How Attractive is Your Firm's Brand on the "Supply Side?"

Sometimes it doesn't hurt to be reminded of the obvious.  Permit me to remind you:

• Ours is a talent-driven profession.
• Professionals—"elevator assets"—are highly mobile.
• The best people are always in limited supply.
• Turnover is expensive, disruptive, and to the extent clients identify with the individual attorney rather than the firm, truly threatening.

So the question is:  What have you done about this lately?

Deloitte has a primer which I commend to you.  Among its key recommendations:

• Focus on the long run.  Where will your needs (by practice group, by geography, by client/industry cohort) be in a few years?  This involves everything from whether you're recruiting at the right law schools to whether your associate development and partner coaching initiatives are in alignment with where you think your firm should be heading strategically.
• Realize that your firm has an image, a perception, dare I say a "brand" in the marketplace for recruits—distinct from the market for clients. Think of your firm's brand image to clients as its "demand side" brand and its brand image to recruits as its "supply side" brand.
• Consider unconventional ways of assessing and recruiting associates—your cheapest source of new talent.  For example, IDEO, the multi-award-winning San Francisco based design firm, sends senior staff members to teach in the engineering master's program at Stanford, creating what amounts to a three-year interview of promising designers.   Imagine some of your corporate partners (the right ones, please!) guest-lecturing at Harvard, Stanford, Columbia (etc.) in the corporate law and securities courses.  Think the top-notch students you might otherwise be unaware of would be receptive to a personal invitation to interview with the firm?

Once you've got the right people, you've got to keep them.  The good news and the bad news here is that money alone won't do it.

To be sure, the overall compensation package must be competitive in the marketplace and, more crucially, perceived as fair.  But once you've achieved that baseline, "softer" factors take precedence:  How strong are your professional development efforts?  Are associates free to move between departments in search of the right fit?  Do you focus on outcomes, not bureaucracy, eliminating constraints and permitting creativity? 

Let's face it:  With the first-year associate package apparently frozen at $125,000 plus bonus, with every firm claiming to be "friendly and collegial," and with the reality of 2,000+ hours/year requirements across the board, how is your firm really going to distinguish itself? 

McKinsey chimes in that it really does get back to "branding."  If you limit yourself to the traditional toolkit (salary, benefits, blah blah blah), you will limit yourself to run of the mill recruits.  But if you can persuasively demonstrate intangible and emotional ties linking your best professionals to the firm with passion and commitment, trust me, you will well and truly stand out—and have the standout recruits to show for it.