Innovation — You’re doing that too, huh?

By Steve Gluckman –

There’s been a lot of discussion in law firms recently around the increasing urgency to innovate.  If you’ve been in the industry for more than a few minutes, you know that firms are facing increasing competition and are looking to improve efficiency, while at the same time, facing the challenge of ensuring that the firm’s talent is equipped with the right knowledge, tools, and insights to deliver exceptional service at a moment’s notice.  A great new book on Innovating Talent Management, planned and edited by Terri Mottershead and published by NALP, was released this past week, addressing a variety of compelling ideas for – as the name implies – innovating in the area of talent management and professional development.  (Full disclosure: my business partner and I authored one of the chapters.  Hope you like it.)

Beyond the ideas expressed in that book, my team and I have had a lot of discussions in the past few months with some of the greatest minds in legal PD to explore some of the current challenges and what, if anything, we might be able to do to help.

What we are seeing is that some (though not all) PD directors across the industry are facing budgets that are getting tighter and tighter; at the same time clients’ – and thus, the firms’ – expectations for the knowledge and capabilities of the workforce are increasing.  There is a consistent theme of being asked to create more value and more knowledge in the firm, but without an increase in budget.  We’ve observed that while they are working at different firms, with different cultures, and different styles, approaches, or business models, it is remarkable how much they are facing the same issues and even designing courses on the exact same topics!  They are assessing the skillsets most in need, developing curricula, planning and coordinating training, scratching their heads in frustration when after a lot of planning and coordination, a sizable portion of the training audience for a live program doesn’t show.  The result:  a lot of time is invested and costs incurred, but less-than-anticipated benefits are realized by the firm, skillsets are not improved, knowledge is not shared, expertise is not expanded.

Now if you’ve ever talked with me for more than 10 seconds, you know that I am constantly encouraging firms to move toward (among other things) bite-size on-demand learning resources that can be accessed at any time and from anywhere, increasing the total population that can ultimately avail themselves of the learning opportunity.  I’m encouraged by the level of adoption I’m seeing and the benefits firms are realizing.  However, in the many discussions I have with firms every day about the work they are doing and how best to get their learning content into this on-demand format, my observation is still that PD groups in firms across the U.S. and around the world are engaged in remarkably similar activities.  I’ve seen that, as a firm in New York is strategizing on how to better train their newest lawyers on understanding fundamental business concepts, for example, another in San Francisco is engaged in the exact same planning and discussion.

The conclusion:  There is a lot of duplication of effort.  There’s got to be a better way.

I think as an industry we should be working together to…

…identify the issues that PD groups across multiple firms are facing in order to identify common themes and centralize problem-solving,

…better identify the skillsets that most need to be developed in our lawyers and staff, and

… design, develop, and deliver training and learning resources in a way that gets the right message out across the firm in a more economical way that also opens PD groups to spend their time and budgets on higher-value-add activities.

I’m sure this concept is not new, but it is something I am passionate about and will continue to explore and work on – and even throw some technology at.  Wanna help?

Blog Author

Steve Gluckman is the Founder of Law Firm E-learning, LLC. He is also the author of the ABA and Amazon.com best-selling book, “E-Learning for Law Firms” (published by the American Bar Association) and has advised scores of AmLaw 200 firms regarding their online learning efforts.