An attorney's employees are deeply interested in their organization's plans for the future. Internal communication among all concerned is essential to create a unified group who understands the organization's objectives (both marketing and otherwise). The benefits are high morale and loyalty toward those objectives. Internal informational meetings, training programs, and newsletters play a critical role in this.
Effective employee communication is two way-downward from top management to other professionals and support employees, and upward from employees and staff to the senior partners.
Current research shows that employees in all types of organizations report that they now get most of their useful information about their organizations from the "grapevine," but say they prefer getting it from their super visors, meetings with management, and publications. Research conducted by firms involved in human resources and employee communications consistently points out the same needs in this area. Employees of every kind of organization — from a major manufacturer to a smaller retailer — respond similarly to survey questions.
Several other items of note from recent research on attorney/staff communications:
- Most employees (attorneys and staff alike) feel that they neither receive nor have the opportunity to send a great deal of information.
- Their primary need is for information related to their jobs.
- Employees generally enjoy good communication relationships with their immediate supervisors and co-workers.
Effective employee communication is involved in all four phases of employment:
- The start, in which recruitment, advertising, interviews, orientation pamphlets, and meetings are used to attract, select, and indoctrinate new employees
- The work, during which many face-to-face and printed communications provide instruction, news, and job-related information
- The rewards and recognition, involving announcements, publicity, and special events concerning compensation, promotions, benefit programs, special events, and awards
- The termination or work interruption, whether caused by mergers, lay offs, elimination of positions, or dismissals of individuals
Employees are remarkably consistent in identifying the kinds of information they want to know.
Effective Methods of Internal Communication
A tried-and-true, and effective, method of employee communications is meetings designed to include all employees. Some are designed only for attorneys, some for other professional staff, and some for support staff. Except for specific and confidential case matters, attorneys are encouraged to inform associates, other professionals, paralegals, and administrative and clerical staff-in short, everyone in the firm-about issues affecting the firm and the people who work there. Secretaries and very junior people will find the information of interest and long-range value to them.
Firm-wide Meetings
Firm-wide meetings should be held on a quarterly basis. Meetings provide a simple way to communicate consistently throughout the firm information on policy decisions, significant news, developments, and new business successes. In addition, the quarterly meetings would demonstrate to everyone in the firm the importance of all levels of employment-from the senior partner to the newest law clerk. Increased cooperation will be the result. The meeting should be conducted by the most senior active partner in the firm, demonstrating that the information is "straight from the top" and is important to senior management. The atmosphere for the meetings should be casual, although the attorneys will want to have notes and, in some cases, prepared remarks. Questions and answers should be encouraged.
It is important to schedule the meetings at a time and place where all attorneys and others can attend. Larger firms may need to schedule more than one meeting-7 a.m., 11:30 a.m., and 4:30 p.m. seem to be good times to catch busy attorneys but accommodate the clerical staff too. Two-way communication should be encouraged at the meetings.
Department-wide Meetings
For larger firms, additional meetings on the department or section level are important. These are more frequent than the firm-wide meetings, probably once a month. But like the firm meetings, the department gatherings are forums to encourage two-way communication and to inform everyone of the department's approach to new business, with specific activities described if appropriate. Recent successes in developing business contacts can be shared, and all staff can be encouraged to exchange ideas on prospective business. Colleagues can be updated on new business prospects, and departmental goals can be set. Information can be shared.
Several departments prefer to have their meetings during breakfast or lunch-sort of a brown-bag environment. To keep the meetings short and to the point, clear agendas should be established. Some firms have brought in "guest speakers" to these meetings for short (10-15 minutes) information presentations on current issues.
All-Department Meetings
To improve communication between departments, monthly meetings should be held with partner and associate representation from each section. Not every person in each department attends these meetings (then it would be a firm-wide meeting!), but partners should attend every time, and associates* attendance might be rotated to keep them informed as appropriate. Again, a strict agenda but allowing for interchange and feedback is important.
Formal New Employee Orientation Program
Each attorney and organization around them has its own culture. New attorney and employee orientation is always required to ensure they embrace the overall goals and objectives of the organization.
The approach to "new employee training" will vary tremendously de pending on the size and practice area of the firm. In larger firms, most employees are immediately trained in their specific job by a supervisor or another attorney. It usually works well that when a small number of new employees have been hired (usually fewer than five), these employees set aside a half-day for an orientation to the firm as a whole-meetings with the senior partners, discussions of the firm's history, goals and objectives, attitudes toward business development, client services, new practice areas, and so on.
Candid projections into the future are of tremendous interest to employees because, since it affects them directly, all employees find this kind of information to be of great interest. Turnover of nonprofessional staff can be a real problem in law firms. Usually, employees who quit will do so for reasons other than money or working conditions. It generally will relate to issues such as respect, attitude of fellow employees, and feeling of contribution to the organization. Employee communication programs can help to overcome these problems by creating a "we" feeling, especially among the clerical employees. Turnover can be reduced by efforts to ensure employee involvement in the firm, often by simple measures such as informing them of upcoming events and providing them with an opportunity to ask questions,
Any attorney office of two people or more needs a policy manual covering topics ranging from client confidences to dress codes. This manual should be distributed and gone over in detail. Other information of value is a style manual so that secretaries or anyone preparing their own written materials will confirm to the styles preferred by the whole firm, as well as to ensure quality and consistency in the firm's all written correspondence. Any sort of printed information about the firm-brochures, narratives on areas of emphasis, and key attorney biographies, should also be distributed.
Administrative Personnel Meetings
If most law firms did a survey of internal staff, they would probably be surprised at what they learned. Issues like communication, job appraisals, new staff recruitment, and work loads will often be raised by the administrative staff. The degree of interest apparent will determine the level of attention these issues require. At administrative personnel meetings, these is sues and others should be discussed. Frequent topics involve such things as the efficiencies of new equipment, training programs, new policies, and other items. Any of these could be causing a loss of productivity at the clerical level that management may never know if they didn't ask.
The office manager or chief administrative officer should meet with the staff once a month to discuss issues of importance to them. These meetings are not as formal as department- or firm-wide meetings, and the agenda is mostly set by the participants. If the staff is not accustomed to open communication and candor among all employees (staff and attorneys alike), then the first few meetings may need direction from the office manager to encourage discussion. But experience has shown that as soon as secretaries and others are encouraged to speak up, they will.
Employee Newsletters
Frequent communication to employees is best in face-to-face situations, such as the meetings described. To supplement this effort, a regular communication vehicle has tremendous value for internal audiences. An internal news letter is desirable for attorneys in firms of 15 total personnel or more.
