My friends Jim and Sheila love dogs. They used to share their residence with a rescue dog named Henry. Dragons live forever, but not so little dogs. So when Henry got sick and his demise was imminent, Jim built a coffin for Henry so that it would be ready when needed to carry Henry to his final resting place in the woods.
While Jim was building his coffin, Henry would see him working on it. After it was finished, Henry could see the coffin, just sitting there and waiting for him.
“Micromanagement is like cutting grass with scissors; it’s tedious, ineffective, and a waste of time.”
~ Lisa McLeod, author and keynote speaker
My wife’s name is Maureen. I love Maureen more than I love life itself. I also annoy her a fair bit. One of the things that I do to annoy her is clean the kitchen frequently. So frequently, in fact, that she has accused me numerous times of cleaning stuff up before she has finished with it.
“It is an ill wind that blows no good.”
~ John Heywood
I recently wrote what I thought was a rather nifty article about the ills in the legal profession, and concluded, as I often do, that many of them can be traced to a culture of greed in Big Law. I got that part past my editors without a problem.
Those of you who have read my stuff before may have seen my article titled, “Beyond Pizza and Yoga: Let’s Get Serious About Mental Health for Lawyers,” in which I advanced the theory that billable hour expectations, a dearth of mentoring, cultures of disrespect, and lack of transparency around career paths, all contribute to the mental health crisis in the profession.
Back a long time ago when I had a modicum of influence in a law firm, I used to include a sentence in every offer letter to associates to the effect that we expected our lawyers to be part of the solution to issues that they encountered at the firm, not part the problem. This was a contractual obligation to come forward to management to address issues that they might have, and to help us to resolve them. They were not supposed to just whine about whatever issues they encountered.
“Lead, follow, or get out of the way” is an expression which some attribute to Thomas Payne. Tommy died in 1809, so this is hardly a new turn of speech.
And yet, back in my law firm (and I suspect in many others), there were partners who never came to terms with it.
I recently wrote an article titled “Hate Everything or Risk the Consequences,” in which I lamented that law firms restrict the social medial activity of their lawyers. But then I spoke to Tony Albrecht, who knows a lot about this stuff and I now realize that I understated the problem.
A holocaust survivor who I know once asked me, “who says you are supposed to be happy?”
I would have to guess that at the law firm where I toiled for 34 years, some people like what I write on LinkedIn, and some do not. The reason that I have to guess, is that with the very occasional exception of one Associate, none of them ever react or comment. Now you might think that the flaw in my logic is the underlying assumption that they are reading my stuff, but the LinkedIn analytics tell me that a good number of them do.
It’s Not a Principle Until it Costs You Money
~ Bill Bernbach
We have all been reading about the law firm of Paul Weiss having settled with the Trump Administration to get out from under an Executive Order, the legality of which is to say the least, questionable.
Some say that Paul Weiss buckled under instead of defending the rule of law. Their Managing Partner said that they were facing an existential crisis and that they took reasonable steps to survive and protect their clients. He also mentioned that their peers in the legal industry offered little support, and in fact targeted their clients.