Ask Ash: The challenge of promotion

Dear Ash,

I have recently been promoted to a managerial position for the first time and although I’m happy about my promotion, I’m finding it a bit of a challenge managing a particular colleague who I’ve worked with across a number of years. He seems to not take any direction from me and assumes that he knows better than me how to manage particular clients. It started off with him making the odd comment to challenge my input during our regular catchups, but more recently he has began to raise issues with my direction in front of other colleagues in a way that is clearly looking to undermine me. I wanted to manage my team in a friendly and open manner but this particular person is seeing this as some sort of weakness and I’m not sure how to address it.

Ash replies:

One of the key challenges of management is understanding how to lead. This can be even more tricky when you have successfully moved up the ranks and require to manage colleagues you worked alongside over a number of years. There will be an inevitable need for a period of adjustment by both sides.

However, the issues you are outlining may be attributable to you not taking prompt action at an early stage to make your managerial boundaries clear. Churchill once aptly noted that: “When eagles are silent, parrots begin to chatter.”

I therefore suggest you need to take action to exert your authority. This does not mean that you need necessarily to adopt an authoritarian style, but you do need to be clear and firm.

Gaining the respect of your team is like walking a tightrope, as you don’t want to be too hard and to demotivate your staff, but you also do not want to be too soft, resulting in a lack of clear boundaries and lack of effective leadership.

I suggest you hold a team meeting and outline your key approach in terms of how you intend to manage the casework and your team. For example, make clear when you normally expect to be notified about key case milestones, perhaps for example when a particular case reaches a certain financial threshold, and what decisions you will expect to sign off. Be prepared for any inevitable questions about this, and where possible make clear how your approach aligns with the overall firm practice and procedures to give more credibility to your outline approach.

Take the opportunity also to highlight your own experiences at the firm; and provide assurance that you are open to always listening to any constructive feedback too.

Effective management is a key skill which takes inevitably takes time to develop; however, by providing your team with initial clarity about boundaries, you should at least be able to take back some control and make clear that you may be nice but that you are certainly no pushover! Good luck.

“Ash” is a solicitor who is willing to answer work-related queries from solicitors and other legal professionals, which can be put to her via the editor: peter@connectmedia.cc. Confidence will be respected and any advice published will be anonymised.

Please note that letters to Ash are not received at the Law Society of Scotland. The Society offers a support service for trainees through its Education, Training & Qualifications team.
Email legaleduc@lawscot.org.uk or phone 0131 226 7411 (select option 3).