🎙️ What is the secret behind Baker Donaldson's remarkable success in the legal industry? Could it have something to do with a revolutionary approach to leadership development?
In this episode, Tim Lupinacci, Chairman and CEO of Baker Donaldson, peels back the curtain to reveal the leadership development strategies that have propelled his firm to the forefront of the industry. We dive into the idea of strategic transformation, discussing how it's not only possible, but absolutely necessary for success in today's evolving business landscape.
Topics we discussed:
🎯 The impact of leadership development on law firms
🏋️ The mini-MBA program: Its conception and results
💡 How Baker Donaldson approaches training at different levels
💼 Building trust and empowering employees for sustainable growth
🔄 Embracing change and refining strategies for continuous improvement
Our guest, Tim Lupinacci, is not only an exceptional leader but also a visionary thinker in the field of leadership development. Tim’s focus on strategic transformation and people-centric leadership has been instrumental in shaping the culture at Baker Donaldson, one of the largest law firms in the U.S.
Don't miss out on more insights from Tim Lupinacci! Make sure to connect with him on LinkedIn.
Join us in this episode as we uncover the power of investing in leadership development and its ripple effects on the success of an organization. This conversation is loaded with tangible takeaways that any leader, regardless of industry, can implement to drive their company towards strategic success. You can't afford to miss this one!
Hi, It's Isar the host of the Business Growth Accelerator Podcast
I am passionate about growing businesses and helping CEOs, business leaders, and entrepreneurs become more successful. I am also passionate about relationship building, community creation for businesses, and value creation through content.
I would love it if you connect with me on LinkedIn. Drop me a DM, and LMK you listened to the podcast, what you think and what topics you would like me to cover 🙏
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (00:00):
It makes them more attuned to the purpose
(00:02):
and certainly as a legalprofessional firm.
We're trying to help our clientsachieve their goals and
objectives.
but to help to connect the workthat's done by every individual
regardless of where title orwhat their position, or whether
they have a law degree or notinto what they're, what the
client's achieving, which couldbe in some instances to help
change the world.
Isar Meitis (01:19):
Before we jump into today's episode, there's
something I want to share withyou.
I've launched another podcast.
The podcast is called LeveragingAI And if you like this podcast,
you're gonna love leveraging AIbecause it's a very similar
approach.
I interview really smart peoplefrom the AI world practitioners
and experts who share how toleverage AI in order to grow
(01:41):
your business and advance yourcareer.
So pull up your phone right now,whatever platform you are using
in order to listen to thispodcast.
Search for leveraging ai, checkit out.
I think you'll find itfascinating.
There's a really fascinatinginterview with ChatGPT as the
guest.
It's unique and different andfun and interesting, and we talk
about the impact of AItechnology on businesses and
(02:04):
society as a whole.
So look for leveraging ai.
And if you enjoy it, subscribeto it and also write me a note
on LinkedIn and let me know whatyou think.
And now to the episode Hello andwelcome to the Business Growth
Accelerator.
This is Isar Meitis, your host,and I've got a special topic for
you today.
As I'm very passionate aboutcompany culture, and I really
think it's one of the mostcritical aspects for long-term
(02:27):
success of any company.
You can see short-term successwith little tricks and gimmicks
and stuff and promotions, but inthe long run, it's the people in
your business that will make itor break it, and having a
strong, positive companyculture.
Provides that operating system,that, bed that you can grow
stuff on in the long run.
(02:48):
Our guest today, Tim Lupinacciis the chairman and CEO of Baker
Donaldson, which is 130 yearsold law firm and one of the
largest in the nation.
And you would assume thatsomebody like that, his biggest
passion is law, and you'll bewrong.
At least I'm guessing.
His real passion is helpingother people develop leadership
skills in developing a healthywork environment and a culture
(03:11):
that will drive people to thriveand grow.
And that is the secret sauce onhow to keep on growing such a
long running company.
And in today's episode, we'regoing to dive into, first of
all, the why is it so importantand why should think about it as
a leader, but also the how.
What are the actual things thatteam and his team are doing in
(03:32):
order to nurture?
Growing other people and growingleadership skills within their
organization.
I think this is immenselycritical to any company and he,
I'm really humbled and excitedto have Tim as a guest of the
show.
Tim, welcome to the BusinessGrowth
Timothy M. Lupinac (03:47):
Accelerator.
Yes.
Sorry.
This is my honor to be here.
You have, I've already told you,you've added a lot of value to
me through all of your work, inso many different areas.
And, this is just an honor and Iabsolutely, I actually don't
tell my colleagues I could careless about the law.
I am more passionate aboutpeople and culture, and helping
people achieve their potential.
yeah, I'm excited to talk aboutthis.
Isar Meitis (04:07):
Awesome.
I really appreciate this and Iappreciate the kind words.
Let's start with why.
Yeah.
Why is it critical?
And if you want, let's go backIn your personal career, when
did you figure out that this wasso important?
Like in what time in your careerdid you say, oh my God, the
people around me, if they wouldhave these skills, that's what's
(04:30):
gonna make them and the companyand me more
Timothy M. Lupinacc (04:32):
successful?
Yeah, that's a great questionand it really does go back.
I did not have this concept ofbeing a leader and what that
meant until I was a younglawyer.
I didn't grow up around lawyers,the profession, my, we moved
around a lot and didn't knowanything about it.
But I literally almost stumbledinto law school.
I, I was a Mass com major.
I thought I wanted to do radioand television.
and, but I took a medial lawcourse and ah, this is
(04:54):
interesting.
and then I took the entranceexam for law school and did,
okay, so I'll just go to lawschool.
And so now I've got my first joband it's with a big firm, a
different firm.
And, I've probably been outabout a year or so and I've
viewed it very much as atransactional type deal.
Yeah.
Like I got a project to getdone, I turned it in.
And then I went on to bill timefor the next project.
(05:15):
and so I had, and I had a verytough boss.
He was a yeller.
and, and, but and I was excitedto be working with him cuz he
was an expert.
I did bankruptcy work, he didex, he was an expert in that
field.
anyway, we had a large projectthat we were working on.
I had a small part of it that Ithen got finished and handed it
to a lawyer who'd been at thefirm five or six years.
a middle level guy.
and then he'd finished it,turned it into the boss, and I'm
(05:37):
onto the next project.
And next thing I know, I'mgetting paged into our boss's
office, the other guy andmyself.
And he's, we walk in, he is on aconference call with a dozen
lawyers.
It turned out other lawyers fromother firms.
and He starts yelling at us thatwe had gotten the project
completely wrong.
And then he said, these idiotsare gonna stay here all night to
get this fixed.
(05:58):
Now I don't, that's not goodleadership.
and he ultimately, he changed.
But, and I thought, I'm gonnalose my job, whatever.
And so we spent, we got it allfixed and it turned out I had
drawn the short straw.
I was picking up my boss at hishouse the next morning to drive
to court for what all this stuffthe project was about.
And I thought, I literally, Iwas, am I gonna have a job by
(06:18):
the time we get back from thishearing?
And it was very quiet, awkwardsilence.
And then he did.
Start out and said he apologizedthat he shouldn't have yelled in
front of other lawyers.
He wasn't so much worried aboutthe terminology he used, but he
said I should have kept it inthe house.
but but then he said, the reasonI'm so disappointed and was so
aggravated, Tim is cuz I viewyou as a leader.
(06:39):
I think you've got a long,successful career ahead of you.
I don't necessarily think thatabout the mid-level lawyer that
was on that project.
I just expect you to own whatyou have and what your part of
the project is and make sure.
Sure it's right, because you'rea leader.
And that really was the firsttime that ever clicked that I'm
a leader.
I'm just a young low person onthe totem pole.
(07:00):
I had skills, but I didn't thinkof myself as a leader.
So that lit literally led me ona lifelong journey.
I've gotta get better at this.
If I'm a leader, I gotta knowwhat does that mean?
And I, it really just led me onmy journey about why now I'm so
passionate about it.
So that's the start of it.
Isar Meitis (07:14):
That's a great story.
so really, okay, let's turn intothe why.
Yeah.
Why should people in leadershippositions care about developing
other leaders around them?
Timothy M. Lupinacci (07:23):
Yeah.
and that's really what mypassion is because first of all,
it's helping folks understandthe mindset that everybody is a
leader.
So first of it, the why is tohave belief in themselves and
have confidence in themselvesthat it's, you don't need a
title, you don't need to run abig organization that you can
lead right where you are.
And that it's gonna really help,fuel your passion and your
purpose and what you're doing.
(07:44):
I talk a lot about, and we'veactually implemented some stuff
here at the firm about, yourpathway.
People are gonna have differentpathways to what they view as
success.
And some do look at a job asit's a paycheck to get to do
other things.
But while you're here, if youcan, if we can really get our
colleagues saying I want to havesome career ambition to maybe,
lead a bigger team or move upthis or get this skill, I think
(08:07):
it just makes, our colleaguesmore engaged.
It makes them more attuned tothe purpose and certainly as a
legal professional firm.
We're trying to help our clientsachieve their goals and
objectives.
but to help to connect the workthat's done by every individual
regardless of where title orwhat their position, or whether
they have a law degree or notinto what they're, what the
client's achieving, which couldbe in some instances to help
(08:28):
change the world.
I think it just helps'em becomemore engaged, more passionate,
and to deliver better clientservice to our clients and it
can be a real differentiator.
So those are some of the why'sthat drive me and like I said
earlier, I really am passionateabout people and helping them
really.
Have confidence and see andspeak into them like they can
accomplish some things.
not in a, hey, everything'sutopia.
(08:50):
It's a sh, bright, shiny world.
Everything, cuz we havechallenges and all that.
But just to, just haveconfidence that we can do more
in what we're trying toaccomplish.
So that's just some things aboutwhy it drives me and why I've
seen it work with our firm.
Isar Meitis (09:04):
Yeah.
I think what you're saying makea lot of sense.
I think you touched on two verybig points.
One is confidence, right?
It's yeah, I trust you.
to do this because I know youcan own the thing that, that I
expect you to do.
And the other is really tying itto a bigger goal, right?
So part of leadership is if I'mjust a note taker, okay, I, this
(09:27):
is what I do, right?
This is my world ends in mylittle task, whatever that task
is.
Big or small.
Yeah.
But if you're part of aleadership, okay, why are we
doing this?
We are doing this too.
So like you said, I could be anote taker, but if me taking
notes helps that other companyachieve their thing, which like
you say, could be saving,solving world hang hunger,
(09:48):
right?
Then I play a role in thatbigger thing, which makes the
thing that I do a lot moreimportant, and I love those
points.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (09:56):
Oh yeah.
a great example is, I talk, Ithought one of our, we have a
woman who's in our Baltimoreoffice who, her title's
receptionist, but Nicole ownsthat, not only the reception
area, but if she sees issues,she hears that something has to
get done, something else.
That's not her job.
She just step, nobody asks herto do it.
She steps up and gets it done.
She owns it, like you weresaying, Essar and.
(10:18):
That may help, a big strategymeeting that she doesn't even
know about that could impactsomething.
And she's one of the bestleaders I've ever seen best
leaders at our firm.
and by doing that in ownership,she actually has now elevated
her title.
She's moved on to do a littlebit bigger task because, and she
wasn't seeking that.
She doesn't think about it.
She just does it.
So yeah, I totally agree withyou.
(10:38):
Interesting.
Isar Meitis (10:38):
So let's move to the how, right?
Yeah.
So I think most people willunderstand even.
Without diving into the details,they understand there's a
benefit in that the how makes itdifficult, and that's why not
enough companies do that becausethere's, what do you actually do
to make FIFA people feel thatthey're leaders?
What do you help them do thatwill drive them personally to be
Timothy M. Lupinacci (11:01):
passionate about it?
Yeah, so we've done severalthings.
I've been in this role fouryears, four and a half years,
and I had a, about a six monthtransition before I took over.
And one of the first things Idid when we had a virtual town
hall to introduce me to thefirm, I knew a lot of people,
but not certainly everyone.
I started out the same, my viewthat everyone of them was a
leader and we needed everyone,stepping up and working together
(11:24):
that every person was valued andvaluable.
So one of it was just speakingthat into'em.
But then one of the first thingsI did is I want to hear from you
to know how we can get better.
We had really struggled andplateaued for a while as a firm,
so we needed to get better.
And I encouraged them to give mefeedback.
and I did, I went around andvisited all our 20 offices and
we had town halls and peoplegive me feedback.
(11:44):
And then important thing wasthat I listened to it.
And then on some of'em, Iexecuted on it.
I can't do everything andeverything wasn't a great idea,
but there was some low hangingfruit from our folks who were in
the trenches.
so that was just trying toinstill, that, again, I like
that word trust.
That's really important, thattrust in them that I trusted
them.
I wanted to learn how to getbetter.
So that was some of the firstpart.
(12:06):
But then I really did need tobuild out.
I could talk about pathways tosuccess, and pathways in your
career and driving purpose, butthat's just words on a page.
And the first couple years we'vebuilt out some, training, some
skill building we were doinginternally, and really called it
like pathways.
Like how, what are your desires,what are your career ambitions?
And what are some skills thatmaybe you don't have those
(12:27):
skills, we can help you getbetter.
And really try to get managersto really get to know.
their colleagues, theirstrengths, the areas they wanted
to improve, and then facilitatethat to some regular training.
And we, we do it virtually.
we do some in person.
so that was the first coupleyears we just really trying to
get some meat around it andthen, We did launch a vision.
Isar Meitis (12:46):
I wanna pause you.
I wanna pause you just for onesecond.
Yeah, sorry.
So basically what you're saying,you're taking a strategic
approach that we usually applyfor the business looking outside
to the inside of the business,meaning, For each individual
offer, let's say types ofindividuals and saying, okay,
you're here on point A, you wantto get to point B again, very
(13:06):
similar to the way you would dowith a company in five years.
You want to be there.
What needs to happen for you tobe there?
So in year one, you gottaaccomplish this and that what
resources in a company or skillsyou're missing in an individual.
Here's the training that can getyou there.
And I love that.
It's really a very strategicapproach to how to elevate
people through the path thatthey chose, which I think is.
(13:29):
More important than anything.
Because okay.
I don't, some people don't wannamanage the department.
That's right.
What they seek, they really, ifI use your company, they really
going to court and fightingjustice, right?
They don't care about running 20other people.
And so you gotta understand foreach person and then giving them
the tools to progress in theirown path.
And I absolutely love that.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (13:51):
Yeah.
and I appreciate that and Ialso, it's not easy either,
right?
there's some.
Job titles.
Some roles that it like in, inthe legal profession for
individuals who have lawdegrees, you come in and most
firms start, you have anassociate and then some firms,
you become a senior associateafter six or eight years.
And then you could become apartner or shareholder.
(14:11):
And then it's the equitypartner, equity shareholder.
it's a path that's pretty wellthere.
Expectations, differentcompanies you're gonna, but it
was harder on our businessservices staff side.
And even initially, our HRdirector was like, Yeah, but it
is a pretty flat organization ona lot of our things.
How can we do it?
I don't want to come off andsay, oh, this is easy, just go
do it.
It was really just understandingand then sitting down with some
(14:33):
folks in the, in that cohort,the business services staff,
what are some things that wouldbe helpful?
What would you think about?
and but I think it's just theintentionality to spend the time
and listen.
And try to build it out just cuzit's, it may be harder than some
areas like the law, the lawyers,it's pretty clear.
we have to skill build for themand we have to help them and
equip them.
but, so anyway, that's.
(14:55):
No,
Isar Meitis (14:55):
it's good stuff.
What was that?
Sorry I stopped you before thatin the middle to go into
Timothy M. Lupinacci (14:58):
the next point.
no.
it's because, it's interestingcause that was some of the
foundation and then, last year Ilaunched a strategic vision for
the firm and, with our firm.
We're pretty much situated inthe southeast Mid-Atlantic.
And when I was looking, talkingto colleagues about longer term
strategic planning, invariably.
It would get into thisdiscussion about geography,
should we be national?
Should we do this?
(15:19):
And then we have someindividuals who do have more of
a national practice and some aremore local practice.
And of course they're saying,oh, we should be more national
or we should be more regional.
And it was just divisive.
And so I really, I got all thisfeedback, and I went away for a
couple days.
I just know there's invaluableto just get away from everything
because I had all the knowledgeI needed.
there's nothing new under thesun, but it's really what's best
(15:39):
for us.
And I landed on this idea.
And again, this is not new.
It's been written about fordecades, about being trusted
advisors and I thought if wecould become better trusted
advisors to our clients, and youhave to unpack what that means,
that we would do better inclient service.
We could grow stickier clientrelationships.
We would be more strategic inour advice instead of just
reactive.
(16:00):
and then the one thing thatconnected back to particularly
the business services and staff,it's something that it would
applaud it.
The whole firm, it would be veryinclusive because our staff have
to be trusted advisors to thelawyers, to the professionals,
and they can build thatrelationship every day.
So that kind of became thefoundation of the strategy.
And again, this idea that itcan't just be words on the page.
(16:21):
I had to build some ways to helpfolks really make this
meaningful.
And people joke with me aboutthis term, terminology and I
know people who have earned anactual M B A.
It is very serious stuff.
You're very, that's amazing.
But I just came up with atrusted advisor, mini MBA
program for our firm.
And not just for the lawyers,but also for the staff.
(16:41):
And we have different trackswhere you can earn credits and
get some rewards.
but it's all with serioustraining about some of the skill
building on relationships andhow can we build trust and that
kind of stuff.
All the basic, so again, it's, Ithink it's just trying to be
creative and take something thatcan engage your colleagues in
something meaningful and theycan make progress.
They can see they're makingprogress.
Isar Meitis (17:02):
I love that.
I want to touch on somethingsimilar that we did at the
company I was in, few years ago.
I was part of the leadershipteam in a large travel
organization, and we had notexactly the same issues, but it
got down to the same thing.
We couldn't hire fast enough forthe growth, right?
We could have.
and we just didn't know what todo.
and what we ended up doing is webuilt our own academy, like
(17:23):
literally actual facility,buildings, classes, computers,
conference rooms, the wholething.
That's awesome.
And a curriculum that we couldtake people and teach them the
right way of doing things.
And for, in our case, was how todevelop relationships and write
the right contracts and growtheir little niche of the
(17:44):
business.
That was one half.
The other half is the stuffyou're talking about.
How do you own your business?
You are right, your own c e o,right?
Yeah.
And yet you're running yourselfand an assistant, but you're a
business unit.
You're a very small businessunit.
It's a billion plus dollarcompany, and you're running$1.7
million.
(18:04):
But you're running 1.7 million,which is more than the vast
majority of people on theplanet, right?
And so you better know how torun it.
So I think it's so important tounderstand that most people, I'm
now quoting, a friend of minewho is also a really smart
business consultant that says, Idon't know a single person that
goes to work in the morning andsays, I really wanna suck today.
(18:27):
Most people go to work saying, Iwant to do something good today.
And most of the cases when theydon't do that, it's either
because they don't have theright training or the right
tools or both, right?
Which means it's on us businessleaders to make sure they have
the right training and the righttools so they can do the right
things at work.
(18:47):
So I love the whole trainingsetup of it.
I just have an interestingquestion for people who are
considering this.
Who built the curriculum, thetraining, like what was the
actual process?
Because there's people have jobsin the company and they're not
to develop and deliver trainingcurriculum.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (19:02):
and it's, and it is inter That's a really
great question, sorry.
And I did not fully, appreciate.
How much that would take tobuild that out because, I, we
had a, all of our attorneys gottogether for a retreat to launch
the vision last year, and thenwe did follow on town halls with
all our staff, and that waslike, say April.
And of course I'm like, andwe're gonna help you and we're
(19:22):
gonna have this trusted advisormini b a and it's gonna kick off
this fall.
And then it's oh wait, we haveto actually, put words, get, put
action behind it.
And we have, we have aprofessional development, direct
director, but really it's notfocused on things like this.
It's been more just basic kindof things.
And so literally, my chief ofstaff and I just started.
(19:43):
and our chief administrativeofficer started building out
like, what could this look like?
And we just have to get itstarted.
not the whole arc of, cuz I loveyour academy.
I think that is brilliant.
And we did not, we knew weweren't gonna have that ready
and baked for the fall, but wereally started saying, okay,
let's break this into threetracks.
One was for the.
The shareholder, the partnerlevel attorneys, and we made
(20:04):
those in person with outsideconsultants.
People they'd get to fly into acity for an afternoon and the
next morning and then fly home.
then we had training for theyounger lawyers and our
paralegals that next level.
And that was more virtual, butit was live virtual.
Yeah.
and with follow on and withactivities and we're doing it
over the months of the fall.
And then for staff and businessservices, we actually had
(20:25):
in-person activities andtraining in each.
Office around the firm bydifferent leaders, and we built
out the curriculum, really builtaround that macer book about
trusted advisors, but just usingsome of the trust equation,
basic stuff.
But after we got it launched andwe had a lot of good feedback
for the fall and from the fall,and even some things we could do
better, which we've learnedfrom.
(20:46):
But it became clear to us wehave to get a professional to
help us.
So we actually have now hired atalent, a director of talent
development, and she had a lotof expertise in this and she's
now building out, we're doingsome stuff in the spring, but
she's really building out almostlike your academy type concept.
So absolutely agree.
It takes a lot of work andeffort and we've realized we
needed a professional to help usinternally to do it.
Isar Meitis (21:08):
So I love everything you're saying.
I want to drill one layerdeeper.
Yeah.
What's.
In the curriculum, what are thethings categories, right?
Obviously we're not gonna teachthe course now, but what are the
big bullet points that you teachpeople in order for them to
understand or how to become atrusted advisor?
(21:31):
How to actually build trust withsomebody to the level they will
give you any task that theythink you can accomplish.
Which is, like you're saying,you wanna do this in-house as
well as towards your
Timothy M. Lupinacci (21:43):
clients.
Yeah.
and that was really the whole,vision about being trusted
advisor was because that's whatthe clients are asking for.
there's all these resource, allthese, surveys in the legal
industry that, you know, Buyersof legal services, the general
councils and city, they'relooking for people who know
their industry, who know theirbusiness and are providing
strategic advice.
the world's much more complexthan it was yesterday, than it
(22:05):
was last year.
just as we've, talked about, forour shareholder level, we've
really spent a lot of timebuilding, training around
confidence.
and, and like we're, cuz we'rethinking like, how do we play up
into the bigger relationships,the deeper relationships,
confidence and communication,business acumen, how do you
translate legal principles intobusiness strategy?
(22:25):
Not because you've got a projectyou're working on, but to really
help identify risks, thatclients could be facing because
you know their industry.
So we really focused it a lotabout that client communication,
relationship building,understanding industries.
How do you do that?
for the younger lawyers, itreally was more built into.
Things like networking and alsoeffective communication and
(22:47):
relationship building.
and at the very early levels,like I came into working at a
law firm, I didn't know anybodyin the city I'm in.
I didn't know anything.
So it's really like, how do,what do you do?
you can't just say, go developbusiness.
cause the.
Particular profession, at leastour firm, you're not going out
and just doing cold call salesstuff.
Although some firms do that'sfine.
That just hadn't been ourculture.
so we're just trying to helpwith that.
(23:08):
And then with business servicesand staff, we really did take
apart this trust equation.
But how can you build trust?
How can you own projects?
how can you, give feedback?
So it's very specificallytailored to what we have, we're
really trying to accomplish.
And now we're.
Like looking at the 2.0 of that,it's really more refining it, in
the different areas.
So I love this.
(23:30):
So
Isar Meitis (23:30):
if we go back and break this, the logic is
obvious, right?
The why we covered, right?
But then the how is more of aview of, I always like the FRO
two.
equation, and I think it's, JimCollins came up with the FRO
two, yes equation.
Like you, you wanna go fromwhere you are right now to where
(23:53):
you want to go, and that's thefirst thing you gotta define.
And I love the way you defineit.
It's not the same for everybodyin the company.
There's different fro twos fordifferent people, depending on
the role, depending on theirlevel, depending on their
experience and their seniority,et cetera.
So if you break it out intobucket and say, okay, for this
bucket, this is the FRO two, thesecond bucket, this is it.
(24:14):
Once you map that, now you canactually start defining what are
the steps, how many hours,what's the physical location
like, all these kind of thingsto get the best outcome.
So I love all of this.
And then you said something thatis.
Maybe the most important thingis then get feedback and do it
again.
Oh.
And get more feedback and do itagain, because I can get, I
think the biggest fear peoplehave is I don't get it right.
(24:36):
It'll be such a huge waste ofresources, time, money, blah,
blah, blah.
And I'm like, yeah, that you, Ican guarantee you are not gonna
get it right in.
Or in the first time around.
But if you don't do the firstand second time, that's gonna be
not great.
And then the second one's gonnabe okay, and then the third
one's gonna be good.
And then the fourth one's gonnabe, oh my God, this was
excellent.
You will never get to theexcellent one if you don't do
the first one, it's gonna beokay.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (24:56):
Yeah, no, I totally agree.
And it's really challenging.
I, most people like this, butcertainly lawyers are on the end
of the spectrum about they gottaknow more than everyone in the
room.
Or at least they think they knowmore than everything in the room
and they, it's gotta, they don'twanna mess up.
You don't wanna make mistakes.
Yeah.
but that's how you learn.
That's how you get better.
And it's funny you say that cuzone of our in-person training
(25:16):
sessions we did last fall, I wasjust on a call with, the
individual.
So professor at, Northwesternand with our new talent
development director and we weretalking about like his next
program and we were veryspecific talking about, this is
some of the feedback, thisreally.
Hit home.
This was, some things didn'treally connect.
How can we build this goingforward?
so I absolutely think that'scritical.
(25:38):
and I also agree the here tothere, the from too, or, how do
we get from here to there?
You've gotta paint that visionof the, there, the outcome you
want, and then back it up.
And so we are, now that we are,really.
More than just getting itlaunched.
We're thinking about like in thecontext of training, like the
level 1 0 1 course and 2 0 1 and3 0 1.
you, but there will be astepping stone approach to get
(26:00):
to the outcome we want.
and so we're really trying to beintentional about that.
So I totally agree.
I think you're spot on with whatyou said.
Isar, I gotta ask
Isar Meitis (26:08):
you Yeah.
One more follow up question thatI'm very curious about.
Yeah.
What's the tangible outcomes youcan actually measure?
Yeah, because you started almosta year ago, right?
do you already see stuff you'resaying, oh, I can see this, and
this happening in this sector ofthe company.
And it's obviously a directoutcome of the effort that we
(26:32):
put in.
Yeah.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (26:32):
Yeah.
and you're, you.
That's another obviously greatimportant, very important
leadership principle that, welaunched a strategy, but again,
it's just words on the paper.
I wanna be held accountable.
So I put some very specificmeasures.
and the three big ones, as itrelates to your question that we
did, we were, we want toincrease the number of what we
call our strategic clients,which are really clients where
we do business in more than one,just one business area.
(26:55):
So we had a definition of whatthat means.
we wanted to improve our brandawareness in the industry and we
wanted to improve our employeeengagement.
And we had some financialmetrics and we actually.
Last year was a record year.
And of course I'm tyingconnecting it back to the people
doing.
I think people taking some ofthese steps is translating, you,
it's hard to always connect thedots, but to see, look, we tell
(27:17):
you to do this, y'all are doingit, you're bought in.
And now we're driving financialperformance.
That's great.
But on those other threetargets, at least in the first,
nine months to 12 months ofthis, we just, got our latest,
employee engagement surveys upand we were up in every
category.
and, still areas forimprovement.
but they were all, 75% or abovewere positive or, whatever the
(27:38):
top two categories of a fivepoint scale.
So we've made improvement overyear, our brand awareness.
We have an external source thatdoes brand awareness and it's
not.
What do you think about BakerDonaldson?
It's really just talking tobuyers of legal services.
Who do you use and trust?
So it's more of a, yeah.
and we increase that by, fromlike the 80th best brand in the
legal market to 68, somethinglike that, year over year.
(28:01):
and then we have.
Incrementally moved.
It's like from 12% to 12.5% ofstrategic clients, after the,
but it's at least it's going theright direction.
Yeah.
And this year is really a bigfocus on what that means and how
to do it.
So all that to say, weabsolutely put measures in that.
We think it's always hard withthe lead measures, lag measures.
But we tried to put some thingsout there that we thought, if
(28:22):
this is happening, we can tie itback to some of the stuff we're
doing.
so far, so good.
It's been a good first year.
Isar Meitis (28:29):
I love that.
I, and I love your point aboutleading indicators versus
lagging indicators.
Yeah.
And you've gotta be very carefulwith what you measure and when
you measure it.
For us, again, going back to theacademy example, yeah.
In the beginning it createssometimes more noise than good.
Cuz the people who go throughthe academy now has a different
kind of knowledge and adifferent focus and suddenly
people who didn't.
(28:50):
And that creates friction withinthe company.
But what happened was, Is thatwithin three to four years, most
of middle management, most ofmiddle management were people
who went through the academy.
Got, and that was a gamechanger.
And the crazy thing is sincethen, that company has been
acquired and it's been through amerger and it's been, and still
(29:13):
a lot of people in the middlemanagement in the new unified
company, these people who'vebeen through the academy 10
years ago.
that's great.
and that proves the point that.
In the long run.
Going back to what I said in thebeginning, and I swear I didn't
plan this, but we went fullcircle in the long run.
If you invest in these kind ofthings, yeah, it works.
And like you said, sometimes youcan see immediate outcome.
(29:37):
Sometimes you, sometimes your,even your employee engagement
survey will show you negativeresults because people are in
that change process and peopledon't like change.
And But if you trust the processand you're really figuring out a
better capabilities, betterskills, better mindsets, better
culture, better everything foryour employees, in the long run,
(29:59):
it will pay off.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (30:01):
you've, we could unpack this for hours
because the whole changemanagement piece is really
important.
Cause as you said, even likewith a law firm, it's been done
generally the same way for ahundred year, a hundred years,
But to have that pivot to, Italk about thinking about our
firm as a best run business,like our clients.
Think about it.
And that has heightenedexpectations, right?
Of re I've gotta show you thereturn on investment that I'm
(30:23):
investing in this mini M B a,but what's the return and what's
the expectation and theaccountability.
And so it is, it does go, itdoes tie, hand in glove, I think
to exactly what you're sayingwith the academy.
Like you had to get folks boughtin.
That this is meaningful and youhad to spend the money to build
it out without maybe seeing theresults immediately.
(30:43):
but that's, but now you lookback years later and you can
have the satisfaction that itmade the difference in people's
lives, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Isar Meitis (30:52):
Tim, fascinating conversation.
Oh yeah.
I really thank you.
This was, oh, Very eye-opening.
I think you're doing reallyimportant stuff, and again,
you're seeing the results, butanybody out there who's
considering this, there were alot of great tips from Tim on,
on how to think about it, how toexecute on it, little steps
along the way.
Tim, if people wanna follow youto know more and what you're
(31:13):
doing and how you're doing it,if they wanna work with a law
firm, like what's the best wayto connect with you, follow you,
and so on.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (31:18):
Sure.
Yeah.
I am on Instagram with my nameand then, the firm is Baker
Donaldson, b a k e r d o n e l so n.com, which you can find me
there.
And then I did launch earlierthis year, a nonprofit called
Everybody leads.org.
and that website is up andthey'll have content about
leadership.
That whole approach of what I'mtrying to do there is take some
(31:39):
of these basic leadership skillsinto underserved communities,
but I am putting content.
And workbooks and things likethat up there as we build it
out.
So that would be another placeto check and certainly can
contact me through that websiteas well.
Isar Meitis (31:51):
Fantastic.
Thank you so much.
This was really great.
I appreciate your time.
Enjoy the long weekend.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (31:56):
Yes, you too.
Thank you.
I really did enjoy this as well.
Isar, keep doing what you'redoing.
You're doing good work, man.
Thank you.
It makes them more attuned to the purpose
(00:02):
and certainly as a legalprofessional firm.
We're trying to help our clientsachieve their goals and
objectives.
but to help to connect the workthat's done by every individual
regardless of where title orwhat their position, or whether
they have a law degree or notinto what they're, what the
client's achieving, which couldbe in some instances to help
change the world.
Isar Meitis (01:19):
Before we jump into today's episode, there's
something I want to share withyou.
I've launched another podcast.
The podcast is called LeveragingAI And if you like this podcast,
you're gonna love leveraging AIbecause it's a very similar
approach.
I interview really smart peoplefrom the AI world practitioners
and experts who share how toleverage AI in order to grow
(01:41):
your business and advance yourcareer.
So pull up your phone right now,whatever platform you are using
in order to listen to thispodcast.
Search for leveraging ai, checkit out.
I think you'll find itfascinating.
There's a really fascinatinginterview with ChatGPT as the
guest.
It's unique and different andfun and interesting, and we talk
about the impact of AItechnology on businesses and
(02:04):
society as a whole.
So look for leveraging ai.
And if you enjoy it, subscribeto it and also write me a note
on LinkedIn and let me know whatyou think.
And now to the episode Hello andwelcome to the Business Growth
Accelerator.
This is Isar Meitis, your host,and I've got a special topic for
you today.
As I'm very passionate aboutcompany culture, and I really
think it's one of the mostcritical aspects for long-term
(02:27):
success of any company.
You can see short-term successwith little tricks and gimmicks
and stuff and promotions, but inthe long run, it's the people in
your business that will make itor break it, and having a
strong, positive companyculture.
Provides that operating system,that, bed that you can grow
stuff on in the long run.
(02:48):
Our guest today, Tim Lupinacciis the chairman and CEO of Baker
Donaldson, which is 130 yearsold law firm and one of the
largest in the nation.
And you would assume thatsomebody like that, his biggest
passion is law, and you'll bewrong.
At least I'm guessing.
His real passion is helpingother people develop leadership
skills in developing a healthywork environment and a culture
(03:11):
that will drive people to thriveand grow.
And that is the secret sauce onhow to keep on growing such a
long running company.
And in today's episode, we'regoing to dive into, first of
all, the why is it so importantand why should think about it as
a leader, but also the how.
What are the actual things thatteam and his team are doing in
(03:32):
order to nurture?
Growing other people and growingleadership skills within their
organization.
I think this is immenselycritical to any company and he,
I'm really humbled and excitedto have Tim as a guest of the
show.
Tim, welcome to the BusinessGrowth
Timothy M. Lupinac (03:47):
Accelerator.
Yes.
Sorry.
This is my honor to be here.
You have, I've already told you,you've added a lot of value to
me through all of your work, inso many different areas.
And, this is just an honor and Iabsolutely, I actually don't
tell my colleagues I could careless about the law.
I am more passionate aboutpeople and culture, and helping
people achieve their potential.
yeah, I'm excited to talk aboutthis.
Isar Meitis (04:07):
Awesome.
I really appreciate this and Iappreciate the kind words.
Let's start with why.
Yeah.
Why is it critical?
And if you want, let's go backIn your personal career, when
did you figure out that this wasso important?
Like in what time in your careerdid you say, oh my God, the
people around me, if they wouldhave these skills, that's what's
(04:30):
gonna make them and the companyand me more
Timothy M. Lupinacc (04:32):
successful?
Yeah, that's a great questionand it really does go back.
I did not have this concept ofbeing a leader and what that
meant until I was a younglawyer.
I didn't grow up around lawyers,the profession, my, we moved
around a lot and didn't knowanything about it.
But I literally almost stumbledinto law school.
I, I was a Mass com major.
I thought I wanted to do radioand television.
and, but I took a medial lawcourse and ah, this is
(04:54):
interesting.
and then I took the entranceexam for law school and did,
okay, so I'll just go to lawschool.
And so now I've got my first joband it's with a big firm, a
different firm.
And, I've probably been outabout a year or so and I've
viewed it very much as atransactional type deal.
Yeah.
Like I got a project to getdone, I turned it in.
And then I went on to bill timefor the next project.
(05:15):
and so I had, and I had a verytough boss.
He was a yeller.
and, and, but and I was excitedto be working with him cuz he
was an expert.
I did bankruptcy work, he didex, he was an expert in that
field.
anyway, we had a large projectthat we were working on.
I had a small part of it that Ithen got finished and handed it
to a lawyer who'd been at thefirm five or six years.
a middle level guy.
and then he'd finished it,turned it into the boss, and I'm
(05:37):
onto the next project.
And next thing I know, I'mgetting paged into our boss's
office, the other guy andmyself.
And he's, we walk in, he is on aconference call with a dozen
lawyers.
It turned out other lawyers fromother firms.
and He starts yelling at us thatwe had gotten the project
completely wrong.
And then he said, these idiotsare gonna stay here all night to
get this fixed.
(05:58):
Now I don't, that's not goodleadership.
and he ultimately, he changed.
But, and I thought, I'm gonnalose my job, whatever.
And so we spent, we got it allfixed and it turned out I had
drawn the short straw.
I was picking up my boss at hishouse the next morning to drive
to court for what all this stuffthe project was about.
And I thought, I literally, Iwas, am I gonna have a job by
(06:18):
the time we get back from thishearing?
And it was very quiet, awkwardsilence.
And then he did.
Start out and said he apologizedthat he shouldn't have yelled in
front of other lawyers.
He wasn't so much worried aboutthe terminology he used, but he
said I should have kept it inthe house.
but but then he said, the reasonI'm so disappointed and was so
aggravated, Tim is cuz I viewyou as a leader.
(06:39):
I think you've got a long,successful career ahead of you.
I don't necessarily think thatabout the mid-level lawyer that
was on that project.
I just expect you to own whatyou have and what your part of
the project is and make sure.
Sure it's right, because you'rea leader.
And that really was the firsttime that ever clicked that I'm
a leader.
I'm just a young low person onthe totem pole.
(07:00):
I had skills, but I didn't thinkof myself as a leader.
So that lit literally led me ona lifelong journey.
I've gotta get better at this.
If I'm a leader, I gotta knowwhat does that mean?
And I, it really just led me onmy journey about why now I'm so
passionate about it.
So that's the start of it.
Isar Meitis (07:14):
That's a great story.
so really, okay, let's turn intothe why.
Yeah.
Why should people in leadershippositions care about developing
other leaders around them?
Timothy M. Lupinacci (07:23):
Yeah.
and that's really what mypassion is because first of all,
it's helping folks understandthe mindset that everybody is a
leader.
So first of it, the why is tohave belief in themselves and
have confidence in themselvesthat it's, you don't need a
title, you don't need to run abig organization that you can
lead right where you are.
And that it's gonna really help,fuel your passion and your
purpose and what you're doing.
(07:44):
I talk a lot about, and we'veactually implemented some stuff
here at the firm about, yourpathway.
People are gonna have differentpathways to what they view as
success.
And some do look at a job asit's a paycheck to get to do
other things.
But while you're here, if youcan, if we can really get our
colleagues saying I want to havesome career ambition to maybe,
lead a bigger team or move upthis or get this skill, I think
(08:07):
it just makes, our colleaguesmore engaged.
It makes them more attuned tothe purpose and certainly as a
legal professional firm.
We're trying to help our clientsachieve their goals and
objectives.
but to help to connect the workthat's done by every individual
regardless of where title orwhat their position, or whether
they have a law degree or notinto what they're, what the
client's achieving, which couldbe in some instances to help
(08:28):
change the world.
I think it just helps'em becomemore engaged, more passionate,
and to deliver better clientservice to our clients and it
can be a real differentiator.
So those are some of the why'sthat drive me and like I said
earlier, I really am passionateabout people and helping them
really.
Have confidence and see andspeak into them like they can
accomplish some things.
not in a, hey, everything'sutopia.
(08:50):
It's a sh, bright, shiny world.
Everything, cuz we havechallenges and all that.
But just to, just haveconfidence that we can do more
in what we're trying toaccomplish.
So that's just some things aboutwhy it drives me and why I've
seen it work with our firm.
Isar Meitis (09:04):
Yeah.
I think what you're saying makea lot of sense.
I think you touched on two verybig points.
One is confidence, right?
It's yeah, I trust you.
to do this because I know youcan own the thing that, that I
expect you to do.
And the other is really tying itto a bigger goal, right?
So part of leadership is if I'mjust a note taker, okay, I, this
(09:27):
is what I do, right?
This is my world ends in mylittle task, whatever that task
is.
Big or small.
Yeah.
But if you're part of aleadership, okay, why are we
doing this?
We are doing this too.
So like you said, I could be anote taker, but if me taking
notes helps that other companyachieve their thing, which like
you say, could be saving,solving world hang hunger,
(09:48):
right?
Then I play a role in thatbigger thing, which makes the
thing that I do a lot moreimportant, and I love those
points.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (09:56):
Oh yeah.
a great example is, I talk, Ithought one of our, we have a
woman who's in our Baltimoreoffice who, her title's
receptionist, but Nicole ownsthat, not only the reception
area, but if she sees issues,she hears that something has to
get done, something else.
That's not her job.
She just step, nobody asks herto do it.
She steps up and gets it done.
She owns it, like you weresaying, Essar and.
(10:18):
That may help, a big strategymeeting that she doesn't even
know about that could impactsomething.
And she's one of the bestleaders I've ever seen best
leaders at our firm.
and by doing that in ownership,she actually has now elevated
her title.
She's moved on to do a littlebit bigger task because, and she
wasn't seeking that.
She doesn't think about it.
She just does it.
So yeah, I totally agree withyou.
(10:38):
Interesting.
Isar Meitis (10:38):
So let's move to the how, right?
Yeah.
So I think most people willunderstand even.
Without diving into the details,they understand there's a
benefit in that the how makes itdifficult, and that's why not
enough companies do that becausethere's, what do you actually do
to make FIFA people feel thatthey're leaders?
What do you help them do thatwill drive them personally to be
Timothy M. Lupinacci (11:01):
passionate about it?
Yeah, so we've done severalthings.
I've been in this role fouryears, four and a half years,
and I had a, about a six monthtransition before I took over.
And one of the first things Idid when we had a virtual town
hall to introduce me to thefirm, I knew a lot of people,
but not certainly everyone.
I started out the same, my viewthat everyone of them was a
leader and we needed everyone,stepping up and working together
(11:24):
that every person was valued andvaluable.
So one of it was just speakingthat into'em.
But then one of the first thingsI did is I want to hear from you
to know how we can get better.
We had really struggled andplateaued for a while as a firm,
so we needed to get better.
And I encouraged them to give mefeedback.
and I did, I went around andvisited all our 20 offices and
we had town halls and peoplegive me feedback.
(11:44):
And then important thing wasthat I listened to it.
And then on some of'em, Iexecuted on it.
I can't do everything andeverything wasn't a great idea,
but there was some low hangingfruit from our folks who were in
the trenches.
so that was just trying toinstill, that, again, I like
that word trust.
That's really important, thattrust in them that I trusted
them.
I wanted to learn how to getbetter.
So that was some of the firstpart.
(12:06):
But then I really did need tobuild out.
I could talk about pathways tosuccess, and pathways in your
career and driving purpose, butthat's just words on a page.
And the first couple years we'vebuilt out some, training, some
skill building we were doinginternally, and really called it
like pathways.
Like how, what are your desires,what are your career ambitions?
And what are some skills thatmaybe you don't have those
(12:27):
skills, we can help you getbetter.
And really try to get managersto really get to know.
their colleagues, theirstrengths, the areas they wanted
to improve, and then facilitatethat to some regular training.
And we, we do it virtually.
we do some in person.
so that was the first coupleyears we just really trying to
get some meat around it andthen, We did launch a vision.
Isar Meitis (12:46):
I wanna pause you.
I wanna pause you just for onesecond.
Yeah, sorry.
So basically what you're saying,you're taking a strategic
approach that we usually applyfor the business looking outside
to the inside of the business,meaning, For each individual
offer, let's say types ofindividuals and saying, okay,
you're here on point A, you wantto get to point B again, very
(13:06):
similar to the way you would dowith a company in five years.
You want to be there.
What needs to happen for you tobe there?
So in year one, you gottaaccomplish this and that what
resources in a company or skillsyou're missing in an individual.
Here's the training that can getyou there.
And I love that.
It's really a very strategicapproach to how to elevate
people through the path thatthey chose, which I think is.
(13:29):
More important than anything.
Because okay.
I don't, some people don't wannamanage the department.
That's right.
What they seek, they really, ifI use your company, they really
going to court and fightingjustice, right?
They don't care about running 20other people.
And so you gotta understand foreach person and then giving them
the tools to progress in theirown path.
And I absolutely love that.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (13:51):
Yeah.
and I appreciate that and Ialso, it's not easy either,
right?
there's some.
Job titles.
Some roles that it like in, inthe legal profession for
individuals who have lawdegrees, you come in and most
firms start, you have anassociate and then some firms,
you become a senior associateafter six or eight years.
And then you could become apartner or shareholder.
(14:11):
And then it's the equitypartner, equity shareholder.
it's a path that's pretty wellthere.
Expectations, differentcompanies you're gonna, but it
was harder on our businessservices staff side.
And even initially, our HRdirector was like, Yeah, but it
is a pretty flat organization ona lot of our things.
How can we do it?
I don't want to come off andsay, oh, this is easy, just go
do it.
It was really just understandingand then sitting down with some
(14:33):
folks in the, in that cohort,the business services staff,
what are some things that wouldbe helpful?
What would you think about?
and but I think it's just theintentionality to spend the time
and listen.
And try to build it out just cuzit's, it may be harder than some
areas like the law, the lawyers,it's pretty clear.
we have to skill build for themand we have to help them and
equip them.
but, so anyway, that's.
(14:55):
No,
Isar Meitis (14:55):
it's good stuff.
What was that?
Sorry I stopped you before thatin the middle to go into
Timothy M. Lupinacci (14:58):
the next point.
no.
it's because, it's interestingcause that was some of the
foundation and then, last year Ilaunched a strategic vision for
the firm and, with our firm.
We're pretty much situated inthe southeast Mid-Atlantic.
And when I was looking, talkingto colleagues about longer term
strategic planning, invariably.
It would get into thisdiscussion about geography,
should we be national?
Should we do this?
(15:19):
And then we have someindividuals who do have more of
a national practice and some aremore local practice.
And of course they're saying,oh, we should be more national
or we should be more regional.
And it was just divisive.
And so I really, I got all thisfeedback, and I went away for a
couple days.
I just know there's invaluableto just get away from everything
because I had all the knowledgeI needed.
there's nothing new under thesun, but it's really what's best
(15:39):
for us.
And I landed on this idea.
And again, this is not new.
It's been written about fordecades, about being trusted
advisors and I thought if wecould become better trusted
advisors to our clients, and youhave to unpack what that means,
that we would do better inclient service.
We could grow stickier clientrelationships.
We would be more strategic inour advice instead of just
reactive.
(16:00):
and then the one thing thatconnected back to particularly
the business services and staff,it's something that it would
applaud it.
The whole firm, it would be veryinclusive because our staff have
to be trusted advisors to thelawyers, to the professionals,
and they can build thatrelationship every day.
So that kind of became thefoundation of the strategy.
And again, this idea that itcan't just be words on the page.
(16:21):
I had to build some ways to helpfolks really make this
meaningful.
And people joke with me aboutthis term, terminology and I
know people who have earned anactual M B A.
It is very serious stuff.
You're very, that's amazing.
But I just came up with atrusted advisor, mini MBA
program for our firm.
And not just for the lawyers,but also for the staff.
(16:41):
And we have different trackswhere you can earn credits and
get some rewards.
but it's all with serioustraining about some of the skill
building on relationships andhow can we build trust and that
kind of stuff.
All the basic, so again, it's, Ithink it's just trying to be
creative and take something thatcan engage your colleagues in
something meaningful and theycan make progress.
They can see they're makingprogress.
Isar Meitis (17:02):
I love that.
I want to touch on somethingsimilar that we did at the
company I was in, few years ago.
I was part of the leadershipteam in a large travel
organization, and we had notexactly the same issues, but it
got down to the same thing.
We couldn't hire fast enough forthe growth, right?
We could have.
and we just didn't know what todo.
and what we ended up doing is webuilt our own academy, like
(17:23):
literally actual facility,buildings, classes, computers,
conference rooms, the wholething.
That's awesome.
And a curriculum that we couldtake people and teach them the
right way of doing things.
And for, in our case, was how todevelop relationships and write
the right contracts and growtheir little niche of the
(17:44):
business.
That was one half.
The other half is the stuffyou're talking about.
How do you own your business?
You are right, your own c e o,right?
Yeah.
And yet you're running yourselfand an assistant, but you're a
business unit.
You're a very small businessunit.
It's a billion plus dollarcompany, and you're running$1.7
million.
(18:04):
But you're running 1.7 million,which is more than the vast
majority of people on theplanet, right?
And so you better know how torun it.
So I think it's so important tounderstand that most people, I'm
now quoting, a friend of minewho is also a really smart
business consultant that says, Idon't know a single person that
goes to work in the morning andsays, I really wanna suck today.
(18:27):
Most people go to work saying, Iwant to do something good today.
And most of the cases when theydon't do that, it's either
because they don't have theright training or the right
tools or both, right?
Which means it's on us businessleaders to make sure they have
the right training and the righttools so they can do the right
things at work.
(18:47):
So I love the whole trainingsetup of it.
I just have an interestingquestion for people who are
considering this.
Who built the curriculum, thetraining, like what was the
actual process?
Because there's people have jobsin the company and they're not
to develop and deliver trainingcurriculum.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (19:02):
and it's, and it is inter That's a really
great question, sorry.
And I did not fully, appreciate.
How much that would take tobuild that out because, I, we
had a, all of our attorneys gottogether for a retreat to launch
the vision last year, and thenwe did follow on town halls with
all our staff, and that waslike, say April.
And of course I'm like, andwe're gonna help you and we're
(19:22):
gonna have this trusted advisormini b a and it's gonna kick off
this fall.
And then it's oh wait, we haveto actually, put words, get, put
action behind it.
And we have, we have aprofessional development, direct
director, but really it's notfocused on things like this.
It's been more just basic kindof things.
And so literally, my chief ofstaff and I just started.
(19:43):
and our chief administrativeofficer started building out
like, what could this look like?
And we just have to get itstarted.
not the whole arc of, cuz I loveyour academy.
I think that is brilliant.
And we did not, we knew weweren't gonna have that ready
and baked for the fall, but wereally started saying, okay,
let's break this into threetracks.
One was for the.
The shareholder, the partnerlevel attorneys, and we made
(20:04):
those in person with outsideconsultants.
People they'd get to fly into acity for an afternoon and the
next morning and then fly home.
then we had training for theyounger lawyers and our
paralegals that next level.
And that was more virtual, butit was live virtual.
Yeah.
and with follow on and withactivities and we're doing it
over the months of the fall.
And then for staff and businessservices, we actually had
(20:25):
in-person activities andtraining in each.
Office around the firm bydifferent leaders, and we built
out the curriculum, really builtaround that macer book about
trusted advisors, but just usingsome of the trust equation,
basic stuff.
But after we got it launched andwe had a lot of good feedback
for the fall and from the fall,and even some things we could do
better, which we've learnedfrom.
(20:46):
But it became clear to us wehave to get a professional to
help us.
So we actually have now hired atalent, a director of talent
development, and she had a lotof expertise in this and she's
now building out, we're doingsome stuff in the spring, but
she's really building out almostlike your academy type concept.
So absolutely agree.
It takes a lot of work andeffort and we've realized we
needed a professional to help usinternally to do it.
Isar Meitis (21:08):
So I love everything you're saying.
I want to drill one layerdeeper.
Yeah.
What's.
In the curriculum, what are thethings categories, right?
Obviously we're not gonna teachthe course now, but what are the
big bullet points that you teachpeople in order for them to
understand or how to become atrusted advisor?
(21:31):
How to actually build trust withsomebody to the level they will
give you any task that theythink you can accomplish.
Which is, like you're saying,you wanna do this in-house as
well as towards your
Timothy M. Lupinacci (21:43):
clients.
Yeah.
and that was really the whole,vision about being trusted
advisor was because that's whatthe clients are asking for.
there's all these resource, allthese, surveys in the legal
industry that, you know, Buyersof legal services, the general
councils and city, they'relooking for people who know
their industry, who know theirbusiness and are providing
strategic advice.
the world's much more complexthan it was yesterday, than it
(22:05):
was last year.
just as we've, talked about, forour shareholder level, we've
really spent a lot of timebuilding, training around
confidence.
and, and like we're, cuz we'rethinking like, how do we play up
into the bigger relationships,the deeper relationships,
confidence and communication,business acumen, how do you
translate legal principles intobusiness strategy?
(22:25):
Not because you've got a projectyou're working on, but to really
help identify risks, thatclients could be facing because
you know their industry.
So we really focused it a lotabout that client communication,
relationship building,understanding industries.
How do you do that?
for the younger lawyers, itreally was more built into.
Things like networking and alsoeffective communication and
(22:47):
relationship building.
and at the very early levels,like I came into working at a
law firm, I didn't know anybodyin the city I'm in.
I didn't know anything.
So it's really like, how do,what do you do?
you can't just say, go developbusiness.
cause the.
Particular profession, at leastour firm, you're not going out
and just doing cold call salesstuff.
Although some firms do that'sfine.
That just hadn't been ourculture.
so we're just trying to helpwith that.
(23:08):
And then with business servicesand staff, we really did take
apart this trust equation.
But how can you build trust?
How can you own projects?
how can you, give feedback?
So it's very specificallytailored to what we have, we're
really trying to accomplish.
And now we're.
Like looking at the 2.0 of that,it's really more refining it, in
the different areas.
So I love this.
(23:30):
So
Isar Meitis (23:30):
if we go back and break this, the logic is
obvious, right?
The why we covered, right?
But then the how is more of aview of, I always like the FRO
two.
equation, and I think it's, JimCollins came up with the FRO
two, yes equation.
Like you, you wanna go fromwhere you are right now to where
(23:53):
you want to go, and that's thefirst thing you gotta define.
And I love the way you defineit.
It's not the same for everybodyin the company.
There's different fro twos fordifferent people, depending on
the role, depending on theirlevel, depending on their
experience and their seniority,et cetera.
So if you break it out intobucket and say, okay, for this
bucket, this is the FRO two, thesecond bucket, this is it.
(24:14):
Once you map that, now you canactually start defining what are
the steps, how many hours,what's the physical location
like, all these kind of thingsto get the best outcome.
So I love all of this.
And then you said something thatis.
Maybe the most important thingis then get feedback and do it
again.
Oh.
And get more feedback and do itagain, because I can get, I
think the biggest fear peoplehave is I don't get it right.
(24:36):
It'll be such a huge waste ofresources, time, money, blah,
blah, blah.
And I'm like, yeah, that you, Ican guarantee you are not gonna
get it right in.
Or in the first time around.
But if you don't do the firstand second time, that's gonna be
not great.
And then the second one's gonnabe okay, and then the third
one's gonna be good.
And then the fourth one's gonnabe, oh my God, this was
excellent.
You will never get to theexcellent one if you don't do
the first one, it's gonna beokay.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (24:56):
Yeah, no, I totally agree.
And it's really challenging.
I, most people like this, butcertainly lawyers are on the end
of the spectrum about they gottaknow more than everyone in the
room.
Or at least they think they knowmore than everything in the room
and they, it's gotta, they don'twanna mess up.
You don't wanna make mistakes.
Yeah.
but that's how you learn.
That's how you get better.
And it's funny you say that cuzone of our in-person training
(25:16):
sessions we did last fall, I wasjust on a call with, the
individual.
So professor at, Northwesternand with our new talent
development director and we weretalking about like his next
program and we were veryspecific talking about, this is
some of the feedback, thisreally.
Hit home.
This was, some things didn'treally connect.
How can we build this goingforward?
so I absolutely think that'scritical.
(25:38):
and I also agree the here tothere, the from too, or, how do
we get from here to there?
You've gotta paint that visionof the, there, the outcome you
want, and then back it up.
And so we are, now that we are,really.
More than just getting itlaunched.
We're thinking about like in thecontext of training, like the
level 1 0 1 course and 2 0 1 and3 0 1.
you, but there will be astepping stone approach to get
(26:00):
to the outcome we want.
and so we're really trying to beintentional about that.
So I totally agree.
I think you're spot on with whatyou said.
Isar, I gotta ask
Isar Meitis (26:08):
you Yeah.
One more follow up question thatI'm very curious about.
Yeah.
What's the tangible outcomes youcan actually measure?
Yeah, because you started almosta year ago, right?
do you already see stuff you'resaying, oh, I can see this, and
this happening in this sector ofthe company.
And it's obviously a directoutcome of the effort that we
(26:32):
put in.
Yeah.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (26:32):
Yeah.
and you're, you.
That's another obviously greatimportant, very important
leadership principle that, welaunched a strategy, but again,
it's just words on the paper.
I wanna be held accountable.
So I put some very specificmeasures.
and the three big ones, as itrelates to your question that we
did, we were, we want toincrease the number of what we
call our strategic clients,which are really clients where
we do business in more than one,just one business area.
(26:55):
So we had a definition of whatthat means.
we wanted to improve our brandawareness in the industry and we
wanted to improve our employeeengagement.
And we had some financialmetrics and we actually.
Last year was a record year.
And of course I'm tyingconnecting it back to the people
doing.
I think people taking some ofthese steps is translating, you,
it's hard to always connect thedots, but to see, look, we tell
(27:17):
you to do this, y'all are doingit, you're bought in.
And now we're driving financialperformance.
That's great.
But on those other threetargets, at least in the first,
nine months to 12 months ofthis, we just, got our latest,
employee engagement surveys upand we were up in every
category.
and, still areas forimprovement.
but they were all, 75% or abovewere positive or, whatever the
(27:38):
top two categories of a fivepoint scale.
So we've made improvement overyear, our brand awareness.
We have an external source thatdoes brand awareness and it's
not.
What do you think about BakerDonaldson?
It's really just talking tobuyers of legal services.
Who do you use and trust?
So it's more of a, yeah.
and we increase that by, fromlike the 80th best brand in the
legal market to 68, somethinglike that, year over year.
(28:01):
and then we have.
Incrementally moved.
It's like from 12% to 12.5% ofstrategic clients, after the,
but it's at least it's going theright direction.
Yeah.
And this year is really a bigfocus on what that means and how
to do it.
So all that to say, weabsolutely put measures in that.
We think it's always hard withthe lead measures, lag measures.
But we tried to put some thingsout there that we thought, if
(28:22):
this is happening, we can tie itback to some of the stuff we're
doing.
so far, so good.
It's been a good first year.
Isar Meitis (28:29):
I love that.
I, and I love your point aboutleading indicators versus
lagging indicators.
Yeah.
And you've gotta be very carefulwith what you measure and when
you measure it.
For us, again, going back to theacademy example, yeah.
In the beginning it createssometimes more noise than good.
Cuz the people who go throughthe academy now has a different
kind of knowledge and adifferent focus and suddenly
people who didn't.
(28:50):
And that creates friction withinthe company.
But what happened was, Is thatwithin three to four years, most
of middle management, most ofmiddle management were people
who went through the academy.
Got, and that was a gamechanger.
And the crazy thing is sincethen, that company has been
acquired and it's been through amerger and it's been, and still
(29:13):
a lot of people in the middlemanagement in the new unified
company, these people who'vebeen through the academy 10
years ago.
that's great.
and that proves the point that.
In the long run.
Going back to what I said in thebeginning, and I swear I didn't
plan this, but we went fullcircle in the long run.
If you invest in these kind ofthings, yeah, it works.
And like you said, sometimes youcan see immediate outcome.
(29:37):
Sometimes you, sometimes your,even your employee engagement
survey will show you negativeresults because people are in
that change process and peopledon't like change.
And But if you trust the processand you're really figuring out a
better capabilities, betterskills, better mindsets, better
culture, better everything foryour employees, in the long run,
(29:59):
it will pay off.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (30:01):
you've, we could unpack this for hours
because the whole changemanagement piece is really
important.
Cause as you said, even likewith a law firm, it's been done
generally the same way for ahundred year, a hundred years,
But to have that pivot to, Italk about thinking about our
firm as a best run business,like our clients.
Think about it.
And that has heightenedexpectations, right?
Of re I've gotta show you thereturn on investment that I'm
(30:23):
investing in this mini M B a,but what's the return and what's
the expectation and theaccountability.
And so it is, it does go, itdoes tie, hand in glove, I think
to exactly what you're sayingwith the academy.
Like you had to get folks boughtin.
That this is meaningful and youhad to spend the money to build
it out without maybe seeing theresults immediately.
(30:43):
but that's, but now you lookback years later and you can
have the satisfaction that itmade the difference in people's
lives, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Isar Meitis (30:52):
Tim, fascinating conversation.
Oh yeah.
I really thank you.
This was, oh, Very eye-opening.
I think you're doing reallyimportant stuff, and again,
you're seeing the results, butanybody out there who's
considering this, there were alot of great tips from Tim on,
on how to think about it, how toexecute on it, little steps
along the way.
Tim, if people wanna follow youto know more and what you're
(31:13):
doing and how you're doing it,if they wanna work with a law
firm, like what's the best wayto connect with you, follow you,
and so on.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (31:18):
Sure.
Yeah.
I am on Instagram with my nameand then, the firm is Baker
Donaldson, b a k e r d o n e l so n.com, which you can find me
there.
And then I did launch earlierthis year, a nonprofit called
Everybody leads.org.
and that website is up andthey'll have content about
leadership.
That whole approach of what I'mtrying to do there is take some
(31:39):
of these basic leadership skillsinto underserved communities,
but I am putting content.
And workbooks and things likethat up there as we build it
out.
So that would be another placeto check and certainly can
contact me through that websiteas well.
Isar Meitis (31:51):
Fantastic.
Thank you so much.
This was really great.
I appreciate your time.
Enjoy the long weekend.
Timothy M. Lupinacci (31:56):
Yes, you too.
Thank you.
I really did enjoy this as well.
Isar, keep doing what you'redoing.
You're doing good work, man.
Thank you.
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