The following are excerpts from conversations with my dog (Koa the Wonder Dog) in late 2010.
KWD: How do you get a lawyer out of a tree?
TJF: Not funny
KWD: Wait…what do you call a lawyer at the bottom of Lake Superior?
TJF: Again, not funny. Where are you getting all this?
KWD: Day time TV – hilarious!
TJF: You should be more respectful towards lawyers. They do a lot of good things in the world. Many lead the way to a better society, or at least try to.
KWD: Seriously?
TJF: Yes seriously – lawyers are leaders in the public, private, and non-profit world. They serve as executives, advisors, and organizers in virtually every segment of society.
KWD: Wow – I never really thought about that. You must have had to learn a lot about leadership in law school.
TJF: Well…actually, we didn’t learn a whole lot about leading back when I went to school– at least not directly.
KWD: You mean human society expects all this out of lawyers and no one is teaching them how to do it?
TJF: Well, more and more law schools are helping lawyers to gain these skills. For instance, the University of Washington is working to develop “leaders for the global common good”. Conversations are also happening in schools like Harvard and Yale. In fact a guy named Ben Heineman from Harvard wrote a great short article in Yale Law’s online journal called Lawyers as Leaders.
KWD: Why did he think teaching lawyers about leadership was important?
TJF: Well, he advances three main arguments. First, we are experiencing a crisis in leadership the world over, so essentially we need the help. Second, lawyers are in a bit of a crisis as a profession and seeking out meaningful leadership roles will help to reconnect lawyers with the more virtuous personal values most of them went to law school for in the first place. Finally, he basically notes that lawyers are one of a very few professions which do not explicitly provide this type of education.
KWD: So basically, the world needs this, lawyers need this, and everyone else is doing it anyway?
TJF: Yes, plus, the issues leaders face today are generally not the type that can be resolved by a single profession. They cannot be solved with technical expertise, but rather are truly interdisciplinary, complex messes which require a leader who can bring together diverse groups of people in ever changing environments.
KWD: Well, that is all very interesting, but if we don’t go for a walk soon, you are going to have a pretty complex mess to clean up on the kitchen floor – so can we finish this later?
TJF: Certainly.
To learn more:
Ben W. Heineman, Jr., Lawyers as Leaders, 116 Yale L.J. Pocket Part 266 (2007), http://thepocketpart.org/2007/2/16/heineman.html.
