Unlocking Practice Growth Through the Power of Delegation
By recruiting qualified staff members, legal practitioners can distribute responsibilities, improve operations and client service, and enable the practice to handle a larger volume of work while maintaining quality standards. Unfortunately, many professionals struggle to find the best people to join their team or to delegate effectively. With that in mind, Christiane Saad provides some practical insights on how to hire support staff and set those relationships up for success.
Hiring and delegating are essential components of a law practice's growth and sustainability. By recruiting qualified staff members, practitioners can distribute responsibilities, improve operations and client service, and enable the practice to handle a larger volume of work while maintaining quality standards. Unfortunately, many professionals struggle to find the best people to join their team or to delegate effectively due to a variety of factors. Additionally, the time and effort required to train others and communicate expectations can deter busy individuals from delegating. Overcoming these barriers requires a shift in mindset, recognizing that effective delegation is crucial for personal growth, team development, and overall organizational success.
The Enterprising Lawyer: Building your team – Hiring support staff and students program, presented by the Solo, Small and General Practice Section, offered critical insight on hiring support staff and explored how to set up the relationship for success from the beginning, with advice on recruitment and employment contracts.
Finding the Right People
Guest speakers Erika Bailey and Emily Orchard, who serve internationally trained lawyers and law students at the University of Toronto’s GPLLM and LL.M. programs, shared information about these competitive programs, which attract diverse and highly educated students from around the globe. These students often bring professional experience, diverse perspectives and language skills that are invaluable for innovative problem-solving and legal analysis, leading to creative solutions. International students often have a deep knowledge of different legal systems, aiding in comparative law cases and complex international regulations. At the same time, their global networks can help expand a firm’s reach and client base. Employers are encouraged to see their potential and provide meaningful mentorship as these students are committed to learning and contributing.
Christian St-Onge, the coordinator for the paralegal and legal assistant programs at College La Cité, explained the practical teaching approach of the programs to prepare students for the workplace. They learn legal research, writing, accounting, file and client management, and scheduling, and are exposed to various areas of law, such as family, criminal, and real estate. The programs also harness their language skills, offering both French and English courses, and many students are bilingual or multilingual, coming from diverse cultural and life backgrounds. When hiring legal assistants, employers should also value the students' language abilities and life experience.
St-Onge emphasized that employers need to have clear office policies and procedures in place – covering work hours, holidays, responsibilities, and scheduling – to help new hires integrate smoothly and understand their expectations. It is essential to look beyond the initial expenses of support staff and assess their value. Legal assistants can become the backbone of an office. They can improve management, workflow, and efficiency by being available and facilitating better communication between clients. Hiring support staff should be an investment that helps the business grow, not just a cost. Setting aside a regular time for two-way communication is essential to make sure that assistants and staff feel valued and to encourage good teamwork. For example, discuss daily or weekly tasks, share office news, and provide assistants the opportunity to raise concerns and ask for help.
Legal assistants usually work in the field for 260 hours, which gives employers a great chance to see how well a candidate works with others, their knowledge, and how well they can do their job in a real setting before making a hiring decision.
Contractual Considerations
On another note, Jennifer Mathers McHenry, the managing partner of Mathers McHenry & Co, a boutique employment law firm in Toronto, highlighted several contractual traps inherent to the hiring process. Lawyers tend to be very risk-averse, but the key advice for those starting a solo or small practice is to hire support staff, especially administrative help, sooner than they think they need to. Doing so frees up the lawyer to focus on high-value, revenue-generating work and helps prevent burnout. Effective administrative support is essential for growth, and clear employment contracts can make the hiring process more comfortable and secure.
She emphasized that employment contract drafting in Ontario presents a critical yet frequently mismanaged aspect of legal practice, with approximately 98 per cent of reviewed contracts – spanning solo practitioners to major law firms – rendered void because of improper drafting by non-specialists in employment law. The financial implications of these drafting failures can be substantial. She provided several examples where employers can effectively contract out of common law obligations through properly drafted agreements, the pervasive failure to achieve this – even among ostensible human resources experts and lawyers practising in other areas – underscores the specialized nature of this legal domain.
According to Mathers McHenry, beyond mere liability limitations, employment contracts serve a dual function as recruitment instruments, where overly aggressive terms limiting employees to bare statutory minimums may deter top talent, particularly those recruited from secure positions. Consequently, employers must balance protective provisions with competitive positioning, recognizing that the employment contract often represents the first collaborative touch point in the professional relationship and can significantly influence recruitment outcomes. Her message is clear: engaging with qualified employment law specialists for contract drafting is not a discretionary expense, but a critical investment in both risk management and talent acquisition strategies!
Learning to Delegate
To improve delegation skills, lawyers should practise clear communication, establish trust with their teams, and implement a system to monitor progress and provide feedback. Young lawyers and students should embrace every opportunity to develop the organizational and communication skills required for effective delegation. When I was the director of the French Law Practice Program, I initiated an experiential learning project for legal assistant students from La Cité to work alongside lawyers’ licensing candidates in a simulated law-firm environment. In this setting, legal assistants are paired with licensing candidates to handle mock cases that mirror real-world scenarios. The project encompassed various legal tasks, during which legal assistants support licensing candidates in preparing legal documents, organizing case files, and conducting preliminary research. This hands-on approach allowed legal assistant students to gain experience in legal procedures, while enabling licensing candidates to develop supervisory and delegation skills in accordance with the rules of professional conduct. The project included feedback sessions, encouraging both groups to reflect on their experiences and identify areas for improvement.
To learn more about delegation, readers can view additional programs here, including the following:
