Does your firm have the skills in place to meet its future needs?

The landscape of the legal marketplace is changing. This is prompting law firms to consider their competitive advantage, their unique selling points and main business focus. As a result, the core skill sets of lawyers are increasingly coming under review. What type of professionals do commercial law firms need today and what type of roles will they be recruiting for in future?

Speculation around this subject is abundant. I've heard of an increasing need for core business skills, commercial awareness and business acumen. I've also heard a call for improved project management skills, alongside greater business analysis skills and enhanced management and leadership capabilities.

Identifying the skills and experience that the firm needs and then matching people to the roles is a tried-and-tested route of ensuring the firm's capability fits its overall business strategy. The firm's senior managers will be asking themselves "do we have the right people doing the right activities?" If the answer is "not really", there is likely to be a skills gap at play.

A skills gap exists when there is a difference between the skills required for a role and the actual skills possessed by the people who would be considered for that role.

Managing the current needs of the firm and balancing them against the firm's talent management strategy and thus closing the skills gap is a role for learning and development professionals, in partnership with their HR and recruitment colleagues.

Skills gap analysis

Skills gap analysis can help a firm to refine and define the skills it needs, both now and in the future. It can make individuals aware of the critical skills they will need to grow and maintain their usefulness to the firm and can help with recruiting efforts when current staff don't have the skills or the interest in the target work or clients.

The starting place for skills gap analysis is for the partners to decide ?what they want the firm to be able to deliver. Once this has been decided, appraisals are a ready resource for conducting discussions about performance and future aspirations against a backdrop of a robust competency framework.

A skills gap often becomes evident during discussions about career aspirations and during performance reviews if the productivity and quality of work of an individual is below or perhaps above the required standard.

In a landscape in which profitability ?is defined by fine margins, productivity and efficiency are essential. Ensuring ?that individuals are carrying out both ?their critical (and perhaps non-critical tasks) is essential to firm profitability.

If individuals are overachieving in ?their present roles, they should have ?the opportunity to move into new or perhaps more challenging roles that ?better suit their capabilities and the firm, ?for mutual benefit.

Clarity of purpose, roles and responsibilities, along with engaged ?and motivated people, are essential ingredients in the performance mix. Ensuring people feel equipped for their roles is critical to maintaining the necessary standards of service and delivery required by successful firms.

Closing the skills gap

When a firm discovers that an individual is lacking skills, it needs to determine the best approach to close that skills gap. Is training the answer or perhaps coaching? Will mentoring be sufficient or does the firm need to recruit someone who already holds the required skills?

Firms that are beginning to train and develop their people in the skills required for the future are positioning themselves well to deal with the changing legal marketplace. Recruitment for future ?trainee solicitors in such firms is changing its focus to encompass assessments of ?the business analysis skills of their ?future recruits.

Sales and client relationship management skills are taking a more prominent role than they have in the past. Partners who are able to hold boardroom conversations with their clients will also be more in demand.

In order to evolve, adapt and succeed in the changing marketplace, firms need to consciously determine whether they have the skills at their disposal to develop and grow in the direction they desire.

?Sue Beavil is the senior learning and development manager at international law firm Mayer Brown (www.mayerbrown.com)