WE’RE
LOOKING FOR A FEW IDEAL CLIENTS. COULD ONE
OF THOSE CLIENTS BE YOU? ©
PeopleWealth’s mission and
vision position us as a leader in response
to concerns that the American Law Firm,
as we all know it, is an anachronism in
danger of extinction. Lawyers are leaving
their jobs and the profession with alarming
speed. Generation X is much smaller than
the Baby Boom generation, assuring that
many well trained, experienced lawyers can
never be replaced. Survey after survey reflects
that fewer than five percent of parents
want their children to become lawyers; lawyers
are among the least respected group in society;
law firm partnerships are not desirable
to young lawyers; and 70% of lawyers are
dissatisfied with the practice of law. "No
more! This is insane!" we said.
We want to change the world.
We know we can do so, we know why and how.
Our Ideal Clients want to change the world,
too. They want to change it now. Together,
we will do so.
Well known Massachusetts Institute
of Technology senior lecturer Peter Senge
is also a member of the Society of Organizational
Learning, a global consortium of researchers
and companies examining learning and change.
He and his colleagues have published The
Dance of Change: The Challenges to Sustaining
Momentum in Learning Organizations (Doubleday/Currency
March 1999). Senge details the unacknowledged
fact that real change in a firm rarely happens
from the top down. Instead, significant
change usually starts small, with one team,
and spreads to other teams.
Senge identifies challenges
of change in three critical areas: (1) challenges
of initial change; (2) challenges of sustaining
momentum; and (3) challenges of system wide
redesign and rethinking.
A small but growing group
of forward-thinking lawyers are acknowledging
the issues, assessing the situation, and
addressing job satisfaction one step at
a time. They are watching the consulting
firms, who employ thousands of lawyers,
and adopting some of their successful retention
strategies. They are studying businesses
that are dealing successfully with the same
declining population, strong economic prosperity,
and multitude of opportunities for workers
in all aspects of American life. They are
looking at successful solo and small firm
practitioners for clues to success.
Groups of lawyers in forward-thinking
firms are doing climate surveys to assess
how their lawyers feel about their jobs
and what can be done to improve the picture
within the business constraints of the practice.
They are putting programs in place to attract,
retain, advance, and promote lawyers in
their practices. Lawyers and their firms
are learning how to improve job satisfaction,
master the art of appropriate goal setting,
generate well-paying legal work that is
fun to do, and infuse their practices with
meaning and prosperity.
Such lawyers are moving forward
because they want to. Because the practice
of law doesn’t have to be so overwhelmingly
smothering. Because the law is too much
to give up. They want to keep the best and
change the rest. These are the lawyers that
will be with us in the future. These are
our Ideal Clients.
Ideal Clients are innovative,
creative and committed to our Mission: To
encourage, facilitate and promote the profession
by improving job satisfaction for lawyers
and keeping experienced lawyers available
to the public.
Ideal Clients share our vision:
Lawyers we’ve counseled are happy people,
well satisfied professionals, respected
by society and leaders in their communities.
Our Ideal Clients focus on
playing ANGEL’S ADVOCATE, they support "what’s
RIGHT with it," encourage lawyers to believe
it CAN work, and the practice of law CAN
be enjoyable as well as meaningful, lucrative
and life enhancing. They know that life
balance IS possible and desirable.
Our Ideal Clients understand
that the practice of law is truly a noble
profession, one that we should all aspire
to perfect and in which we should participate,
that it is the most flexible work in the
world, work that has space to accommodate
all good lawyers.
Career building skills are
designed to improve productivity, increase
performance and raise job satisfaction to
the point where the size of the profit pie
can comfortably accommodate more partners
and higher salaries. Appropriate goal setting
eliminates hoarding work below one’s level
of expertise as well as the temptation to
accept unprofitable or undesirable work.
If you have the desire to
be one of PeopleWealth’s Ideal Clients,
you’re on the road to getting to a happier,
more prosperous life within the practice
of law. Call us. We want to work with you.
You know you’re an Ideal Client
if within the last month you have:
