Here's a shocker: law firms have difficulty with implementation. Perhaps you've noticed that even firms with a really good grasp of their future and the capability to put together thoughtful strategies to cope with change, often seem to get stymied when it comes to trigger pulling. Now, lets face it, every individual, little less organization, has some trouble with implementation. I, personally, don't have to look any farther than my own history of new year's resolutions to observe implementation failure of a monumental scale.

Much has been written about why law firms are so bad about implementing. The reasons range from the precedential mindset of lawyers to the ineptitude of law firm management. But I suspect the root of our problem lies deeper in the consensus-based structure of law firm partnerships. Recently I was describing a traffic jam I had been in on an interstate highways to a colleague. It was late at night and cars were bumper to bumper for miles. Then suddenly after inching along, traffic returned to normal speed with no evidence anything that would have caused such a jam up.

My colleague explained that the traffic problem was probably the result of a "caterpillar effect." What happens is that a motorist taps his or her brakes for no particular reason, which causes the person behind to cautiously ride their brake. This goes on car after car causing an eventual traffic jam.

Amazingly, I see the exact same effect in play with lawyers - particularly in mid-sized firms. The firms' desire to maintain a culture of consensus drives them to become almost fanatical about achieving buy-in among their partners. All it takes is one or two partners to metaphorically "tap the brake" and implementation comes to a screeching halt. And usually, no one even knows why.

Some law firms brag that they never actually take a partnership vote; everything is achieved through consensus. Not surprisingly, these are the same firms that have problems with implementation and usually with profitability. Consensus is defined as a decision-making process that requires the consent of all participants. In most law firms that is a virtually unachievable goal. And, if consensus is achieved, the process typically takes so long and the decision is so watered down, that implementation effectively never occurs.

Building complete consensus is a wonderful concept, but in a rapidly changing environment, the key to success may be going with a simple majority to avoid the traffic jam caused by a few "brake tappers."

Contact the author, Ed Wesemann 

Contact the author, Jordan Furlong  

Lawyers are professional storytellers. We use stories to inform, motivate and persuade in transactions and cases. In court, when arguments are roughly balanced, the best storyteller usually wins. Your first meeting with clients is an exchange of stories. Storytelling is so effective because it immediately connects at both an emotional and intellectual level, engaging the imagination and the creativity of your listeners.

Most of us by now know why and when we should tell stories, but not everyone knows how to tell stories well, or how to improve this skill. Take heart; you are a born storyteller, and getting better is a matter of remembering what you love about stories. There are three enjoyable stages in this process.

1. Demystify

Storytelling is not the preserve of a gifted few. Stories for humans are like water for fish: we are so used to them that we don't recognize storytelling as an innate human trait. Our children's' first words are stories; they delight in telling us, endlessly, what they can see and what they have been doing. Every family mealtime conversation, every newscast and almost all entertainment is some sort of storytelling. Whether we call it by name or not, storytelling is what we do most of the time.

2. Familiarize

Pay some more attention to the stories and storytellers that you already enjoy: friends, actors, newscasters, politicians, and particularly colleagues and clients. How might you categorize the storytellers you know? What makes the good ones so good? Why do the poor ones fail to engage? The first rule of improving your storytelling ability is that it must be enjoyable. Don't waste a minute studying or enduring what is not pleasurable.  (You probably get enough of that at work!)

3. Internalize

Are we forgetting how to remember? The benefits of memorizing have only begun to be fully appreciated in the past 20 years. For more than 100 years, our educational systems included the memorization of poems, a practice discontinued in the 1950s when learning subjects "by rote" was shown to be inefficient. But in abandoning the memorization of poetry, the educators threw the baby out with the bathwater. 

There are three major benefits to memorizing prose or poetry and reciting it. First, it develops a part of the brain that is not used in any other kind of learning and increases and extends our ability to memorize. Secondly, it improves our use of language, adding to our vocabulary and enabling us to use powerful metaphors and other linguistic techniques.Finally, memorizing and reciting important information helps us to design our information "for the ear," to prepare presentations more quickly and to speak more confidently and memorably with acuity, empathy and power.

Follow these steps to unleash your inner storyteller. You'll enjoy speaking more, and people will enjoy listening to you more. It's that simple.