A Northwest Law Firm That’s Run Like Southwest Air
. . Larry Bodine recently wondered what would happen if a law firm were run like Southwest Airlines. Neither he nor I thought we’d ever see such an animal. Evan Schaeffer also scoffed at the notion. Today, I learned that a 30-attorney San Francisco law firm, Rogers Joseph O’Donnell & Phillips, might have already achieved SWA status in its work environment. The firm was honored recently with a Psychologically Healthy Workplace Award by the American Psychological Association. According to an article in Washington Lawyer that stresses the great need for lawyers to reduce workplace stress (”from the President: A Healthy Workplace is a Wealthy Workplace,” by Shirley Ann Higuchi, Feb. 2004):
“The firm has adopted two strategies: making the organizational structure less hierarchical and allowing employees to have a say in the nature of their work environment. Hence secretaries don’t just receive job evaluations; they design their own performance reviews and can evaluate the attorneys as well. New hires are required to introduce themselves to all of the firm’s employees, and all employees are expected to have an open-door policy to foster frequent and open communication.
“Town hall meetings are a regular occurrence, and employees are encouraged to communicate in an honest and open fashion. Employees know that although there is no guarantee their ideas or concerns will always be accepted, their thoughts will at least be heard, evaluated promptly, and responded to fully.
”When the firm first adopted these strategies, it was hoping that by treating its employees well it would lead to their treating the firm’s clients well, and such treatment was important for business. The measures have paid off: morale, productivity, and client satisfaction are at an all-time high.”
Higuchi, the DC Bar President, notes that there is no one model for such creating a healthy workplace, and she suggests a number of other practices that might work in law firms. She concludes that “Such practices are increasingly showing themselves to be not just good, but necessary for both employee satisfaction and organizational success.”
The principle at stake here, the thread that runs through all healthy workplace practices, is simple. It appears that health and wealth are not mutually exclusive. They work in tandem and are, in fact, mutually supportive.
Postscript (02-05-04): Matt Homann has a good post on the topic of keeping employees happy: An Employee’s Perfect Law Firm.
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