Page 31 - Social Media Musings

Social Media Musings – Part III My Reflections on the Practice and Life
while not ignoring or downplaying others’ concerns and fears. Listen to those concerns and fears and respond to them as best as you can. We’re in this together.
If you’re a firm leader, think of firms that have the best reputation in your areas of practice, and study their websites for clues as to how they do it.
As a law firm leader, make encouragement a habit.
Associates at firms are looking for partners to invest in, care for and listen to them. If firms don’t care for their associates, why should the associates care for their firms?
If you interview candidates, consider the following question:
- What activities have you persisted with in your life long after the initial excitement and energy was gone?
You’re looking for candidates who persevere.
If what matters to your team members doesn’t matter to you, don’t expect that what matters to you matters to them.
If you don’t know what motivates and inspires the individual members of your team, any attempts to lead them will fall short.
I’ve been practicing 23 years, 22 at the same firm, and until recently, I’ve always had have an associate-sized office. Your firm wants
to save money? When your lease is up, downsize the square feet. No one needs a large office. With remote work, some may consider sharing offices. Consider reducing your real estate footprint.
Some of your lawyers are going to want
to discuss recent events at work. Create a safe, open environment so these important
discussions can be held.
Each person is responding to and dealing with this new reality differently. As firm leaders, we must meet our team where they’re at psychologically, mentally and emotionally and help them, as we help ourselves, through this.
For firm leaders who aren’t paying attention to the stress of your team during this pandemic, appreciate that ignoring others’ stress doesn’t make it go away and it will manifest itself in your firm and in your firm’s operations.
If you’re a law firm or voluntary bar association, understand that for the foreseeable future, all CLE, training and education will be online. Create and push out content.
Expect the acceleration of reliance on online CLE in light of travel restrictions. Expect
this transition from live to virtual CLE to be permanent.
Set aside one half hour once or twice a week, early in the morning, to leave detailed voice mail messages on others work voice mails to check in on them during these challenging times. Hearing a familiar voice asking how they are means a lot.
Being a diverse lawyer, and having spoken with many diverse young lawyers, one of the reasons diverse lawyers leave firms
is that those in positions of power at
their firms don’t understand them, their backgrounds, their paradigms, and this lack of understanding causes some diverse lawyers to seek other firms that do a better job getting to know them, understanding them and communicating with them.
©2021 Federation of Defense & Corporate Counsel
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