December 15, 2006
Performance Evaluation of Law Firm Associates
While mega firms have sufficient access to the talent pool to pursue their “move up or out” model for associates, midsized firms have a greater need to retain and develop their younger attorneys. This means there is need for constructive rather than destructive performance evaluations to guide the associate’s development as a well-rounded attorney.
Unfortunately, doing performance evaluations doesn’t come easy for most midsized law firm partners. It is one thing to express your opinion to other partners about a given associate’s performance. It is another thing to give helpful counseling to the individual with an objective of enhancing their career prospects.
One helpful tool is the man/woman job overlay. Take a standard letter-size sheet of paper to represent the job—the traits and skills required for a fully competent incumbent individual such as:
Professional Competencies
Writing skills
Work Ethic
Interpersonal Skills
Client Relations
Client Management
Compliance with firm policies and procedures
Overlay a second sheet of paper representing the associate’s performance. Explain that the associate‘s current performance fulfills that portion of the job obligations covered by the second sheet of paper. It is only the uncovered portion that represents the improvement needed to completely fulfill the expectations of their current position, or the position to which they hope to move.
The overlay will cover most of the original sheet of paper, emphasizing that only small changes are needed to round out performance. The discussion can focus on the positive steps that need to be taken by the individual being evaluated.
Morepartnerincome.com is sponsored by Juris, Inc. For information about Juris® products and services for increasing law firm performance and partner income, go to www.Juris.com
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Filed under HR by Tom Collins