What do you do if you’re the three firms who finished at the very
bottom of the annual American Lawyer‘s rankings for associate
satisfaction?
That’s what The Wall Street Journal is reporting
on today,
and while it’s not my practice—indeed, I intentionally avoid
it 98% of the time—to cite pieces in the WSJ (on
the theory that you’ve all seen the piece already, or shortly will)—this
one begs for a brief gloss, if only to comment upon how breathtakingly
obvious are the measures these firms are taking.
The firms, all New York-based, I am quite proud to say, are Curtis,
Mallet-Prevost, Colt & Mosle (dead last), Cahill (second to last)
and Proskauer (third to last). What’s the gripe? Essentially,
it’s all about communication: The lack thereof.
One
Cahill associate reports (in the
original piece in The American
Lawyer) that his mentor "just yells at me" when giving
quote-unquote feedback. At Howrey, one offers up this: “Learn
to communicate. It is easier to hack into the CIA computer network
than to learn about executive committee decisions that affect everyone.” At
Proskauer, associates learned about two highly material developments—the
opening of a Boston office and the acquisition of litigation boutique
Solomon Zauderer—in the press! (You cannot make this
stuff up.) Another Proskauer associate reports that she
came to her annual review prepared to discuss specific, scarcely
radical, suggestions for how she could improve her skills (more involvement
in depositions, e.g.) and the partner dismissed it all as something
she shouldn’t trouble herself with "at your level." It
was, she reports, "like talking to dead air."
Now, to the firms’ reactions: What’s remarkable is how simple it
is to avoid landing in this particular uncomfortable corner, and
how the moves the firms are making to address the problem are so
elementary they barely qualify as Management 101:
- Cahill Gordon told its associates what the American
Lawyer numbers on revenue were likely to show before
the piece was published. - Proskauer held “town-hall” meetings
where associates could ask questions of management, and began
putting associates in the loop about the firm’s finances
and strategy. - Curtis, Mallet initiated
quarterly meetings with associates, and invited associate participation
on a handful of firm committees.
Essentially, the firms vowed to behave as though associates (a)
had opinions (b) which were worth listening to. Not a
bad start, when you consider that, as Roger Meltzer, chair of
Cahill’s hiring committee, puts it: “Whether they’re mid-level or
senior associates, they’re the next partners of the firm.”
