Law Practice Management Asked and Answered Blog

Category: Chief

Aug 07, 2018

Firm Administrator vs Director of Administration or Chief Operating Officer

Question: 

Our firm is a fourteen-attorney firm in South Florida. I am the senior member of a three member executive committee. Our firm is in the second generation of partners. The founders retired five years ago. Upon their retirements we changed our governance from a managing partner to an executive committee model supplemented with a office administrator – some refer to the position as the office manager. Our executive committee model has worked relatively well. The administrator that we hired five years ago is still in place but we are not satisfied with his performance. We believe that this is in part due to the fact that our expectations have changed. When we hired him we thought that we needed an office administrator primarily to manage the office staff and the billing and bookkeeping function. So we hired an administrator that had worked, as his first job out of junior college, as an office manager in an eight-attorney firm for two years and had an associates degree in accounting. He has does a good job with managing the staff and the billing and bookkeeping. However, we have now discovered that we want more – we want executive level leadership. We want someone that is respected by all the attorneys and can:

  1. Provide overall leadership
  2. Help lead the executive committee
  3. Develop create solutions to problems
  4. Lead the associates
  5. Serve as marketing director, etc.
  6. Take the lead in strategic planning and implementation of a strategic plan

I welcome your thoughts and opinions.

Response: 

Yes your expectations have indeed changed. Your administrator has not been able to grow in the role expectations that you now have for the position and does not have the education or experience to meet your new demands.

My observations are as follows:

  1. You would like your administrator to act and think like an owner/partner.
  2. You would like your administrator to be a quick learner.
  3. You would like your administrator to provide a higher level of management insight and bring business training and experience to the table.
  4. You would like your administrator to be accepted as a peer professional by all the attorneys in the firm.
  5. You would like your administrator to be innovative and willing to question the status quo.
  6. You would like your administrator to provide recommendations concerning new methods for  improving the firm’s operations and profitability.
  7. You would like your administrator to be able to resolve most administrative issues with minimal guidance from the executive committee.

I believe that you would like an administrator to serve more in the role as a Director of Administrator or Chief Operating Officer and your present administrator simply does not have the education, experience, and maturity to function in this capacity. If you want someone to serve in this capacity you will have to hire someone with degree credentials – such as a MBA or CPA, that will facilitate the candidate’s acceptance by other attorneys in the firm as a peer professional as well as provide the candidate with the academic tools needed to carry out the expectations of the position. In addition, you need to hire someone that has ten years plus as a director of administration or chief operating officer position in a similar size firm or company – preferably a firm that provides professional services such as a law firm, accounting firm, engineering firm, etc. You will have to look beyond the titles that candidates have had and inquire into the specific duties and roles performed. You will need to back up this inquiry with solid reference inquiries.

A director of administrator or chief operating officer position is rare in a fourteen-attorney firm. Many firms your size have administrators or office managers similar to the office administrator that you currently have. The downside to establishing such a position in your firm will be the salary that you will have to pay – more than many of your attorneys and even some partners are being paid – and turnover in the position when an opportunity from a much larger firm comes along.

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John W. Olmstead, MBA, Ph.D, CMC

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