OPERATIONS MANAGER TRAINING FOR ATTORNEYS

This comprehensive management training is designed to support attorneys in becoming powerful, inspiring and ethical managers of legal teams, working groups and organizations. Many attorneys do not know how to develop their management skills and are ineffective managers. Attorneys will learn their core personality style and attendant strengths and weaknesses as managers. Attorneys learn how to create effective strategies to improve their alignment and execution abilities. The course covers interpersonal communication, goal setting, law office management, influencing team members, diversity and equity, client conflict and case management.

COURSE INCLUDES:

1. 2 Hour Video Instruction
2. 30-minute coaching session
3. Documents and Worksheets

SCHEDULE:

TIME	SUBJECT	PARTICIPANT TASKS
0:00 – 5:00	Overview of Program Outline	Slides
3:00 – 10:00	Introduction and personal story of how management training improved me as an attorney. Managers are stuck in between.
10:00 – 15:00	Overview of course logistics and topics – quizzes, short answer, certification, email support, chat support for tech issues? Take what works and leave the rest	Participant Lists Goals for Training
15:00 – 30:00	Big Picture Overview of Recursive Nature of Organization and Role of Manager Definition, Beers Model, Tribal Leadership, Engagement Q12 data.5 Dysfunctions of a Team. Good/Powerful Managers give  Good/Powerful Feedback	Slides
30:00 – 40:00	Law Office Operations Manual management tool	DOC 1: Operations Manual DOC 2: Employee Handbook
40:00 – 50:00	The use of DISC personality style assessment in manager development, review of assessment, take assessment – regular and work of leaders. Managing teams with DISC	Assessment Quiz #1 : Basic DISC DOC 3: Sample Free DISC assessment results – 123 Test DOC 4: Sample Paid DISC assessment results – WILEY
50:00 – 60:00	Review of participant’s DISC personality style assessment and opposite personality style	Assessment Quiz #2: Participant describes 3 insights
60:00 – 65:00	5 MINUTE BREAK
65:00 – 75:00	How to talk to a team member using DISC – Adapting your communication style and conflict management, feedback model and TKI Conflict model.	DOC: 3 How to talk to sheets DOC 4: Reflective Listening Sheet DOC 5: 1 Minute Manager Feedback Sandwich DOC 6: TKI Conflict Model Assessment Quiz #3: Participant lists strengths and challenges to  Adapting your communication style
75:00 – 90:00	Review of WIR-LA accountability communication tool for managing team members	DOC 7: WIR-LA Feedback Tool worksheets, both positive and constructive Assessment Quiz #5: Participant describes value and challenge of using WIR-LA tool
90:00 – 110:00	Utilization of tools and assessments in Law Office Management and Performance Evaluations	DOC 8: List of Attorney Tasks DOC 9: Performance Evaluation Protocol DOC 10: Q-12+ Workplace Assessment Assessment Quiz #6: Participant describes value and challenge of using tools in Management tasks
110:00 – 120:00	Creating Supportive work environments for attorneys through cultural norms	DOC 11: Diversity and Equity – personality styles and implicit cultural bias DOC 12: Manager as Coach protocol Assessment Quiz #7: Participant describes value and challenge of using tools to transform workplace culture
110:00 – 120:00	How to run effective meetings as a leader – Death By Meeting	DOC 13: Meeting Protocol Assessment Quiz #8 Participant describes value and challenge of using tools in Meeting  protocols
120:00 – 125:00	Conclusion – further resources for manager training and development, course evaluation	Assessment Quiz #9 Course Evaluation DOC TO EMAIL TO PARTICIPANT AND EMAIL TO STATE BAR: Issue Certificate of Attendance

Unlike other professions, attorneys have critical ethical duties and burdensome competency requirements that demand high levels of personal performance, year in and year out. Failure to properly perform any of these broad mandates can lead to complaints, public reprimands, suspension and debarment.

Managers of law firms are caught between Leadership and the Attorney team. State bar associations across the country are advocating for law firms to begin changing their company cultures in order to support lawyers in maintaining their wellness. As a Manager, your challenge is to create a workplace where attorneys stay in the flow of excellence every day. You also have to be an inspiration to other attorneys, and hold them accountable to their promises. It is obvious that most attorneys cannot meet these Manager challenges, and for this reason good Managers are extremely valuable. When compared to the general population, attorneys suffer from twice as many incidents of substance use disorders and mental health issues. Furthermore, increasing numbers of attorneys are being disciplined, sued and incarcerated for wrongdoing in their roles as lawyers.

Law firms’ reputations suffer when their attorneys burn out. Managers have a daunting task in supporting Attorney teams in a wide range of mandatory duties, that include the following:

• Competence (Model Rules 1.1)
  • A lawyer shall provide competent representation to a client.
  • Competent representation requires the legal knowledge, skill, thoroughness and preparation reasonably necessary for the representation.
• Diligence (Model Rules 1.3)
  • A lawyer shall act with reasonable diligence and promptness in representing a client.
• Communication (Model Rules 1.4)
  • A lawyer shall obtain informed consent
  • A lawyer shall keep client reasonably informed.
  • A lawyer shall comply with reasonable requests for information.
• Conflict of Interest (Model Rules 1.7)
  • Representation must not be limited by a personal interest of the attorney
• Safekeeping Property (Model Rules 1.15)
  • Duty of trustee for client monies
• Declining or Terminating Representation (Model Rules 1.16)
  • When a lawyer’s health (mental or physical) interferes with their ability to practice effectively, they have an ethical duty to step down.
• Expediting Litigation (Model Rules 3.2)
  • A lawyer shall make reasonable efforts to expedite litigation
    consistent with the interests of the client
• Misconduct (Model Rules 8.4)
  • Lawyers cannot Commit a criminal act that reflects adversely on the honesty,
    trustworthiness, or fitness as a lawyer. This includes DUI and Illegal drug use or possession

Many Managers avoid being in charge because of the extra demands and emotional drainage of being responsible for the performance of other attorneys. However, there is a systematic way to learn Manager skills that, when mastered, make it easier to handle the responsibility. In order to have a long and truly successful career as a Manager in the law, you have to first understand yourself and how to execute the Leader’s vision of the law office. You have to know your strengths and weaknesses. Without this critical data, you cannot master the fundamentals areas that are mandatory to becoming a successful Manager.

All attorneys have blind spots, so it is normal to feel frustrated and struggle in mastering Management skills. It is painful, humiliating and inevitable to make mistakes as a Manager. What is worse is to keep making the same mistakes over and over again.

Research in the areas of neuroscience, psychology, organizational development and economics prove that learning DISC is necessary to communicate your expectations and feedback, create a healthy company culture, and manage conflict. You also need to know how to run meetings, how to manage your firm using an operations manual, and how to give performance evaluations.

After your training, schedule your 30 minute Coaching Session to clarify your goals, identify your challenges in achieving your goals, and brainstorm strategies to overcome your challenges.

REQUIRED PRE-WORK (10 minutes)

We require you take a DISC personality style assessment before this training. You can take a basic free test DISC assessment at 123 Test https://www.123test.com/disc-personality-test/

RECOMMENED READING (Audiobooks are available on Spotify):

One Minute Manager Blanchard and Johnson

Emyth Revisited Michael Gerber

5 Dysfunctions of a Team Patrick Lencioni

Tribal Leadership Logan, King, Fischer-Wright

Death By Meeting Patrick Lencioni

ABOUT ACTUALIS ATTORNEY WELLNESS AND MARK C. DALY:

Even before becoming an attorney in 1999, I learned how to develop my personal and professional skills by attending workshops, educating myself, getting peer support, and hiring professional coaches and therapists. I learned how to bring out the best in myself, my companies and the teams I supervised in my legal career. Over the past 20 years I have become a certified professional coach and a certified Shadow Work ® coach and facilitator. I am a Registered, Non-Licensed Therapist in the State of Colorado with strict duties of confidentiality, which is very necessary when working with attorneys! I have taken courses in Voice Dialogue, Gottman Marriage Counseling and Emotionally Focused Therapy. I have used these skills to coach executives, managing and associate attorneys, as well as support staff, to become more satisfied and successful practicing law. Since 2004 I have been a registered CLE provider. I have coached and mentored dozens of attorneys in law office start up, practice management, and immigration law fundamentals.

I have been an immigration attorney for 26 years. In the beginning, I struggled financially, emotionally, physically and spiritually. I have been married, divorced, and finally remarried in 2010. As a single dad dealing with a traumatic divorce, I know what it is like to mismanage a law office, break rules of competence and act unethically. Through it all, I have managed to learn from my mistakes and gain mastery in the 5 fundamental areas of attorney wellness – Leadership, Management, Finances, Mental Health and Physical Health. I twice started, built up, managed, and sold successful law practices in Nashville and Denver, and now I am financially free. I maintain excellent and loving relationships with my wife and grown children, and I have a great relationship with my extended family and even my ex-wife! In 2025, my wife and I went on a one-year sabbatical around the world to learn, grow, relax and enjoy life. I gained a better understanding of myself, and decided to become an inactive attorney and launch Actualis Attorney Wellness. My primary aim is to help attorneys feel good, enjoy life, and do the right thing.