Finding Your Formula:

Getting The Right People in the Right Seats

Introducing HTM’s Staff Coaching Program

by Justin Crawford

Justin Crawford

Formerly COO for the world’s largest multi-national global shipping company, China Shipping Company and Principle of a multi-million law firm. He has had start-Up success building several multi-million companies from the ground up, including a Pillow manufacturer. Having also cultivated a team with Elon Musk’s first hire out of Asia, he is also author of Best Selling Book: Live Free or DIY.

Today, he runs SmallLawFirmRecruiting.com and is launching HTM’s Staff Coaching Program.

Getting the right people. It’s a challenge every business faces in its trajectory to the top. The How to Manage forum currently has more than 5000 pages of discussion topics. Of all of those pages, more than 25% are in some way related to hiring. As part of the answer, Justin Crawford brings brains and brawn to How to Manage Think Tank behind tackling the challenge of find the right skilled people to fly your rocket to the moon. A magnet for great talent, Justin has also brought his expertise to being able to identify Objectives and Key Results (OKR) for law firm team positions.

Originally conceived and launched as the HTM iCOO program, this first iteration provided coaching and consulting guidance to law firm owners that were outgrowing the How To Manage COO program.

“As their law firms matured, we knew firm owners were looking for in-house COOs. I structured iCOO to root out the right people and then, ultimately, train and onboard them,” Justin explains.

Explaining that HTM learned through the launch that law firms needed more, Justin found Law Firm owners wanted more. They were crying out for more vetting for positions, more training for onboarding, and more coaching to bring the new C-Level staffers up to speed. Soon, Small Law Firm Recruitingwas born. A turnkey solution, SmallLawFirmRecruting.com now finds, on- boards, and trains COO’s into law firms. Under Justin’s leadership, he has amassed a smart team of people behind these functions—each consistently drinking the same How To Manage a Small Law Firm Kool-Aid and spreading the Happy Lawyer love.

Another lesson learned was that Justin says he discovered most prospects for the iCOO program were just not fully prepared for a COO. In many instances, there was still work to be done before a COO would make sense to their firm. Yet, the true gold mine of the program lie in the structured,
robust onboarding that Justin did with each COO.

“It’s the secret sauce.” Justin explains.

“For four weeks, the COO is mine. I own them solely for the first two weeks working with them one-on-one, training them. Throughout weeks three and four, their days look like 20 hours with Justin and 20 hours with the Law Firm.”

Turns out that special sauce was an A-HA! moment for Justin and HTM. The demand for richer, more structured onboarding and staff training is extremely high. Imagine for a minute what it would be like for each of your team members to be bringing their “A”game every day. The ROI on your biggest resource and expense soars because they are working extremely smart and are fully trained to establish systems, to measure everything, and to hold others accountable and be held accountable, themselves. That’s the extraordinary difference between your team being forced to figure things out on their own and your team putting proven principles to work in your firm, says the key program developer.

Now in testing, Law Firm Staff Coaching will transform law firms through transforming their team. What’s more, the program touts a 4x to 50x ROI for your firm. That’s a powerful return! But even more, the process is designed to instill an environment that fosters success and reduces HR drama in firms. When all of these elements come together, your firm overflows in dividends. While many are financially lucrative, not all are. Some improve the quality of
everyone’s work life, which, in turn, have benefits of their own.

WHY INVEST IN STAFF TRAINING?

1. Trained Team Members are happy law firm team members.

2. Happy Team Members stay where they are happy. Less turnover.

3. Happy Team Members will work longer for an employer who values them.

4. Happy Team Members will work for fewer dollars. ROI goes up.

5. Communication is enabled and enhanced among all audiences engaging with Happy Team Members.

6. Happy Team Members produce at a higher rate and at higher quality.

When testing is completed, Justin explains the HTM 12-Week Crash Course will empower new hires who are not fee-earners through:

• Intense, practical training

• 1:1 coaching

• Personal business contribution plans

• Professional development plan for accountability and growth

Ideal candidates will include team positions such as law firm administrator, office manager, law firm marketing manager, marketing director, COOs, CFOs, and client intake staff.

“I help them create a personal business contribution plan which leverages this OKR system clearly defining success for their role and exactly how success will be measured in 90 day increments,” says Justin.

“I literally get them and their boss on the same page about those critical points of how success will be defined and what the goal posts will be.”

Coming out of that 12 week crash course, the program then transitions to a 1-to-1 coaching that works them through the OKR’s, holds them accountable to the progress they are making in those 90 day plans, and then submits a monthly report card to the owner to check in with them. Once a quarter we have a parent/teacher conference where the three of us get on one call and make sure that we go over the plan from the last 90 days and how we did according to that plan. We will know at the end of each quarter, did we get 60% of the way through? 90% of the way through? Why didn’t we get 100% of the way through? What were the roadblocks that stood in our way? How will we prevent those from happening next quarter?

The Staff Coaching Program ALPHA and BETA testing groups are closed. A waiting list is now forming for those firms interested in the live program. It can help you in maximizing marketing ROI in the legal industry.

Email justin@howtomanage.com to let him know you are interested.

SmallLawFirmRecruiting.com remains the perfect solution for those firms seeking qualified COO talent, and need help identifying and onboarding talent. Visit themonline to learn more about their services.