Russell Long (1918—2003) was a US Senator from Louisiana for nearly 40 years (1948—1987) and chairman of the Senate Finance Committee for nearly half that period. As such, he was an expert on the US tax code and, legend has it, observed that the realities of politics meant any effort to enact “tax reform” could be summarized as, “Don’t tax thee, don’t tax me, tax that guy behind the tree.”
This brings us to the issue of accountability in law firms.
Lawyers seem to love accountability in theory—the plaintiffs’ bar would cease to exist without the principle—but hate it in practice, certainly when applied to them. There are many reasons for this peculiar to lawyers, above and beyond the intrinsic human aversion to being called to account on general principles, but two of the most salient seem to me to be:
- Lawyers’ all-consuming desire to be their own autonomous beings, masters of all they survey, including their matters, practices, their clients, and their role within the firm; and
- Our profoundly disagreeable, but uncanny, knack for hair-splitting distinctions which, when invoked in self-defense, attempt to deflect blame aimed at us on the flimsiest of pretexts.
If you believe that all’s right with the world under this state of affairs, you may stop reading now. But if you work in a firm of any size whatsoever—I’m tempted to say anything larger than a solo practice without an associate or paralegal—this is not the optimal way to behave.
Before going any further, let me stipulate that I’m talking about accountability for the business and economic performance of the firm: Not about trial strategy, deal structure, or creative exercises in interpreting the Internal Revenue Code. As one of our favorite managing partners says, “You’re entitled to your own witness list and theory of damages; you are not entitled to your own time-keeping or client billing habits.”
Now, I read a lot of management literature, and the frequency of strong articles on accountability appearing can be measured on a quarterly or semiannual basis, but I have a nominee: A “ten best of the year” column from PwC Strategy& Inc.’s strategy + business, “The Accountability Equation.”
It begins with an all too familiar scenario: Something has gone systemically wrong in a high-visibility context, public or private, and the question is who’s to blame? The person at the top? The person who did, or omitted to do, the act at issue? Someone who made a flawed risk/reward calculation? The “system?” And almost invariably, of course, the CEO or other top dog is brought into it: The CEO must[/should] have known! The CEO couldn’t possibly have known! Regardless, the CEO can set things straight!
Then we can descend into second-order issues: Were red flags ignored? (By whom?) If there was a bad actor, who we can identify with hindsight, why couldn’t they have been identified with foresight? Was the bad guy ID’d ahead of time and warned without effect? Not warned? (Which is worse?) Did “the system” invite people to behave badly? Who designed the system that way? And on and on…
At that point, of course, the only reality that matters is that it’s too late. The purpose of “accountability” in a living, breathing organization should be to help you avoid this tar pit to begin with.
Coincidentally or otherwise, the article starts by referencing the now 15-year-old Trusted Advisor, by David Maister, Charles Green, and Robert Galford, which lays out a framework of: [Credibility + Reliability + Intimacy (the ability to build open, positive relationships)] ÷ Self-Orientation = Trustworthiness.
As an arithmetic tautology, high scores on the three elements in the numerator and a low score on the element in the denominator will yield a high trustworthiness quotient (and vice versa—it is a tautology, after all).
Our author updates this equation to produce his own:
[(Personal accountability) + (Mutual accountability) + (System accountability)] * (Mission orientation) = Accountability quotient
We all know what personal accountability is: Fulfilling responsibilities on time; confessing mistakes openly and without defensiveness; keeping one’s promises. A good thing.
Mutual accountability is a bit more subtle, but amounts to organizations and the individuals within them enunciating clear standards and holding everyone to them. This is the bedrock of a “high performing organization,” on which I will have more to say in a separate piece. In the simplest terms, it means each member of the team can count on the others to do what they’re supposed to do, when they’re supposed to do it, to the best of their ability. If the analogy of military platoons comes to mind, you’ve got the right model.
System accountability stands for the host of externally-driven processes, safeguards, and checks designed to ensure individuals and organizations are actually answerable for what they’ve done. Financial audits by independent third parties are one example, as are the media, regulatory regimes, and industry self-governing bodies and standards—yes, even outside compliance audits by $1,000-an-hour law firms!
So personal, mutual, and system accountability should all reinforce each other in a fairly intuitive way.
But what about that denominator, “mission orientation?”
It serves a couple of disciplining roles: To begin with, people can lose sight of their mission if they’re caught up in the weeds of checklists and tick-boxes designed to enforce a (faux and actually constraining) view of accountability as something akin to paint-by-numbers. Second, it should remind everyone to keep focused forward and be aspirational: This is about serving the ultimate raison d’etre of the enterprise, which had better be client service.
Invoking “accountability” should never provide cover for finger-pointing, blame-shifting, or office politics by other means. Without explicitly incorporating this denominator, that becomes more of a risk.
To make all this a little more concrete, even dramatic, here’s an example. Suppose partners who lobbied for hiring a particular lateral were held accountable for the lateral’s performance in the first three years (say) after he/she joined?
And by “accountable” I mean in dollars and cents terms: Compensation.
I’m confident most of you know all too well how facile it is for partners—they needn’t even be practice group or office leaders—to become infatuated with that shiny new potential lateral and begin a campaign to persuade management that if only so-and-so could be persuaded to join their team, performance would enjoy a healthy boost.
And, as is true in all but the tiniest minority of firms, should the lateral be recruited, usually with what economists drily call great “transaction costs,” and flame out, the lateral’s patron saint(s) will proceed about their business as if nothing had happened. It’s not that accountability will be diluted; accountability was never invited to play a role in overseeing this transaction to begin with.
Here’s the net result: The entire firm suffers from the wasted expense, distracted energy, futile motion, and general demoralizing effect of a bum lateral hire. The sponsoring partner suffers too, of course, but only pro rata with the rest of the firm.
Now imagine the opposite outcome: The lateral exceeds all expectations, boosting the office/practice area’s business, reputation, and esteem among clients and within the firm. The sponsor will, with some fair degree of justification, expect to be rewarded, tangibly (compensation) and intangibly (recognition and respect).
You don’t need me to point out the asymmetry of this exercise from the standard law firm playbook.
I’m here to tell you it (a) makes no sense; (b) is fundamentally unfair; and (c) exposes management as laughably hypocritical the next time they might try to invoke “accountability.”
But, it will inevitably be protested, how can we expect the sponsor to have any impact on the lateral’s performance? That’s what’s totally unfair!
I differ.
Here are the ways a variety of behaviors will change under an Accountability-for-Laterals Regime:
- Sponsors will be far more discriminating in targeting, vetting, and recommending laterals to begin with. The admissions office, if you will, will abruptly adopt higher standards.
- Should the lateral actually come on board, the sponsor will dive in energetically to helping integrate them into the firm: Introducing them to partners and associates left and right, steering suitable matters their way, sharing clients who could benefit from the lateral’s skills, and so forth. Contrast that with the usual HR and IT briefing followed by “see you at the holiday party.” (This is a small example of what incentives can do to affect behavior.)
- Finally, whether the lateral succeeds or fails, the resulting spoils/expenses will be allocated within the firm much more fairly and equitably. Rather than the sponsor sharing pari passu with the rest of the partnership in the lateral’s addition to or subtraction from the firm’s performance, the sponsor will enjoy disproportionate benefit (the lateral was their idea, after all) or suffer disproportionate penalty (same). If this doesn’t pass the fundamental test of fairness, might I ask what else does in this situation?
With a moment’s thought, I’m highly confident you could come up with a list of half a dozen other areas where an Accountability Regime could be invoked—with teeth.
In the meantime, please feel free to try the Lateral Accountability Regime at home.
