Make ‘Talent’ the Primary Focus

Often the main focus of the Legal Operations team is to allow their legal professionals to provide their legal expertise to their clients in the most efficient manner. The quality of new additions to their team becomes a secondary effort of the firm as a whole. You can (and should) prioritize talent no matter the size of your firm to give it the right 'mind and market share'.

Focusing on quality additions to your team means strategic planning, and gathering resources for a successful process. Once you make talent focus the foundation of your efforts, things get much simpler!

Be Ardent About Controlling Costs

Like all companies, the recruiting team is dependent on other departments to function at their best. The finance team, for instance, is their partner for securing a new hire budget. Since all efforts are interconnected within a company, keeping detailed metrics of your hiring efforts (including how long it takes you to fill a role) can both help you understand your department goals as well as bring visibility to your frugal efforts. So, it is advisable to fill up the essential roles as soon as possible to make up for the cost of an empty role.

Creating context surrounding your cost savings is not just a recruiting team goal, but also helps you with critical stakeholders.

Collaboration Is Key

The best recruitment department knows maintaining an open and honest culture is essential for the team’s success. Hiring managers basically understand who they are looking for to fill each role, but may need a little help in execution.

This is where collaboration comes into play. Creating a close-knit environment where interaction is mutually beneficial can help everyone’s efforts. Sharing data and successful approaches in regular 1-on-1s or group meetings can engage and excite every team member. Creating a safe space for everyone to share and ask questions is crucial; make learning and improving the goal. 

If you are starting this effort, be the example and share first! You’ll help inspire the whole team to join in.

Sharing of ideas amongst all

In tech, recruitment is focused on finding active over passive talent. Recruiters know this makes for a more efficient hiring process and engaging experience for everyone. What about the legal industry? Share ideas and insight into what all great candidates have in common and build your processes around those:

• Active (e.g. current bar admission, and recent work)
• If hiring for a legal tech firm, look for their online presence (this can often connote an interest in tech)
• Critique your messaging strategy; does it attract these candidates?

The companies who understand the importance of talent acquisition know its benefits last much longer than the hiring process. If you can get all your stakeholders to agree with your mission and process, your firm will be well on its way to hiring the very best.