Law Practice Management Asked and Answered Blog
Category: responsibility
Aug 10, 2013
Law Firm Strategic Planning – Implementation – Responsibility – Accountability
Question:
I am the managing partner of a 17 attorney law firm in downtown Chicago. We are a litigation boutique firm with a majority of our work in insurance defense. We have been in practice for 7 years. While we grew quickly during the early years – we have reached a plateau and growth has stalled. We are planning our first strategic planning retreat and hope to develop a long range strategic plan. Do you have any suggestions?
Response:
Where more planning efforts fall short is in the implementation of the plan. The plan lays on the shelf and collects dust. I suggest that the plan be implemented through the firm's existing management structure, i.e., the managing partner, executive committee, the strategic planning committee, and practice area chairs.
Individual partners should be assigned responsibility and held accountable for the satisfactory implementation of each phase of the plan in accordance with an agreed-upon timetable. This should be done during the planning retreat session.
Status reports should be provided to the other partners in each phase of the plan in order to keep them apprised of the planning activities.
Suggest an online project management system (portal) be used to track progress.
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John W. Olmstead, MBA, Ph.D, CMC
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