legal sanity

As a professional service provider, I eagerly consume anecdotes and observations about the breeding or destruction of customer loyalty. I like to consider the topic from different angles - marketing, leadership, business development, design and more - because I think they all play into the superior service delivery mix. One aspect of client service that's come up again and again in my experience and readings is the importance of owning our mistakes and missteps. I've posted about this before, commenting that it's easy for lawyers to "get lulled into a place of complacency where we quickly excuse our business mistakes without reflecting on them or seizing the opportunity they offer for positive change and growth." The connection between honest appraisal of professional services and the power of mea culpa is nicely underscored in this recent post from Kevin O'Keefe of LexBlog. In it, Kevin candidly reflects on the state of his growing business and admits: "Despite our goal to [sic] having our clients be raving fans [ ], there's been times when LexBlog has sucked." Pledging his commitment to do better by his clients in 2006, he concludes: "Yes, there may be times when LexBlog service sucks in the coming year. But we're still going to be relentless in our efforts to be great." As a long-time LexBlog client (I believe this blog was one of its first efforts) I can attest to Kevin's ongoing candor about his business strengths and weaknesses. And his pledge - plus its real-world translation - is what keeps me a loyal LexBlog evangelist.

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A while back, I wrote about Kevin Carroll, a creative idea catalyst who writes and speaks about the connection between play and an enriching work life. At the time, I had just picked up his inspiring book, Rules of the Red Rubber Ball: Find and Sustain Your Life's Work. Since then, I've thought a lot about Carroll's message and how it's played out as I've re-designed my career to engage my passion for helping others achieve success and satisfaction in the law. If you'd like to sample his ideas and philosophy, the good folks at 800-CEO-Read recently interviewed Carroll via a podcast you can access here. I think he makes some cogent points that are very relevant to our everyday dealings in the legal profession.

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I opened the month with this post discussing Dick Richards' book on connecting with our genius to foster success and satisfaction in business and beyond. With the holiday season and New Year upon us, it's a great time to contemplate how lawyering honors, translates and transmits our genius in the world. This post from the Self-Development Network offers some assistance on this front. It links to an interesting podcast in which Richards previews his approach and provides tips on decoding, or "naming," our genius and expressing it in the workplace. For another perspective on the road to meaningful and fulfilling work, take a look at this Alchemy of Soulful Work post entitled You Get What You Give. In it, Chris Bailey discusses what might happen if we stopped focusing on quid pro quo and ROI and, instead, shared our knowledge and expertise with others freely, fully and without expectation of return. I wish you all a wonderful holiday time and a very happy New Year.

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As lawyers, we need to be deft communicators. Whether we're in front of a fact finder, client or other business associate, we survive and thrive on our ability to get our message across to people. In this post, blogger Kathy Sierra discusses the anatomy of memorable communication. Specifically, she explains, our brains more readily "convert a memory from short-term to long-term storage" when the message we're receiving evokes our emotions or passions. Sierra cautions, however, that certain emotions work against memory retention because they make us feel uncomfortable or inept. Among the memory-averse emotions are stress, anxiety and worry. Unfortunately, these often are the very emotions elicited by the typical lawyer communiqué. But, we're not without recourse here. According to Sierra, we can boost our message and its memorability factor by linking (or infusing) it with "things the brain finds interesting," like beauty, story, surprise, music or humor.

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I've previously posted on the alleged work ethic divide between seasoned lawyers and newcomers to the profession. The topic is again put on the table via this article from CareerJournal.com; this thoughtful post by Chris Bailey at the Alchemy of Soulful Work and this one from Kathy Sierra at Creating Passionate Users. Because they consider it from different angles, the three commenters afford us a well-rounded view of the issue. Notably, despite their different vantage points, they all suggest that the emergent generation gap derives as much from the demise of the "job-for-life" world as it does from the rise of a collective view of "work as secondary" to a meaningful life lived "outside the office."

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About a year ago, I read and really enjoyed David Maister's book, The Trusted Advisor. So, I was happy to see Gerry Riskin's recent post linking to Maister's article Do You Really Want Relationships? In that piece, Maister details the differences between business transactions and business relationships, positing that most professionals (read lawyers) embrace the latter approach to client interaction. In transaction-based affiliations, the professional acts as an expert by taking the reins from the client and declaring: "Leave this to me, I'll get you the result you want." The expert wants "the client to cede authority to the warrior to do battle as she or he sees fit." This stands in sharp contrast to the relationship-minded advisor who strives to add "guidance, input, and counseling to the client's own thought and decision-making processes. The client retains control and responsibility at all times; the advisor's role is subordinate to this, not that of a prime mover." Maister acknowledges the strong draw of the transaction, particularly for the many professionals who "find comfort in the rational, the logical, or the analytical." But, he says, most clients would "prefer to hire a true advisor if they could find someone skilled in taking that approach." He also asserts that, ultimately, transactions "are not in the best long-term interests of either professional or client." Maister then suggests ways to transition from client transactions to client relationships. However the transition is made, he concludes, we must "put the client's interest first and keep the faith that this relationship-building act will be repaid through future reciprocity." Maister makes many great points. Echoing his message is this post from Jim Calloway citing The Ten Commandments of Good Client Relationships (pdf).

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This post from John Moore of Brand Autopsy discusses the business application of the Broken Windows Theory. As noted in this commentary and this one, it's a theory of community demise holding that "disorder in urban neighborhoods leads people to be disorderly." Metaphorically speaking, if you don't fix broken windows quickly, people will get the message that nobody cares and more vandalism and decay will follow. In his new book, Michael Levine applies this theory to the business world, opining that companies should place a premium on identifying and quickly repairing their broken windows - those aspects of their operation that signal an indifference to consumer satisfaction and that ward off customers. Given the escalating levels of client discontent and defection it's experiencing today, the legal profession would also benefit from employing this theory within its ranks. The attorney-client relationship window is broken. The question remains: How do we fix it? This is a topic I've addressed before here, here, here and here (to give you a sampling). As this article by blogger Ed Poll suggests, the window's disrepair results from a system-wide breakdown. And the fix requires a collaborative and comprehensive approach that starts in law school and continues in our law firms and professional organizations.

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I'll be offline for a bit as my sister, Debbie, is getting married this weekend. Debbie, who has a JD-MBA from New York University, is someone I admire a lot for her ability to follow her passion while sharing compassion with others. A few years ago, she left the long-familiar terrain of New York City and relocated to Colorado, where she knew only a couple of people. There, she stepped off the corporate track, became a yoga instructor, met her fiancée and (among other ventures) started a non-profit that aims to introduce yoga to disadvantaged kids. Just the ramblings of a proud sibling on the eve of a special day, you say. Well, maybe. But I also share this personal anecdote as a way of highlighting the nexus between our life's work, the passion with which we pursue it and our capacity for compassion. I've previously discussed the spokes of this network here, here and here. Over at his blog, a clear eye, Tom Asacker adds to the discussion with a great post built around a question he's pondered for a while: "Which attribute [is] more important to success in business: passion or compassion?" The question's answer came to Tom as he wandered the floors of Cleveland's Rock & Roll Hall of Fame: "Passion and compassion are simply opposite sides of a successful business coin. It works like this: when communicating one-to-many, passion rules! When communicating one-to-one, compassion rules! This rule applies to everything from advertising, selling, PR, speeches, customer service, employee communication, negotiation, etc." I think it's a terrific answer for all of us trying to build our skills, success and satisfaction in the law or any other vocation.

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In this post and this one, I noted that lawyers can probably learn a lot from current discourse about the deterioration of typical doctor-patient relationships. Entering the conversation is this New York Times article chronicling the prevalence of "problem doctors" in today's medical profession. Acknowledging that there have always been arrogant, rude or dismissive practitioners, the piece observes that their number is increasing "as doctors get involved in medical systems that prioritize speed and technology." To counter this trend, some medical groups are starting to use patient surveys to assess and guide their doctors. The upswing in this kind of monitoring comes as "health maintenance and preferred provider groups [ ] are starting to pay doctors according to their performance." When a doctor receives low survey scores, remedial actions may include courses, counseling or training sessions designed to help them "learn to listen to patients and treat them with dignity and respect." These doctors also benefit from learning "simple ways to let patients tell their stories and to show empathy by responding to a patient's emotionally charged comments." Given that client dissatisfaction and defection are so prevalent today, law firms should consider sampling surveys and corrective measures like those used to foster positive doctor-patient relationships.

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In this post, Larry Bodine offers a "scientific" answer to a key question: Should law firms spend time and money trying to teach business development skills to lawyers who "don't do any business development"? The proffered answer, by way of organizational psychologist Neil T. Witmer, is "No." According to Witmer, some lawyers simply "lack the essential personality elements [read - drive and confidence] to develop new business." Absent their innate draw to rainmaking, it's better to leave these practitioners "in the library or their offices, where they belong. No amount of coaching, training or individual business planning will ever work for them." If your mouth is agape with a big "wow," here's a fine rebuttal from Gerry Riskin of Amazing Firms Amazing Practices. Challenging Witmer's understanding "of lawyers, law firms or the legal profession," Riskin opines that encouragement and training can work wonders for many reluctant rainmakers. To this end, he states: "Almost all lawyers [ ] can be trained to dramatically improve their client-relations skills from Meeting Prospective Clients, Managing Client Expectations to Dealing with Complaints and Getting more Referrals (and much more)." The commentary rounds out with a Bodine/Witmer reply to Riskin and this thoughtful input from The Greatest American Lawyer blog. I've always looked at business development skills as synonymous with relationship-building skills. Networking is, in essence, about genuinely connecting with other people to foster valuable personal and professional relationships. It can be done anytime and anywhere we encounter other human beings. I think this message, and the skill set needed to apply it in the world, is something that all lawyers would benefit from learning on the firm's dime. Even if the firm's investment does not translate into new business via every lawyer taught, there's still a significant ROI in terms of a decided boost in the lawyer's ability to relate to others in the firm and beyond.

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This ThirdAge blog post from Lisa Haneberg pairs nicely with my recent musings on "reorienting our career compass towards more meaningful and fulfilling work." Lisa introduces us to Dick Richards new book, Is Your Genius at Work? According to her synopsis, Richards theorizes that we each have a genius, one genius, that's been with us our whole life. That genius - which is what it is, not what we wish it to be - is the root of success and satisfaction in our work. His book aims to help us identify and engage our genius for career and larger life fulfillment. Lisa continues her review in this companion post. Outlining Richards' peeling-the-onion approach to recognizing genius, she quotes his book as follows: "Imagine an onion in which the outer layers represent your skills, talents, behavior, accomplishments, interests, and creations. You have developed the talents and skills you most enjoy because they allow expression of your genius. They are the means by which your genius comes alive." I know many lawyers come to a critical point in their career when they question whether the work they're doing really syncs up with who they are - with their heart-felt talents and interests. This book seems to offer some great guidance on answering this very important question. For more on this subject, you can follow the comment threads following Lisa's posts. Per Lisa, you might also want to check out Richards' blog, Come Gather Round.

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