Friday 30 March 2012

Why Staff Leave Law Firms

There's a wealth of information around on the reasons for people leaving organisations...most of it aimed at educating managers how to slow down the flow...

Today's post takes a different tack altogether...


Even when you have your culture right, your remuneration right, and the work available for staff right, people will leave...welcome to life in the 21st Century...

There is a never-ending list of reasons why people leave when the firm's settings all seem as good as you can make them...

They follow a life partner elsewhere...

They have family problems...and perhaps simply don't want to follow a life partner anymore!

Illness...

Illness of a relative...

Moving to another area to assist a sibling with problems of their own..

Behavioural problems...you were happy to free up their future...

Mid-life crisis...they felt like a change...

Inherited or won a fortune...

Am sure you can add many to the brief list! (Would love to hear your "specials"!)

The real point is whether or not you've had the team member productive while they were with you...actually made a profit from their impact on your business...

So often we hear principals bemoaning the fact that someone has left just when they were finally starting to become productive!

There's a real problem in this...because most people do actually want to be productive and valuable to an organisation...it's just that most don't know how, and left to their own devices it simply won't happen while they're with you...or not to the extent you need...

The reason most team members are insufficiently productive is systemic problems in the management of the firm they work for...

The problems are rife...but most come down to a failure to properly address the problem with planning and marketing systems, and usually that's because principals are too busy to see the wood for the trees and don't set up proven workable systems that will ensure the right culture and the right outcomes...

If you feel that you have employees who could be doing far better for you and for themselves, today is a good day to start the process of fixing it...you don't have all that long before, on the law of averages, they will leave...

Finally an old adage I'm reminded of by a client's experience this week...staff leaving because they did not like being accountable for their inputs and outcomes...

Where you're worried that a staff member might leave and cause you some disruption if you make them accountable for some decent productivity for their remuneration, and all your on-costs...just think for a moment of the guaranteed damage they'll do to you if they stay...

In this regard, our service of the week is the KMSProfitGap Analysis™...

You complete a short questionnaire and we run our very experienced eye over your structure, revenues and costs, and tell you what you are losing every year in profit because of the way you are operating...your investment is great value because it doesn't require a site visit...and the upsides for you are very clear...more fun and more profit year in year out if you implement the basic suggestions we make...

To arrange to discuss with us, initially please email  kmspgablog@lawfirmprofit.com






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