Law Firm Management:
Why the Diversity and Gender Equity “Best Practices Guide” Makes Good Management Sense
By Michael J. Ford

In my last column I advanced the proposition that the practice, the profession, and the business of law were interrelated parts of the legal profession.

In this column I would like to shine a spotlight on an exciting new “best practices” guide that promotes the inclusion and advancement of all attorneys, including members of protected classes recognized by law, within law firms. 

Unfortunately, this June 2008 guide has the potentially misleading title of “Diversity and Gender Equity in the Legal Profession:  Best Practices Guide.”1

I say “misleading” because this guide provides common sense law firm management principles that can, and should, be applied across the board, without regard to gender or diversity, by all law firms.

The guide contains excellent advice and recommendations in all areas of law firm management, but this column focuses on one in particular: “Provide viable flexible workday programs, including alternative work schedules, telecommuting, job sharing, and retirement phasing.  Provide needed technology.”  Let me tell you a story illustrating the value of this recommendation.

As with most of my good stories it focuses on the law firm where I have spent almost 30 years. 

Quite a few years ago we had an attorney who was an excellent motion and appellate practice attorney.  He had only one flaw—he was a working golf pro. 

This attorney’s unwillingness to commit heart and soul to our practice would, for most firms, have been the kiss of death for any working relationship.  However, our golf pro attorney was so extraordinary that we made an exception to the general rule and worked with him to give him the time he needed to ply his trade as a golf pro and then to come inside and work with us when the snow flew.2 

Along the way the law firm learned to deal with remote access to the office through computers and to support attorneys who weren’t “in the office” every workday. 

Fast forward a few years and we had attorneys who chose to reduce their time in the office to raise their children.  Now that we had had experience accommodating our golf pro attorney it was easier to accept the fact that the world would not end if we accommodated other attorneys, even shareholders, with reduced work schedules. 

The years advanced and we began to have attorneys ready to transition in to retirement, but not yet ready to call it a day completely.  Given our golf pro and parent experience we were able to fashion and accept work agreements that have allowed our older attorneys to approach retirement gradually and not on an all-or-nothing basis.  In the process we learned that the need for and value of flexible work schedules is gender-blind. Flexible schedules can make employees happier, productive, and less distracted.

These three examples illustrate for me how the principles in the “Diversity and Gender Equity in the Legal Profession: Best Practices Guide” just make sense as good management.  If I could, I would rename the guide to “Best Practices Guide for Humans.”

I have often felt that the only “rule” we need to manage a law firm is the golden rule.3  However, until the happy day when we can follow that rule, the “Diversity and Gender Equity in the Legal Profession: Best Practices Guide” may be the next best thing.

I encourage you to study the complete document, available at the Web site of the MSBA’s Diversity Implementation Task Force and at http://BestPractices.
notlong.com. 

The principles in this guide may earn a law firm kudos for enlightened law firm management.

I submit that, if followed, the principles in this guide will make your law firm stronger and more profitable.

Promoting “Best Practices”

Diversity and gender equity recommendations from the “Best Practices” Guide are the focus of a new Diversity Best Practices Outreach Task Force approved by the MSBA Assembly September 19. That new task force will:

• Increase the Guide’s visibility within the legal community;
• Promote use of the Guide by legal employers and the integration of “best practices”;
• Develop materials based on the Guide for CLEs and for use by legal employers;
• Secure commitments from legal employers to use the Guide and share feedback;
• Help develop a long-term structure for the MSBA to pursue its multiple diversity efforts.

Notes
1 The Guide provides best practices with respect to recruiting, developing, and retaining attorneys regardless of their gender, race or ethnicity, religion, disabilities, or sexual orientation or gender identity. 
2 Thankfully, Minnesota’s snow season is longer than its golf season. 
3 Do unto others, as you would have them do unto you.

MICHAEL J. FORD is president of the Minnesota State Bar Association. A shareholder in the law firm of Quinlivan & Hughes, PA, St. Cloud, Minnesota, he is a graduate of St. John’s University and received his JD from the William Mitchell College of Law. He concentrates his practice in the areas of civil litigation, insurance coverage, employment and government liability, and land use and general casualty law.