Can BCG help someone find a job in a geographic area not generally associated with his or her practice area?

Q: Can BCG help someone find a job in a geographic area not generally associated with his or her practice area, such as an entertainment attorney in Nebraska or an agricultural property lawyer in New York City?

James LaFontaine, Chicago

A: It really depends on the practice area and the city. Some practices do not need to use recruiters; these groups will hire candidates through contacts or word-of-mouth. Likewise, some areas of the country, such as Nebraska, do not have a large enough legal market to require the services of a recruiter. Within large cities such as Los Angeles and New York, some entertainment practices work with recruiters. I do not think I’ve ever come across an opening for agricultural property, so I doubt these practices would use a recruiter. Other practices that do not generally work with recruiters are personal injury, immigration, insurance defense (not insurance coverage—that is very different), civil rights, criminal law, and family law.

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Why I Believe BCG Attorney Search is the Greatest Legal Recruiting Firm in the World

BCG Attorney Search

“The Nation’s Standard in Attorney Search and Placement”

The very foundations of BCG Attorney Search are built upon the ever-present need to constantly improve. This is evident in several aspects of how this business is run. I personally feel that BCG Attorney Search is the greatest recruiting firm in the world. The reasons for this are described below.

First, we only do law firm placements and have not diluted this important fundamental by having several different and diverting focuses at any one time. This means that when an attorney approaches us, they are dealing with experts because we are dealing with and studying the same law firms day in and day out. Through geographically segmenting our efforts, we have assured that each recruiter in every area we serve has the best possible understanding of their law firm clients. We have made the decision not to do in-house placements because we know that in-house placements will only serve to widely disperse our efforts and never make us an expert in anything.

This strategy has also allowed us to emerge as the search firm with the most law firm positions in the world. This is something the market notices and attracts a great deal of candidates.

Second, we stress an extremely high work product here. No search firm produces a better work product than us. The quality of our work product communicates to the firms who review our submissions that we know what we are doing. It also allows us to consistently learn more about candidates—and the market in general—than our competitors do. In addition, by producing such an outstanding work product, the firms we are dealing with take our efforts seriously. Everyday, our recruiters are being pushed to produce a better and better work product.

Third, through our website, we communicate a great deal of information. This communication draws traffic to our site and establishes us as experts in our chosen field. Our website is probably the most widely viewed web site in the permanent law firm placement field in the world.

Fourth, we use technology in radical ways that are years ahead of our competition. Through mass email, the distribution of our jobs to thousands of subscribers each day, the personal response we provide to each submission we receive and more, we are consistently communicating with a greater and greater audience than our competitors. By building a substantial community of people who are aware of our abilities, we are reinforcing the message that we are better than our competition hundreds of times each day.

Fifth, we have a super group of people who are committed to our mission and communicate our mission to everyone in this organization and the outside world. By consistently communicating our mission and unique organization goals and differences, we are spreading the word that we are, in fact, much better than our competition.

Sixth, we make efforts geared towards improving the legal community as a whole. Through our annual publication, The BCG Attorney Search Guide to Class Ranking and Law Review at America’s Top Law Schools, we are driving home a message about our expertise as researchers and attorneys to a diverse audience that includes (1) law schools, (2) law students, (3) practicing attorneys, and (4) law firms. The levels we go to service the legal community through this and our other written efforts are unparalleled by any other American legal search firm.

Seventh, through aggressive advertising and a well conceived branding strategy, we are driving our name home to everyone in the legal community. In addition, we ensure that our advertising is as timely as possible. There are few practicing attorneys in the United States who have not heard of our firm. We probably do more advertising than any other permanent attorney placement firm in the United States.

Eighth, we have uniform standards for our work. Every recruiter who works in our firm is expected to do a similar amount of work each week and produce a consistently good work product. By ensuring that we are all operating at similar production levels, we can ensure the orderly growth of our company through consistent revenue generation.

Ninth, we are a team. Through our weekly teleconferences, our BCG College, our weekly goals and our constant exchange of information, we are the most formidable team in the American legal recruiting field. No group tries harder to achieve each others goals. No group wants more than anything to see its other members succeed. By lessening competition, ensuring that we are consistently helping one another, we experience market domination.

Each and every day we come to work we are thinking of how we intend to raise the bar that day. Every idea we have, every innovation we make, is something that raises the bar and takes us more into the realm of being much better than we were before.

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What Qualities/Characteristics Should I Look for in a Legal Recruiter?

Being a good legal recruiter is very difficult work. If you take the average graduating class at a law school of say 500 people, I would estimate that 70% of the graduates could be outstanding lawyers if they apply themselves. Conversely, I would estimate that 99% of the people who graduate from law school could not be good legal recruiters (i.e., 1% or 5 of the 500 people could potentially be good legal recruiters).

A good legal recruiter needs

to have persuasive skills,

to be likeable,

to have a good pedigree in most cases to understand the nuances of top level firms, needs to to have an outstanding work ethic,

to be entrepreneurial,

to be a risk taker,

to be diligent about learning information about the market,

to be good at understanding people,

to have a high level of concentration,

to like people,

to have a natural inclination to be in the legal profession,

to be tough skinned, and

to be intuitive.

These qualities (and these are only a few) are the qualities which distinguish good recruiters in my opinion from poor ones. But it goes far, far from this. A good legal recruiter needs to be genuinely excited—deep down—about their job and have a 100% commitment to what they are doing. Nothing less. This is fundamentally important and no recruiter can be without this.

The best legal recruiter out there will get out of bed each morning so excited about the job they are doing they cannot wait get to work. The best legal recruiter out there will spend their weekends excited for the coming week so they can get back to work. The best legal recruiter will probably also not be able to control themselves from not working and will find themselves logging on during the weekend. A final point is that the best legal recruiter is excited about the people their candidates and interested in their lives. They are interested in the employers they are working for and the people in the employers. The best legal recruiters may be so excited about what they do that they cannot help but get overly excited about the legal industry just by reading about it—they see opportunities everywhere they turn for their candidates.

Genuine, deep down and natural commitment is incredibly important. Because attorneys are so naturally conditioned to believe that practicing law is the only thing an attorney should be doing, there is a perception of sorts that anytime an attorney steps out of the practice of law there must be something wrong with them. I would submit to you that this is often true—yes, there is often something wrong with the people who leave the practice of law.

People who leave the practice of law often do so because

they have a poor work ethic and do not want to work as hard,

they cannot get along with others,

they cannot concentrate for long periods of time,

they have drug or alcohol problems,

they have no interest in the legal profession,

they do not know what they want to do,

they want to spend more time with their family,

they want to be “independent” from a working environment.

You name it—there are a lot of negative reasons people leave the practice of law. Some people have horrible legal pedigrees and simply cannot get hired once they leave. Others have a myriad of personal reasons for leaving and cannot find a job after losing their job for one reason or another. Personally, I do not care why people leave the practice of law—this is their business—but I want to be clear about one thing: I sure as hell would never want to hire a legal recruiter who is leaving the practice of law for any other reason than that they know they are suited for legal recruiting. This is the only reason they should be leaving.

When I hire the right legal recruiter at BCG Attorney Search who knows they should be recruiting and wants to recruit because they get excited about it something miraculous happens. The recruiter changes peoples lives and enriches the law firms they are working for. More people get better jobs, people find jobs that make them happier, lawyers end up working where they should be working. Tons of great things happen. I am proud of this. As the CEO of a legal recruiting firm I run a recruiting firm that is not motivated by profit from hiring tons of legal recruiters but by having the absolute best legal recruiters possible. It is no easy task making sure only the right people are part of our team. In fact, we even run psychological tests on all prospective recruiters to make sure they are cut out for the work.

When a legal recruiter enters the profession or recruits for the wrong reasons then you will not be benefited. What is true for many professions is no less true for legal recruiting: There are a lot of people in the profession that should not be there.

Many people believe that the best legal recruiter is the one who went to the best law school or worked at the best firm. In my experience, the opposite is more often than not true. It does not matter where your recruiter went to school or where they worked when it comes down to their ability to get excited about you, understand you and be in love with their job and what they are doing. This is what everyone needs when they are being represented by a legal recruiter. Certainly the intelligence of your recruiter is important but what is most important is a recruiter whose heart and soul are in the work and they know they are doing exactly what they should be doing with their career and life. Most likely this recruiter will tell you from the heart how their life was changed by becoming a legal recruiter, they knew it was the profession for them and they cannot get enough of it. Find a recruiter like this and they will change your life to.

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The BCG Attorney Search Difference

Most attorneys do not give sufficient thought to planning their legal careers. Sure, when they graduate from law school, they seek out the best jobs they can get. They practice for a couple of years, then at some point probably decide to seek new jobs. Yet sometimes even after working for a few years, and possibly even after multiple job changes, these attorneys still don’t know where they really want to be in their legal careers. If they do know, then they don’t know how to actually get there. Because of this, countless attorneys continue to follow unfulfilling career paths, and as a result many end up leaving the practice of law completely. Many of these attorneys could have built successful and rewarding legal careers, had they only been more aware of how to plan such a career.

Legal recruiters often are valuable assets to attorneys who are trying to find fulfilling career paths. Good legal recruiters are experts in the legal market. Their clients rely on them for advice on every issue that might affect their careers. Furthermore, their clients count on them to locate not just any jobs, but jobs that are perfect fits for each client’s own individual career goals.

Good legal recruiters do not merely know about the general legal market; rather, they forge close relationships with both law firms and candidates. They must grasp what each firm is looking for in potential hires, and must know about everything from firm culture to specialized practice groups. Additionally, they must identify what each candidate really is looking for in his or her career, and must know enough details about each candidate to (a) discern which employer would be the best fit for that candidate, and (b) successfully present the candidate to that particular firm. In short, good legal recruiters need to know where their clients truly want to go their legal careers, and how they can get there.

BCG Attorney Search is most successful legal-recruiting firm in the United States. The company has gotten jobs for thousands of attorneys, and the depth of its resources is unrivaled in the industry. BCG’s recruiters are first-rate attorneys who have practiced with major American law firms. Additionally, BCG works only on placing attorneys in law firms, and has developed unmatched expertise regarding the unique needs of attorneys.

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The Principle of “Kaizen” and BCG Attorney Search

MEMO

TO: BCG Attorney Search

FROM: A. Harrison Barnes

RE: Kaizen at BCG Attorney Search

DATE: January 15, 2009

Introduction

This memorandum discusses the principle of “Kaizen” which in many circles has been called the key to Japan’s success in many industries. On a daily basis, each of us should be questioning how things are done and improving the processes and procedures in place for BCG Attorney Search.

As we make continuous changes to our database, as we service existing candidates, as we work with new candidates, as we are helping each other to learn, as we are investing in the future through our efforts now, as we are making efforts as a group to help each other and the candidates we are serving–we are following many of the principles of Kaizen.

I sent out a short memo on Kaizen several months ago; however, I wanted to follow up on this in more detail. It is my opinion that through following many of the principals of Kaizen, we can eliminate many of the profound inefficiencies which characterize the operation of recruiting firms as we know them on a daily basis. It is only through eliminating these inefficiencies that we will experience the levels of success we are capable of achieving as a group.

While we are already following many of the principles of Kaizen, we need to expand on continuing to foster a culture of continuous improvement within our firm.

Our actions need to be geared towards ensuring that we grow, become more efficient and experience the levels of achievement we are all entitled to and will experience if we achieve our goals. It is my hope that we can take many of the observations provided by this memorandum and apply them to our goals as an organization. As an added benefit, I believe that this memorandum provides many useful examples we can draw from in our daily lives.

Kaizen Defined

Kaizen has been variously defined; however, two common definitions are:

KAIZEN means gradual and orderly, continuous improvement. The KAIZEN business strategy involves everyone in an organization working together to make improvements.

KAIZEN means improvement. Moreover, KAIZEN means continuing improvement in personal life, home life, social life, and working life. When applied to the workplace KAIZEN means continuing improvement involving everyone.

Kaizen is a tool originally used by Toyota to foster continued improvement within its Toyota Production System. It began as “Quality Circles,” a means of factory shop floor employees solving quality issues within a structured team framework, using specific new tools.

1. “Kaizen Events”

At Toyota, and other Japanese companies, Kaizen events are constantly occurring. In general, a Kaizen event will involve the management appearing at the desk or machine of a worker and observing exactly how they do their jobs. The efficiency of the processes and procedures followed by the employee in doing their job are aggressively questioned, critiqued and analyzed. How does the employee hold a tool? How many steps does it take to go between different machines where the work may be occurring? Then, as inefficiencies are pointed out, the employee is expected to adapt and change immediately. The intensity of a Kaizen event cannot be underestimated. Most people have common ways of doing their jobs that become ingrained in them and are resistent to change.

During a Kaizen event, if the employee does not not immediately change and correct the inefficiency, they are fired on the spot and another person is brought in to do their job. When a Kaizen event occurs, the President of Toyota might even follow around a janitor to figure out the inefficiencies in the way he performs his job—no employee escapes Kaizen events. This approach to work is something that occurs at all levels of the organization and involves everyone. Work, and how it is done, is constantly questioned in order to raise the level of efficiency.

One of the most important aspects of Kaizen is that it is something that the entire company participates in. In the lunchroom, factory workers may discuss with each other how to address various inefficiencies. The employees are empowered to address inefficiencies without the involvement of management and also take great pride in being efficient. When Kaizen events do occur, the most efficient groups take great pride when few inefficiencies can be pointed out in their work. Like an organism, work groups are constantly changing and becoming more efficient on a daily basis.

While this Kaizen approach to managing a company may sound in some respects draconian, it does result in the process of ensuring that work is performed in the best possible manner with the least amount of waste. While he did not call it “Kaizen”, this method of approaching work was also the building block behind each of the companies started by Howard Hughes (many of which are growing multi-billion dollar companies today decades after his death). For example, companies like Hughes Space Systems (which started Direct TV) are products of this continuous drive for improvement and were founded by Hughes disciples decades after his death in a Hughes-created corporate environment which pushes constant improvement and innovation.

The point of a Kaizen event, and Kaizen generally, is that the norm must constantly be questioned in order to ensure that the work is performed in the best possible manner. I was reminded of this principal in reading a recent Motor Trend article which discussed the fact the engineers who designed the Lexis LS400 decided to half the space between metal fittings in the car this year. While this was completely unnecessary (the car is consistently ranked one of the top 10 cars in the world in terms of quality), the engineers did this because it was an improvement and one they believed they were capable of making.

While Kaizen may seem insignificant, I can assure you that this principal is an important foundation behind BCG Attorney Search’s very existence and that following Kaizen is something that will be rewarded around here. An example of a Kaizen-related event is when a small change was made to the database by an employee after being aggressively questioned by another employee about her efficiency. The change made to the database resulted in a savings of over one week of work for the person per month. While my response was atypical, in conjunction with other Kaizen principles the person exemplified in her work, she did receive a meaningful raise.

Kaizen, as you could learn from the definition, is a common word and very natural to individual, continuous improvement in personal life, home life, social life and working life. Everybody deserves to and should be willing to improve himself/herself for the better continually. “If a man has not been seen for three days, his friends should take a good look at him to see what changes have befallen him” quoted from the old Japanese saying, describes how natural KAIZEN is.

Kaizen at BCG Attorney Search

Not a day should go without some kind of improvement being made somewhere here. I have provided some tips below that should give you some ideas about what Kaizen philosophy is and how we have implemented and can implement Kaizen at BCG Attorney Search:

1. We should discard conventional fixed ideas. A perfect example of this is the fact that we are often of the opinion that only certain types of candidates are placeable. For example, we seem to have a firmwide consensus that certain types of attorneys are not placeable. Nevertheless, several recruiters has proven this is not true.
2. We should think of how to do it, not why it cannot be done. We frequently have various tasks which seem impossible.  We need to find ways to ensure they are done. It is also axiomatic that we can make more placements if we are taking each and every telephone call that comes into the office. How can we fix these problems?
3. We should not make excuses and start, instead, by questioning current practices. There are plenty of reasons that certain goals we set might not get completed in a timely manner. One issue we have had in the past is that goals which are not set are not completed. If we cannot complete the goals which are set, then the real issue is how we are doing our work and the efficiency we are bringing to it. The issue should not be that we have the work to do. Just like virtually every other United States company, there is not a lot of room for excuses about why goals cannot be met here.
4. We should not seek absolute perfection. Do it right away even if for only 50% of target. While we are aiming for perfection, simply stated, perfection is not always possible. Taking actions to ensure that we do our best is vitally important to our success. It is better to make an effort at doing something than not doing it at all.
5. We should correct it right away, if a mistake is made. Mistakes happen. What is most important is realizing that we need to correct mistakes rather than allow them to continue. We should always be asking ourselves why something did not work out the way we wanted to instead of dwelling on a mistake.
6. We should ask ‘WHY?” five times and seek root causes. If we believe that there is any need for improvement, either in our organization or in how we are doing our jobs, we need to ask ourselves “WHY” and search for the reasons we need improvement and how to effectuate that improvement.
7. We should seek the wisdom of multiple people rather than the knowledge of one. None of us can possibly know the solutions to every issue we face. It is better that we all operate as a contiguous group—learning and growing from each other—than as islands unto our own. This is probably the largest single reason recruiters fail—seeking input from others is vitally important to our success.

Kaizen Lessons

In our day-to-day work it is important that we do not accept convention ritualistically. Instead, we should always be seeking to improve the work that we do and become more insightful, more efficient and more alert to ways to improve the environment around us.

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