
Treating Your Staff Badly Can Have Disastrous Results
In many law firms, there is a sharp line drawn between lawyers and staff (i.e., everyone else). There are rules about co-mingling. Significant differences in pay structures. Disparate expectations for hours worked. And there are often good reasons for some of these distinctions. But not uncommonly, there is also an unacceptable distinction between the way lawyers communicate with each other as compared to how they treat their staff. Too many young lawyers begin practicing without ever before having held a real job. Their visions of importance and self-aggrandizement have been allowed to percolate unfettered for seven years of undergrad and...