Why brilliant lawyers aren’t necessarily excellent team leaders

Do some New Zealand law firms have a Steve Jobs problem? Jobs possessed brilliant technical skills but was famously pushed out of Apple in the mid-1980s partly because his leadership skills were poor. His decade away from the company taught him about trust, focus and empowering others – lessons that would later help transform Apple into one of history's most successful businesses.

The gap between technical excellence and leadership ability can show in any industry – including Kiwi law firms. Partners who excelled as lawyers can struggle to lead successful teams. Firms may promote based on legal skills alone without developing leadership capacity.

Baker Tilly Staples Rodway Hawke's Bay HR director Andrea Stevenson recently told NZ Lawyer that this is an issue law firms are increasingly recognising and seeking to address.

"I seem to be doing more work in this area, which potentially reflects what is in the environment," she says. "Like many organisations, law firms probably haven't always invested in leadership development or been intentional about how they structure, manage and support teamwork."

The pattern repeats across the profession. Lawyers spend years developing deep expertise in their field, then suddenly find themselves managing people – a job requiring entirely different skills. "Lawyers are highly skilled and capable, but there is often minimal investment throughout their career on leadership development and team management," Andrea says.

Like many companies, law firms expect key workers who’ve been promoted to automatically become top-rate leaders. "We expect these people to show up later in their career and just be awesome at leading."

Like Apple in the 1980s, the fallout is visible when businesses have leaders with dazzling technical skills but underdeveloped people skills: conflict handled poorly or not at all, values differences mistaken for personality clashes, team-building data left unused, and juniors denied developmental opportunities because seniors won’t delegate. Add in the breakneck pace of change, and professions like law face a stark choice: invest in leadership development, or risk undershooting their industry’s potential.

Handling conflict

The ability to handle conflict well separates high-performing teams from mediocre ones, Andrea says. "The hallmark of a high performing team is to be able to manage conflict effectively. Conflict aversion is an epidemic in New Zealand. Other cultures handle conflict better because unlike many Kiwis, they don't take it as person criticism.

“To us, it seems brusque when other cultures say what they think, but it’s simply a direct viewpoint and it’s not taken personally."

At one end of the spectrum, conflict-averse behaviour creates artificial harmony. People maintain pleasant facades while harbouring unexpressed frustrations. "The pleasantries, or the niceties, when we're trying to maintain this lovely, positive relationship, can be disingenuous and creates artificial harmony," she explains. "I might have some observations or feedback, but I'm not telling you."

At the other end, harsh directness damages team morale just as severely. Both extremes hurt team performance.

What works sits in the middle: Productive dialogue. "To come together and be able to talk about real issues, particularly at a leadership or partnership table in a law firm is crucial… to then be able to come to an agreement and leave the room in alignment – and for that alignment to be seen by the wider organisation – is a real skill," she says.

The challenge intensifies in partnership models where consensus matters. Leaders who can debate issues behind closed doors, then present unified decisions to the rest of the firm, create stability. Those who carry disagreements beyond the leadership table create silos and confusion.

"The leaving the room and having each other's back, particularly for leadership teams, is really important."

The values clash

Many perceived personality clashes are actually values clashes, she explains. A partner focused on profit and another focused on people will clash over decisions, regardless of their personality types.

"It's often not a personality clash. It's usually a values clash. We believe different things. If I'm sitting across the partner table from you, and you're all about money and I'm all about people, we're going to clash in our perspectives," she says.

Effective teams need diversity in thinking and personality, but they also require anchors in purpose and values. "Why are we here? What's our purpose? Why do we exist? What are we here to do?" Andrea says. Some teams can answer these questions in minutes while others require half a day.

“It can mean that we're trying to operate as a team, but we haven't even worked out the fundamentals of why we're here."

Teams also need clear operating norms around communication, decision-making, accountability and meeting rhythms. "What is going to be our primary mode of communication? Is it in person, text, Microsoft Teams, WhatsApp or email? Sometimes I get five answers to that question, which already means the team isn't going to be effective," Andrea says.

The team-building data sitting on shelves

Many law firms already possess detailed personality and values data about their teams but never use it after recruitment.

"In the ideal world we would be utilising robust assessment tools at recruitment and that information can then be utilised for development, leadership coaching and team mapping. You already it at your fingertips, so why not use it," Andrea says.

These assessments reveal team strengths, insights and gaps in composition that firms could address intentionally. Mapping personality traits across a team reveals thinking styles and preferences, for example whether everyone thinks pragmatically with no one driving innovation, or whether the team lacks people who are focused on results. “It doesn't necessarily mean we need to go get that personality in to fill a particular gap, but we can be intentional about filling it with a different way of thinking."

The partnership model challenge and the delegation gap

The partnership structure in law firms creates unique leadership challenges compared to traditional corporate hierarchies. Most leadership research focuses on C-suite models with clear reporting lines to boards, but partnerships can be inherently more complex where everyone is meant to have a voice and find consensus.

“In private sector partnerships we're trying to operate a democracy, but irrespective, there’s often still a hierarchy hiding within it.”

Regardless of whether decisions are made by consensus or from the top down, some leaders struggle with delegation because they can often complete work faster and better than junior staff. But failing to delegate prevents growth for both parties.

"Lawyers in leadership roles are leading people who are now doing the job they used to do. A lot of the time they can do it better and quicker. But if they don't start delegating, they are not helping that individual grow," Andrea says.

She observed a consistent pattern in 360-degree feedback that reveals a gap between senior lawyers' assumptions and junior staff desires. "Without fail, despite assumptions the [junior] team member is overloaded, they will be asking their leader to delegate more."

Managing accelerated change

The pace of change in legal services continues to accelerate, driven by technology, artificial intelligence and shifting client expectations. She recently heard a speaker compare AI's introduction to the Industrial Revolution in terms of workplace impact.

"The pace of change that we are facing is massive and it's getting incrementally faster. We haven't really got our head around the type of change that we are then going to have to lead," she says.

Law firms need clear change management strategies. "How are you going to do change? Do you understand what a great change process looks like? Do you understand how change impacts people or how to get their buy in? Or are you just expecting people to come with you, and are then surprised when they don't?"

But she also cautioned that technological change is a people process, not a technological one. Leaders often focus on explaining why change is positive without addressing concerns. Change-averse team members need reassurance about their concerns and what will remain stable before they can engage with what's changing.

The challenges facing law firms don't have simple solutions. But firms that invest in leadership development, establish clear team norms, learn to handle conflict productively, and manage change strategically will outperform those that don't. The skills that made someone an excellent lawyer won't automatically make them an excellent leader.

Just as Steve Jobs discovered during his time outside Apple, recognising that gap represents the first step toward closing it.

This article was written and originally published by NZ Lawyer.