Insight: A New Post-Pandemic Leadership

David Gutierrez

Law firms need to prepare for the new form of leadership that emerged post-pandemic. 

The pandemic caused a disruptive change in business. A couple of years of working from home gave many employees respite and time to consider their career paths, priorities and life goals.

Many decided they wanted to live without the pressure of working confined to small spaces for many hours of the day. Some questioned the need to carry out their work in a cubicle when they could do it from home. The time wasted in a car, commuting to and from the office, suddenly emerged as an important issue when deciding about one´s professional life. 

Others questioned the need to spend all day in the office, with a likely imbalance between family, personal, and home life. Many associates sought other jobs or became self-employed entrepreneurs.

For law firm leaders, these issues are introducing a new leadership paradigm.  Today more than ever, these leaders must recognize a new reality of both the industry and the aspirations of their employees. They must be visionary, willing to change, and take risks.

I would like to make a few comments about this new form of leadership in law firms. Not all of them are new, but they are more relevant now than ever before.

Collaboration: If anything became apparent during the pandemic, it was the interdependence of different groups of specialists in the same law firm. We went from thinking in silos to thinking in terms of integration. 

Today, more than ever, leaders must ensure that employees work collaboratively. This is more than working as a team: it requires understanding that the growth of the firm’s platform is key for all collaborators as individual members. The collective takes precedence over the individual. Success depends on multifaceted groups, not soloists. 

Talent: To achieve smart collaboration, it is critical for law firms to recruit the best people. The ability to recruit, interview and hire quality people is an art, not a science.

Relying on the expertise of professionals who advise on who to hire and who to avoid is key.

It requires leaders who are distinguished not only by their professional and personal qualities, but also by their ability to organize and use talented teams.

Attracting talent is key. Recruiting and hiring the best and most appropriate people is essential to the firm. 

Authenticity: During the pandemic we all participated in videoconferences in t-shirts and, in many cases, even in our pajamas! Fictitious forms lost their relevance.

The new form of leadership must be authentic. It is actions, not ties, titles or positions, that make a leader inspiring.

An authentic leader must celebrate diversity, for it is from such diversity in discussion that the best new ideas emerge. He or she must be clear, acknowledge mistakes, recognize the best, and share knowledge and experience. He/She should not be afraid to be vulnerable.

Self-criticism: Leaders of post-pandemic law firms should ask themselves some basic questions: How do you want others to perceive you as a leader? How should you change your behaviour to show your readiness for leadership? What do you need to do to succeed with your current leadership opportunities? What do your superiors expect from you? How do you want people on your team to describe you? What do you need to achieve in the short and medium term?

It is very important to know how to ask questions, to know how to listen, to learn to receive feedback (even negative feedback...) and to have the clarity, the team and the ability to implement changes on the issues that are generating resentment in their team.

Versatility: The pandemic created a crisis for companies around the world. It killed nearly 5 million people and negatively impacted more than 500 million, including, of course, employees of corporations around the world.

Leaders must be prepared to handle crises, from stock market crashes to natural disasters, and even unthinkable tragedies. Capable leaders must be ready to take control, remain calm, and assist and reassure their employees to provide stability in difficult times.

Vision: Law firm leaders must be able to see a better future. They have a sense of what should and could be, as well as what is. Business leaders of yesteryear focused on supervision and monitored their staff for obedience and compliance. Modern, enlightened leaders focus on trust and intuition, not supervision.

Leaders are called upon to establish efficient work arrangements that suit the majority of their employees. For example, in the past, work flexibility didn’t matter that much. But today it is a new priority. In these fast-moving times, modern leaders must be true agents of change and be thoughtful and transparent while keeping an objective of transcendence. 

Someone once said that "working is so ugly, that we even get paid to do it". Times have changed, and law firms must become more attractive to retain employees. Their competition is no longer just other law firms, but the legal departments of their own clients.

They must figure out how to retain top talent. They must develop ways to recruit promising new employees.

In any case, firms can only go as far as their leaders do.

David Gutierrez
BLP LEGAL
June 29, 2023

blplegal.com