Interpretation of the Company's System

In the morning of July 11, the European Cup came to an end. Although its best player Cristiano Ronaldo left the field due to injury in the first half, Portuguese team still defeated French team at the last moment and won its first European Cup championship. To be honest, the championship of Portuguese team relied on some luck. But, it is an indisputable fact that it protected its goal well within 109 minutes, and grasped the opportunity. Portuguese team won the game owing to their teamwork, systematic operation and persistence, rather than the conservatism of French team. I’m not a professional football commentator. I don’t intend to, and am not able to, discuss the technique and tactics of Portuguese team. However, I want to discuss the management of a law firm based on this interesting event that Portuguese team still wins the champion after losing Cristiano Ronaldo. It seems that there is no relation between these two things. I just use it as an example, and you can deem it as my inspiration in this football night. 

If a law firm is centered on some lawyer, there will be hidden risk, just as a football team designs its tactics around some star; 

A law firm needs a core partner just as a football team needs a star and an enterprise needs an entrepreneur. However, if the role of this core partner is played to the limit, it will become the biggest obstacle for the development of the law firm. 

In the lawyer industry, most law firms run around some lawyer. They have a common feature that: This core lawyer is the leader in respect of profession, marketing and management, who control everything in the law firm. And all professional teams and functional teams serve this lawyer. One day, when this lawyer retires, this law firm will also end! 

One lawyer can be excellent and great to the extreme. However, no matter how excellent a lawyer is, he or she can not replace all functions of a law firm. Even if there are other excellent lawyers in this law firm, they will improperly depend on this core lawyer gradually in such case, and the law firm may even form an abnormal mode of operation and management. Like a team, if a football team always designs its tactics around some star, the initiative and creativity of other players will be obliterated, and the fate of this team will be determined directly by the performance of this star and the whole team will lose its system and balance. 

We can see that the Spanish football team which has risen in recent years has no absolute star, but they still won the World Champion and European Cup successively; As an evergreen in the world football, German football team defeated Brazil by 7:1 and finally won the champion in 2017 World Cup, which had no especially shining star. Among all teams participating in this European Cup, Italian football team even had no A-lister player, but it still defeated Spain, and cornered Germany to the 9th round of penalty kick These teams have a common feature, namely, they have no absolute core player, but consist of players having balanced power, with a set of shaped tactics. In contrast, Argentinean football team which has the genius Messi has not won even one champion in the finals of four large events. This may be not accidental. 

Of course, it will be perfect if a football team has both a representative start and a batch of quasi-stars, and it can also run as a system. If our law firm has a representative figure and a batch of partners with great power (although not godlike figures), and runs based on an mature mechanism, we will run on the right track and may achieve sustainable development. 

The management of a law firm requires integration, just as a good football team runs by virtue of unity and system when the star is absent. 

At the 25th minute in the finals of the European Cup, Cristiano Ronaldo quit the game with tears. Fans all over the world expected the French team to perform and win the game easily. However, this result did not occur in the following 109 minutes. We can not attribute the loss of French team to effortlessness or bad luck. Throughout the game, except the most threatening header by Griezmann, the defense of Portuguese team had no defect basically in other time. Portuguese team did not become depressed or slack because of the advanced quit of Cristiano Ronaldo, but still united, run as a system, and persisted. 

We have to say that Portugal team’s wining in this game is the victory of the coach Santos over Deschamps in respect of tactical ability, the victory of the whole Portuguese football team in respect of mentality, and the victory of a team over stars. As reported by some media, we will never know if Portugal would win the champion of 2016 European Cup if Cristiano Ronaldo was on the field, just as we will never know why Ronaldo should get disease suddenly in the 1998 World Cup. I would say that the tactics of Portuguese team return normal; the abnormality is corrected; the psychology of players is back to normal and the system truly starts running, just because of the quit of Cristiano Ronaldo. This depends on not only the command of the coach on the field, but also the conscientiousness and ability that players have fostered for a long time. 

As for a law firm, it will be a great thing for its lawyers if it can still run well, having a professional support point, a market development system and a well-operated management mechanism, when the core partner is absent. Actually, it is not hard to achieve this target, as long as the management of the law firm is not based on individuals but system; the market of the law firm does not rely on resources but brand; and the service of the law firm does not rely on individuals but team. 

From this perspective, the emphasis on the corporatization of law firm and the pursuit of the integration and enterprization of a law firm are really normal logics.