Pathway to Success Step 3 – Alignment

You may be asking what alignment has to do with achieving goals and being successful in your practice. The answer is that alignment is a key component to success. Let me describe for you what alignment means.

Alignment occurs when your goals adhere to what you say you’re doing. For example, if your firm says that you are family-friendly, then you need to act family-friendly. You also need to define what family-friendly means.

Does it mean that your team can take a break from work and go see a school play? Does it mean that you only work so many hours in a day and that’s how you are structured? You need to define what you say your culture is and ensure that your actions are in alignment with that culture.

The problem that we find, and this is the case not just in law firms, that a firm will say that it believes in one thing and then its actions don’t show they believe what they said.

The effect on your team when you are in alignment with what you say your culture is can be powerful. Alignment helps you retain your talent. It also makes it possible that your team will give you their best, because they know what your values are and they are able to agree with those values. Plus, this helps when you hire new people. They can discover what your firm’s culture really is so that the both of you can make a decision on if working there is the right fit.