legal sanity

The most recent installment of ABAJournal.com's Above the Trees relates how Chicago’s 911 call center is designed to combat the enormous stress that comes with the job of dispatching emergency services. To foster calm and comfort, the call center floor boasts dimmed lights, circulated fresh air, adjustable work stations and a temperature setting that’s “a touch higher than normal.” Bringing the outdoors in, the floor also features “an expansive atrium flooded with natural light and filled with cushy couches and thriving plants.” The designers equipped this area with tables “stacked with magazines and games, letting staffers lose themselves in narrative or find community over a game board.” Augmenting the on-site offerings are a gym, stress reduction clinics and a city-sponsored “assistance program that includes professional counseling.” Above the Trees “looks at leaders and industries outside the law” to help lawyers better understand and navigate their own business operations, client interactions and work-life challenges. Law firm managers should heed this article's message. We’re a profession plagued by stress, attrition and discontent. And, as I’ve shared before, there’s a definite nexus between workplace environment and worker happiness and productivity. Employee physical and emotional comfort should be an integral part, and a priority, of law firm design.