.  Interestingly enough, that is what our psychological profiles of lawyers tell us-- that they are risk-averse, often low in resilience, optimism, and emotional intelligence, all of which has helped mire them in an 18th-century business model. 

Here's the question-- which firms will be the real leaders, the ones who actually take the out-of-the-legal-box steps toward addressing these critical people management areas?  Because there seems to be a consensus that that is the only effective way forward.

 

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

While Emotional Intelligence has become a popular buzzword, the researchers on whose work Daniel Goleman based his bestselling Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ, only formulated an assessment to test EI in 2002. Called the MSCEIT (Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test), it is the only EI assessment based on abilities instead of self-reports, i.e., it gauges your actual EI performance instead of asking how good you are at EI. 

Does it make any difference whether a lawyer is emotionally intelligent or not? To determine whether there is a correlation between emotional intelligence and excellence in lawyering, we undertook a study. 

We began with lawyers listed in The Best Lawyers in America as our "excellent" lawyers. Those willing to participate were given the MSCEIT and follow-up feed-back free of charge. 

Our participating lawyers practice across the country: Seattle, San Francisco, Chicago, Houston, Columbia, SC and New York. Their firms range from a small, 15 lawyer boutique to regional powerhouses to global behemoths. And the results are interesting.

• This group of excellent lawyers performed 20% higher on average than lawyers generally.
• This group's highest score was in Understanding Emotions, the most cerebral of the four branches of EI, and the branch that most lawyers perform best in.
• Also like most lawyers, this group's lowest score was in the Perceiving Emotions branch. Although notably higher than the average lawyer score in this area, even excellent lawyers barely score the national average.
• Excellent lawyers score significantly higher than lawyers generally on the sub-branch Managing Emotional Relationships. 

While these excellent lawyers, like lawyers in general, are better at analyzing emotions than recognizing them, they are operating on a higher EI plane than their colleagues. The excellent lawyers' significantly higher average total results and significantly higher ability to manage emotional relationships may account for at least a part of their excellence: they are generally more emotionally intelligent and they are better in relationships with clients and colleagues.

Stay tuned for some of the (non-identifying) specifics on the best performing individuals.

CALL TO BEST LAWYERS TO PARTICIPATE

While we have a good start, we want even more results to produce a more reliable study. We invite any lawyers now listed in The Best Lawyers in America to take the MSCEIT—a 40-minute confidential on-line survey-- at our expense. We will provide you with individual feed-back, a written report, and the opportunity to have your firm identified as high performing.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments (2)
• Trackbacks

In April 1955, Dean of Harvard Law School Erwin Griswold noted, "Many lawyers never seem to understand they’re dealing with people and not solely with impersonal law” -- a comment that unfortunately continues to ring true today, when the legal profession’s reputation suffers from an image characterized by a lack of interpersonal sensibilities. 

One of the first law school courses in the nation to apply human relations training to law was taught by Professor Howard Sacks at Northwestern Law School during the 1957-58 school year. The two-week course, entitled "Professional Relations," was offered without credit. Professor Sacks appealed to other law teachers to join in his experiment, both by offering stand-alone courses and integrating human relations training into the regular law curriculum. But a law review article written by Harvard Law Professor Alan Stone in 1971 noted that "law schools . . . have largely ignored the responsibility of teaching interviewing, counseling, negotiating, and other human relations skills." 

Legal academics continue to take the position that lawyers must learn to be more effective interpersonally. As Vanderbilt University Law Professor Chris Guthrie summarizes it, "Lawyers are analytically oriented, [and] emotionally and interpersonally underdeveloped."

It’s more than just a matter of being “nice.” Our survey of Emotional Intelligence and Excellence in Lawyering shows lawyers who are listed in Best Lawyers in America score significantly higher in emotional intelligence than the average lawyer. There’s excellence in that intelligence.

To participate in our study, see our entry “Emotional Intelligence and Excellence in Lawyering” under the topic Emotional Intelligence.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks