Q.2 from Ep. 22 of the Ask the Law Firm Seller Show: Why do Key Employee Lawyers at Senior Attorney-led Firms not want to purchase their boss’ law firm?

During Ep. 22 of the Ask the Law Firm Seller Show, Jeremy E. Poock, Esq. addresses the following question:

Why do Key Employee Lawyers at Senior Attorney-led Firms not want to purchase their boss’ law firm?

 

In response, Poock first explains the following 4 reasons why key employee lawyers do not want to purchase their boss’ law firm:

 

1. Owners of Senior Attorney-led firms hired their key employee lawyers “X” number of years ago, and those same key employee lawyers continue to only want a job, as compared to aspiring to becoming the owner of their boss’ law firm.

 

2. Key employee lawyers went to law school and not business school, i.e., the vast majority of key employee lawyers do not consider themselves as professional lawyers, as compared to entrepreneurs who seek to own and grow a small business law firm.

 

3. Key employee lawyers cannot afford to purchase their boss’ law firm because of too many other monthly expenses, including home mortgages, ongoing student debt, saving for their retirement, saving to help their children with college tuition, saving to purchase a second home, etc.

 

4. An assumption (hope) by key employee lawyers that their Senior Attorney bosses will never retire.

 

Poock also explains the following more fundamental reason why key employee lawyers do not want to purchase their boss’ law firm:

 

Key employee lawyers want and need to maintain a “Reliable, Predictable, and Safe” (RPS) job.

 

As Poock points out, key employee lawyers often maintain a RPS meter, which they seek to remain green, i.e., safe.

 

So, when Senior Attorney bosses approach their key employee lawyers to discuss purchasing their law practices, the RPS meter of those key employee lawyers often immediately shifts from green (safe) to red, i.e., no longer reliable, predictable, and safe.

 

In fact, as Poock, explains, rather than having an intended effect of key employees expressing an interest purchase their boss’ law firm, the effect of the RPS meter shifting from green to red can lead to a “Random Tuesday Event,” namely, the applicable key employee lawyer(s) notifying their Senior Attorney boss about accepting another job, together with providing only 2 or 4 weeks notice.

 

Rather than risk the loss of key employees to a Random Tuesday event, Poock advises that Senior Attorneys recognize that their key employee lawyers likely want to maintain a Reliable, Predictable, and Safe Job.

And, rather than pursue an internal succession plan that could result in a Random Tuesday Event, Poock explains that Senior Attorney sellers of law firms should instead pursue selling to, or merging with a Growing Law Firm that wants and needs the key employee lawyers of Senior Attorney-led firms.

 

“[R]ather than try to force the square peg into that round hole of having [a] key employee lawyer try to purchase your practice, we really urge that Senior Attorneys recognize that what your key employees want instead is a reliable, predictable, and safe job, which is what growing law firms present when they purchase Senior Attorney-led firms,” Poock states.