My experience has taught me that legal recruiting coordinators are almost always the most critical non-attorney positions in a law firm. I've sent this email to every hiring partner and legal recruiting coordinator I know. I'm sending it as a call to action to elevate your firm and the profession.
I have seen countless firms succeed by prioritizing this position and attracting and retaining the right people for it. I have also seen firms fail and struggle when they did not give this position the high level of respect it is entitled to and deserves. Incredibly, I've seen far too many law firms let people go from this position or cut it back when the market slows down (like it is now).
When the market picks up (and it always does), it can take years to find and train a new legal recruiting coordinator with the institutional knowledge and skills of their predecessor. Ultimately, this may cost the firm millions because they do not have enough attorneys to handle the work, and valuable attorney time is wasted on training replacements. All law firms must understand just how crucial this position is. Despite not billing clients for their time, legal recruiting coordinators are profit centers, not cost centers.
Introduction
One of the most important roles in any law firm is held by legal recruiting coordinators. In my 25+ years of legal recruiting, I have come to conclude that the legal recruiting coordinator is the most important non-attorney position in almost any law firm.
Just about all law firms sell their attorneys: their minds, their legal work, their hours, their advice. I write a lot about the kind of attorneys that law firms should hire; however, I’ve never written about the people the law firm needs to recruit, screen, hire, and onboard the right attorneys. This topic is incredibly important. In fact, it is probably among the most important topics I have ever written about in the thousands of articles and webinars I have ever done to serve the legal profession.
All law firms need a certain type of attorney to do their work, and without the right attorneys, law firms lose money, have unhappy clients, and suffer. Legal recruiting coordinators are one of, if not the most important roles in law firms. In large markets and large law firms with massive salaries, law firms can easily find attorneys in different practice areas to do good work and bill hours. In contrast, an excellent legal recruiting coordinator is extremely hard to replace. They are often indispensable.
This is a hard job. It is a position that all law firms that want to grow and recruit good human capital should have. Without someone dedicated to this position, the firm will flounder. Attorneys are constantly leaving firms and may simply quit with no plans, be fired, go to another firm, go in-house, go into government, or go on long-term paternity/maternity leave. In order to serve clients and make money, pay attorney and staff salaries, office space, credit lines, guaranteed partner draws, firm events, and everything else that law firms do, attorneys working and billing hours is crucial. Without a dedicated legal recruiting coordinator, most law firms are in trouble.
See Related Articles:
- Everything You Always Wanted to Know about Legal Recruiting Coordinators and Their Role in the Attorney and Law Student Hiring Process
- Why Almost No Law Firms Care About Legal Recruiter Fees
- Why You Should Never Use a Legal Recruiter: Do Not Use a Legal Recruiter Until You Read This
Why Legal Recruiting Coordinators are Critical for Law Firm Success
1. Legal Recruiting Coordinators Recruit Applicants for the Firm.
To generate applicants to help grow the firm, legal recruiting coordinators may publicize their positions on their firm's websites, outside job boards, solicit applicants from people their own attorneys know outside the firm, search their applicant tracking systems, network with law schools, and, of course, trust recruiters they know.
Some legal recruiting coordinators are charged with contacting potential candidates on LinkedIn, and calling and emailing candidates at other law firms. They literally work as legal recruiters inside of law firms, beating down doors to find people.
2. Legal Recruiting Coordinators Screen Applicants.
Once applicants come in, they are responsible for screening out countless attorneys. When they find attorneys that match the firm's standards and needs, they either schedule interviews with the candidate or circulate the resumes to attorneys within their firm. Often, they contact the candidate for more information or conduct a preliminary interview with the candidate to screen them before attorney time is used. When they circulate resumes to attorneys, they may advocate for certain candidates and not others.
Most legal recruiting coordinators have a deep understanding of the types of applicants the firm needs. They understand the right experience, how the law firm views attorneys from different practice settings and firms, the academic requirements the firm demands, the salaries that certain types of attorneys may require, whether the firm is open to relocations, whether their position is in high demand and they can reduce normal hiring standards, or whether other firms are losing work and attorneys in their practice area, necessitating higher hiring standards. They also understand countless small cultural cues that the law firm tends to favor and those it does not.
Reviewing applicants is a massive task. They not only need to review candidates but also log these candidates in and notify them that the firm has no interest in them. This is a ton of work, mind-numbing, and exasperating because applicants needing a response just do not stop.
3. Legal Recruiting Coordinators Do Positive Public Relations for the Firm in Their Role.
At all times, the legal recruiting coordinator is the face of the law firm. Their ability to speak with attorney applicants and the market (law schools, recruiters, vendors, etc.) determines how the firm is viewed by those outside of it. They tell candidates why the firm is a good place to work, they search for the best candidates, sell the firm, and tell candidates they like that the firm likes them and get offers closed. They politely tell others they do not need them.
They answer phones and return countless messages from potential candidates, interviewing candidates, law schools, recruiters, potential summer associates. They also need to coordinate summer associate programs when law students show up. They may be in charge of recruiting permanent attorneys, contract attorneys, and even staff.
In addition to all this, in large markets, legal recruiting coordinators belong to legal recruiting associations where they attend meetings, network with others, and share information about best practices and other firms. They also often attend various conferences and network there. Some go to law schools and assist in interviewing.
Because they are the face of the law firm, they are the brand of the law firm. Applicants, interviewees, legal recruiters, law students, recruiting coordinators at other firms, attorneys interviewing from other law firms, will all reach conclusions about the firm's brand based on their interaction with legal recruiting coordinators. Over time, these interactions will shape the firm's brand. The professionalism and personality of the legal recruiting coordinator become a reflection of the firm's brand.
4. Legal Recruiting Coordinators Are in Charge of the Interview Process.
They are then in charge of organizing interviews, convincing busy attorneys to interview applicants (who often avoid the legal recruiting coordinator because they resent not using the time to bill hours). Once the interview is scheduled, they need to make arrangements to get the attorney, summer associate, contract attorney, staff attorney (who knows) into the office at a convenient time for the potential hire. Then they need to create schedules, create new schedules when an attorney interviewer is called into court, in the middle of a transaction, or has a family or other matter.
Before the interview, the legal recruiting coordinator needs to arrange the candidate’s schedule, provide attorney bios to the candidate, and deal with last-minute interview changes. The legal recruiting coordinator also needs to be constantly alerted for emails, voicemails, and texts from attorneys and interviewees about scheduling, travel, cancellations, and more.
When the candidate finally arrives for the interview, they may need to meet them in the lobby and brief them on the schedule. Here, they evaluate the candidate’s demeanor, how they treat them, how they have treated others (receptionists, for example), how the candidate is dressed for the interview, and much more. Often, they need to be ready to continue meeting the attorney at the doors of the people interviewing the attorney after a certain period (for example, 30 minutes).
After interviews, most legal recruiting coordinators need to collect interview evaluations from attorneys who may dodge their requests. This is a lot of work. Then they need to make recommendations about whether certain attorneys should be made offers or not. They may need to organize recruiting committee meetings, get approvals, and this can be equally time-consuming.
5. Legal Recruiting Coordinators Are Responsible for Coordinating Offers.
After the interviews, the legal recruiting coordinator often needs to "debrief" the attorney, thank them, and send them on their way. Sometimes a decision is made to make an offer in the interviews, the recruiting coordinator learns about this, and the attorney is not told yet. The legal recruiting coordinator then needs to turn on the charm and make the candidate feel more welcome with verbal hints that everyone liked them and be solicitous about encouraging the attorney to call with questions, for example. If a recruiter is involved, they traditionally call the recruiter and pass on how much the firm liked the candidate. If the opposite occurs and the candidate is not the firm's material, an impression needs to be left that is professional but not at all encouraging.
For all this time, they need to keep candidates they are still interested in "warm" while the firm makes decisions. Sometimes the firm's plans change after weeks of work: A partner leaves, a client leaves, the firm is worried about economic conditions… who knows. Then the work stops and was for nothing. The legal recruiting coordinator may feel deflated after so much work.
6. Legal Recruiting Coordinators Oversee the Offer Stage.
When a candidate is made an offer, the legal recruiting coordinator may be in charge of reference checks, asking attorneys to call the candidate to make them feel excited, welcome, and getting the hire closed.
When and if an offer is made, they need to make the candidate feel welcome and wanted while waiting for the candidate to accept. They often need to do background checks, call references, review social media and professional profiles, verify the attorneys’ dates of employment match, try to ascertain if the attorney is still at a firm (or just on the law firm website and using voicemail), verify represented books of business, have conflict checks performed and use networks to better understand the attorney's professional reputation.
Some legal recruiting coordinators have better networks than others; these networks are indispensable. While the firm waits for a candidate to respond to an offer, they must keep other "second choice" candidates warm. If candidates do not accept, they may also look at recent applications and bring in more people. They may need to start the entire process of recruiting candidates again.
See Related Articles:
- A Comprehensive Guide to Working with a Legal Recruiter
- What Characteristics Should I Look for in a Legal Recruiter?
- The Three Styles of Legal Recruiting: Which Sort of Legal Recruiter Would You Prefer to Work With?
Conclusions
The work of a legal recruiting coordinator never ends. At each stage, everything needs to be organized, responded to, and more. Voicemails, emails, applications, interviews never stop. This is a stressful job. This is also a job that is beyond important for law firms to staff correctly. Some law firms appreciate this role more than others. If someone is good enough at this position and the firm knows it, they will do whatever they can to hold on to them. Regardless of your hiring role in your firm and if you are a partner running a recruiting department or a legal recruiting coordinator, you cannot afford to underestimate how crucial this role is.
- If you are a law firm partner without a legal recruiting coordinator, the odds are excellent that you need one, and they will dramatically grow your firm and improve its culture if you hire the right one. Legal recruiting coordinators are profit centers, not cost centers.
- If you are a law firm partner with one or more legal recruiting coordinators, consider what you can do to provide more resources, appreciate their role more, and even give bonuses (which some firms do) for their success in bringing in the right attorneys when needed. This role is incredibly crucial to your success. By all means, do not lay off a solid recruiting coordinator during a market slowdown—they are profit centers, not cost centers.
- If you are a legal recruiting coordinator or in a human resources role where you hire attorneys, you may forward this email to anyone who wants to know how valuable this role is. If I owned a law firm, I would pay my recruiting department more if I read this. These points should also guide the material you put on your resume and discuss in future interviews. Most importantly, during slow legal markets, use this material to show firms you are a profit center, not a cost center.
