With all the attention we pay to strategy, globalization, M&A
and consolidation, practice group and knowledge management, and
other issues in firm management on the more or less empyrean plane,
it’s time for a word about associates.
For starters, associates constitute the future of your firm—and
preposterous as it may seem, we almost all have been or will be
associates, hopefully for several productive years. So it’s
time for a little mercy, blended with tough love, for associates.
What’s wrong with associates and what do they need most? What’s
"wrong" is simply everything they don’t know—which
time alone will cure eventually, but which a nourishing diet of
professional development can accelerate greatly. And it’s
in all our selfish interests to boost associates up the learning
curve as fast as intellectually and humanly possible.
I
will take to my grave the memory of an assignment to draft a set
of interrogatories the first dewy-eyed week I reported to work
at a large New York law firm, since merged out of existence but
utterly representative of the breed at the time: When I delivered
them with great trepidation, bordering on cold sweat, to the assigning
partner, he spent no more than 15 seconds perusing them before
blurting out, "These read like you’d never written an interrogatory
before in your life!" "Well, yes sir, that would be
true." And it continued to be sink or swim on those
same non-negotiable terms. The enduring conviction that this
eminent and prestigious firm seemed about to embrace, with relish,
the project of reducing a highly trained and expensive professional
to a quivering recluse remains with me today—and strongly
motivates this small essay on the economic insanity of that archaic
behavior.
As Exhibit 1 we have a National Law Journal piece on
career-building
101, which reminds us that however effectively law school teaches
the skills of researching, writing, and advocacy, it teaches nothing
of the soft skills of business development or managing one’s own
time, caseload, and practice. The first few years of associate-hood,
of course, necessarily and correctly focus on developing the purely
professional skills (being able to draft interrogatories, e.g.). But
for associates who end up being more valuable to their firms and
more satisfied professionally, it’s none too soon to start thinking
about, and training for, future life as a partner—with all
of the project management and client development skills that will
need to kick in.
On this score, the advice of the piece is inarguable, if elementary:
- find the practice area you’re at home in;
- have a plan; where do you want to be in 3 years or 5?;
- if at all possible, find a mentor;
- understand the firm’s expectations; and
- get feedback.
Far meatier and insightful is an article I stumbled
across from
July 2002 pointing out the existence, and the consequences, of
a deplorable gap in law school education: The all but complete
absence of courses on law firms as businesses.* This leaves
associates starting out utterly in the dark about the fundamental
dynamics that drive what they cost and what they’re worth to their
firms. Note that we’re not talking about weighty strategic
choices, the long-term impact of market positioning, the dilemmas
facing mid-tier full-service firms, or any other advanced management
issues: We’re talking about billing, realization rates, the
relative profitability of different practice areas, and other "low-hanging
fruit."
To recur to my own experience, I had no clue at what point the
firm might "break even" on me (and the firm, as you might expect,
would have been the last to tell me).
Ignorance can lead associates into an attitude of entitlement—always
an endearing trait to partners!—because they are simply clueless
about how the money behind their salary check is generated. Associates
with at least a modicum of savvy about the business realities of
a firm are far less likely to fall into that trap.
Why are there virtually no such courses? This is an example
of microeconomics trumping macroeconomics, as it were. (I’m
somewhat contorting these terms, but bear with me.) From
the "macro" perspective, the profession would be far better off,
immediately and at very little cost, if law school graduates had
been exposed to Firm Economics 101. On this I hope all readers
of "Adam Smith, Esq." can agree.
But from the "micro" perspective of law school faculty or deans
designing curricula, firm economics is an orphan: It isn’t
"academic," in the conventional sense; it doesn’t have anything
to do with training one to "think like a lawyer," it bears no connection
to either substantive or procedural law; and it’s a safe generalization
to say that personality types attracted to the career of law professor
don’t think like businesspeople or economists.
If such a course would benefit, in very concrete terms, the buyers
of law schools’ output—read: law
firms—couldn’t a mutually beneficial deal be struck to get
such courses up and running? Both Adam Smith and Ronald Coase
know the answer: Of course; it would be trivial.
*I’m only aware of two in the country: One I’ve heard of
at the University
of North Carolina but know little about, and
one at Indiana
University School of Law/Bloomington, where I had the privilege
of guest-lecturing last fall.
Update: (4:30 pm) I have only my
own traitorous memory to blame for omitting this course since I
know Prof. Karl Lutz who teaches it, but the University of Michigan
Law School (Ann Arbor) offers "Law
Firms & Legal Careers."
Separately, I learned from a 3L at the University of Washington
School of Law of "Practical
& Professional Responsibility in the Small or Solo Law
Practice," which includes the novel requirement that students
finish the semester by presenting a business plan. And, to
the anonymous 3L who tipped me off to this: Many many thanks
both for the heads-up and for your kind words about "Adam Smith,
Esq." ("your site continues to be a voice in the darkness").
Lastly, Matt Homann has also picked
up the thread.
Any other courses out there? Let me know!
Update 2: (15 Sept., 11:15 am)
"Van L." writes from Brigham
Young University (emphasis
supplied):
"Just FYI: I am currently taking a course called “Law
Practice Management” at BYU.
The course description is as follows:
‘This course is designed to introduce law students to issues that arise
in the private practice of law. The
underlying thesis is that a law office is a business, and that success
in private practice is as much a function
of effective management as it is a function of mastering substantive
legal knowledge….’"
Couldn’t have said it better myself.
"N.O. Stockmeyer" writes from the Thomas
M. Cooley Law School (Lansing, MI):
"Our school offers this course: ‘LAW OFFICE
MANAGEMENT: Analyzes problems related to the management of
private law firms. Emphasizes legal economics, organization, billing,
business systems, client counseling, and opening a new practice.’"
Thanks, Prof. Stockmeyer.
Can we tempt any more examples out of the woodwork?
Update 3: (15 Sept., 5:05 pm)
Professor William Henderson of Indiana University School of Law/Bloomington,
who teaches the course I cited above, writes:
"David
Wilkins at Harvard, Karl Lutz at Michigan, Rick Abel at UCLA,
and John Steele at Boalt/Stanford/Santa Clara address some of
these issues in the context of Professional Responsibility, often
forgoing discussions of the Rules in favor of current realities
of the profession. Jack Heinz at Northwestern also recently added
a course called the Transformation of the Legal Profession, which
focuses on empirical trends in the legal profession (especially
the rise of the large law firm) since the 1970s. Michael Trotter
of Kilpatrick Stockton in Atlanta used to teach a course at Emory
entitled the Transformation of the Legal Profession, which was
based on this excellent 1997 book, Profit & the Practice of Law:
What’s Happened to the Legal Profession. Also, Elizabeth Chambliss, who formerly served as research director of the Program on the Legal Profession at Harvard Law School, teaches a course called Law Firms at New York Law School.
It is noteworthy that these courses emanate from two perspectives: Trotter,
Steele, and Lutz are all adjuncts who are current or former partners
at Am Law 200 law firms. In other words, they can speak from
experience. Abel, Conley (at UNC), Wilkins, Heinz, Chambliss and I are all
empiricists committed to studying the legal profession.
That said, I am glad for the opportunity to teach a course that focuses
purely on the economic and business issues. There is more than
enough material to fill a course, and it is highly relevant to
the 70+% of our students who will be employed by law firms."
Thank you, Bill. The observation I find particularly trenchant
is Bill’s implied explanation of what motivated these people to
launch the courses they have: They are either current or
former AmLaw 200 partners, or "empiricists." Not,
in other words, archetypal law professors. Duly noted.
