Holding on to knowledge

In addition, the recession may have increased employee dissatisfaction. Morale may be low if firms have been forced to conduct layoffs over the past year. It will be even worse if remaining lawyers feel that the communication of those layoffs was poorly conducted '“ or that the firm generally treated its staff poorly through the recession. In that case, the next few months could see many more lawyers defecting to firms that appear to better care for their people. This leaves firms facing a potential hole in their operations, as well as a significant gap in their knowledge base.

In this environment, knowledge-retention strategies are more important than ever '“ not only in terms of storing knowledge that is vital to the firm, but in effectively passing it on to those who most need it '“ i.e., the next generation.

In Volume 3 Issue 4 of KIM Legal Tom Young of KM consultancy Knoco, wrote a masterclass on 'knowledge harvesting' for the legal profession. In it, he applies some very simple KM strategies to improve knowledge retention. In brief, he highlights the following steps:

• It is vital to first focus on what key knowledge is required to drive the firm's performance. Any retention strategy then follows on from this;
• Do not try to harvest everything. Focus only on the knowledge that your firm cannot afford to lose;
• The risk of knowledge loss often arises from staff leaving. Just one lawyer may hold critical knowledge of a particular practice, but is approaching retirement age;
• Identify the individuals associated with key knowledge in your firm;
• Think about what the recipients will really need from that person. What areas of their knowledge are most important? Interview the recipients and pass on their feedback to the individuals with key knowledge;
• Firms might then move to 'self-harvesting' '“ leaving the onus on the person involved to pass on the required knowledge to those who need it. It will only work, however, if the person has the time and inclination to do this;
• Alternatively, with lawyers under huge time pressures, firms might find 'assisted harvesting' more effective. This involves including another person in the harvesting process. For example, a PSL might interview the retiring lawyer and document their thoughts and insights. Before the interview, they would likely also interview the recipients of the knowledge to ensure they steer the interview correctly. If not a PSL, an internal member of the KM team could conduct this role '“ although for technical knowledge, a PSL might better understand the context of the interview, making the process more successful. Such an interview needs to be planned well, as there may be few opportunities to harvest such knowledge before the lawyer leaves.

Improving inter-generational knowledge flow
Such a strategy could also be complemented by similar moves to improve communication between generations '“ and younger generations are different to those now approaching retirement. Both Generations X and Y are used to much more feedback and communication from a very young age. They expect to be involved in firm-wide developments, and to be recognised and rewarded for their efforts. Baby boomers, meanwhile, are more likely to assume that no feedback means that they're doing okay. This kind of attitude can obviously make succession planning very difficult because retiring baby boomers are less likely to place great value on either receiving or providing feedback. To a degree, they may exist in their own bubble.

But firms have the opportunity to tap into the enthusiasm of the younger generations to push lawyers of all ages to collaborate more effectively. Knowledge managers have long been working on such collaboration efforts. Communities of practice are a prime example of such activities and have proved very successful in improving collaborative cultures in many organisations. Such experience could now be applied to succession planning efforts '“ in terms of bringing generations closer together in order to learn from each other and share knowledge. Phyllis Weiss Haserot, president of consultancy Practice Development Council, suggests several strategies that firms could employ to help build internal relationships and respect, while agreeing common goals for working together more effectively:

Facilitating cross-generational conversations via work teams. These would come together at the start of a new matter or at least on taking on a new client, enabling senior and junior people to share knowledge in a non-threatening environment '“ enabled by having a facilitator who is not directly part of the team.

Multi-generational group coaching. This would enable a group of people of all ages to come together to talk through ways of working together more effectively.

Advanced transition planning. Bringing together multi-generational groups from both the law firm, as well as their counterparts from the client team. 'It's not only the senior baby boomers from the law firm that are transitioning their responsibility. Clients are also doing it to their next generation too,' says Haserot.

'The client is therefore a very important part of this tool. They need to be brought in to make sure they're comfortable with the people taking over the work and that the firm understands  their needs. It's about working together for a smooth transition and firms must involve the client; it's not just about the incumbent and the successor in the firm.'

Increasing success rates with social media
While the above tips would no doubt help firms in their succession planning, it would also be difficult to envisage most firms having time to do much of the above '“ at least it would be tough to do all of this in person. However, technology '“ particularly in terms of Web 2.0 and social media '“ may just enable firms to bring generations closer together without having to either invest huge amounts of money or lawyers' time in the effort. Many KM practitioners, for example, have been involved in introducing social networking tools to improve internal collaboration. David Jabbari, former global head of knowledge management at Allen & Overy LLP, was one of the first to introduce social software such as blogs and wikis into his firm to promote knowledge sharing across different offices. And many other firms have followed.

For younger generations, the move to social media is an obvious one that plays to their strengths. According to a recent Nielsen Norman Group report, 'Enterprise 2.0: Social Software on Intranets', there is an increasing expectation, particularly among the younger generation, that social networking tools should be available in the workplace.1 However, the study also found that many companies are still only thinking about implementing Web 2.0 tools. For law firms, this may well be an opportunity to not only improve internal collaboration but to make the working environment far more appealing to younger generations, helping to increase retention rates by creating engaged communities across offices, and even potentially attracting new recruits by offering an open and communicative culture that appeals to younger generations.

The value of KM systems to succession planning
It is not just new technology, however, that can support succession-planning efforts. For many years, law firms have implemented sophisticated KM systems that support knowledge transfer and knowledge retention. KM systems in themselves have been the cause of much debate with many firms arguing that they have not lived up to their initial promise '“ largely because of the difficulties in getting lawyers to use them.

An information-management roundtable conducted by Ark Group in the summer of 2009 gave some insights into the work KM professionals in the UK have been doing in terms of their KM systems in recent years. Some firms, for instance, had implemented a KM system aimed at providing lawyers with easy access to internal and external expertise from one point. More firms, however, seemed to be moving towards search technologies, a trend that has witnessed growing momentum over the past year. One KM director described how they'd implemented an enterprise search system to run over the document-management system, KM library, practice-management system, the people system, intranet and external resources, enabling people to easily search for any variety of information stored in the firm via a Google-like search facility. While such systems may not deal so well with tacit knowledge, the ability to easily find information from a whole variety of sources cannot help but improve a firm's knowledge-sharing capability.

In terms of succession planning, there may also be a particular value in such search technology. At Reed Smith, for instance, the firm needed to provide lawyers with speedy access to all the information they require, but the firm also wanted the system to go beyond data and documents, enabling lawyers to easily identify people with the most relevant expertise or experience for a project, no matter where they might be based geographically.

The system, while extremely sophisticated in terms of searching for context relevant data, also provides expertise location. This has meant that staff can search for all matters, deals and cases, as well as locate people with the required experience in each area. The system does this by tapping into various information sources, including time and billing systems, SharePoint, and internal firm matter and case databases. It then provides a detailed and up-to-date profile of individuals and their relevant subject areas.

Duncan Ogilvy, KM partner at Mills & Reeve LLP, has seen a similar benefit from his firm's search technology. 'We have an excellent know-how database supported by a search engine, which enables collaborative working in a surprising way,' he says. 'For example, it enables us to have a directory of expertise. By searching what you're working on and how you're recording time, it works out who the experts in the firm are in various areas. That then enables lawyers to know who they should be collaborating with.'

It can be easy to assume that KM splits into information management, governed by systems, and knowledge management that is more behavioural and based on building a culture of collaboration. But both search technology and Web 2.0 tools are demonstrating that the lines are blurred '“ and that technology can be extremely effective, not only in speeding up internal knowledge flow but in allowing different people to come together more easily. For succession planning, such tools may be vital not only in connecting different generations and levels of experience, but also in giving lawyers more time to engage in succession-planning activities. After all, firms will be able to build communities far more effectively where lawyers can combine face-to-face collaboration with a virtual meeting of minds.

What should KM professionals be doing?
From the above, it is hopefully clear that KM teams have an awful lot to offer in terms of succession-planning strategies. Their skills should not be viewed in isolation '“ KM teams will have to work with both leadership and other support divisions in order to make succession planning work. But KM professionals have for years been working on initiatives that directly plug into succession planning '“ for example, collaboration and knowledge-sharing programmes, and community-building activities. In partnership with IT, they also often have the expertise of the technology implementation that supports these efforts.

In the wake of recession, when resources may still be few and far between, it can be easy to relegate functions like KM to a back-office discipline. But to do that would be to dismiss its potential as a huge aid to succession-planning efforts. By recognising the abilities of KM professionals to help firms in supporting knowledge retention and collaboration, firms may also open the door to a kind of organic succession planning '“ one in which people of all generations naturally share their knowledge and expertise because that is the culture of the firm. In such a firm, succession planning would not have to be a enforced programme of dos and don'ts; it would merely become the natural outcome of a firm in which all the lawyers work together more effectively and productively.

This article is adapted from an excerpt of Transition Planning for Law Firms, written by Caroline Poynton and published by Ark. For more information contact Robyn Macé at rmace@ark-group.com

References

1. 'Enterprise 2.0: Social Software on Intranets', Nielsen Norman Grou