Giving a Bad Review Forum

[Anonymous User]

Please don’t quote.

A question for the more senior attorneys around here— any tips on how to best give a bad performance review as part of a formal associate evaluation? As background I am a junior partner in a BL group. We have a lowly midlevel associate (call them “Bob”) that has a reputation for being difficult— I’m talking poor responsiveness, sloppy work product, bad attitude. The thing, however, is that these issues are the worst when Bob is staffed on my matters— they will give short shrift to my assignments and hide behind the fact that they are doing work for more important (senior) partners. Their overall poor attitude has not escaped the attention of the senior partners in the group, but everybody is too busy with the actual work to get dragged down into this (lawyers hate/are bad at managing) and unlike me, the more senior partners are not on the receiving end of Bob’s worst BS.

I would really like to set for the record that Bob’s behavior is not ok— any thoughts on how to best present this in their formal eval? Evals always call for specific examples, but is it too much to pull out the email receipts? Want to balance between rocking the boat internally and not letting Bob slide.

[Anonymous User]

You should absolutely give a bad review if it is deserved. Make the review as matter-of-fact and dispassionate as you can. (Like if you're writing a legal brief for a judge who hates overly emotional language and doesn't like adjectives or adverbs.) Describe the mistakes in as specific detail as possible and anticipate counter-arguments that someone who is determined to cast the negative review as unfair might make. Were your expectations clear? Did you manage well? Did you give any feedback in real-time so that Bob could fix the problem before it got worse?

[Anonymous User]

I echo the point about feedback in real-time. I absolutely think that bad reviews should be given where deserved, but I also think that it's wrong to blindside an associate by sharing your feedback from behind a keyboard. You say the firm is bad at management - awkward convos about poor performance and how to resolve it are part of what good management is made of.

If you don't want to leave a scathing review, you can also phrase things in a way that makes your point clear if you read between the lines. I had one review that said something like "Bob is very hard working and takes ownership of tasks, but he should consider flagging problems early when team assistance may be needed." That was code for you nearly tanked a big filing two days before it was due because you bit off more than you could chew - we stepped in to save your ass but you must give us more warning next time. I don't mean to say you have to phrase things this way, but it's a good way to drop some not-so-subtle hints without sounding super negative. It sounds like you could do that here by suggesting the associate is really busy with other matters, but should make sure they give the attention due to each matter.

[Anonymous User]

I'm going against the grain here but I'm actually of the mind that you should not leave a bad review. At least not if it can be traced back to you.

Assuming you want to become a senior partner, you just need to do good work and bring in business. This doesn't help either of those goals and actually hurts the second. Bob is the type of the guy who is going to go in-house very soon. You want Bob to love you because he's going to give you business someday.

Otherwise, you stay as a junior partner and Bob sends business to the senior partners.

source: I am a nonequity partner but will bring in 1MM in business this year. My book is like 75% associates who used to work for me.

[Anonymous User]

I'd make the review very focused on "So I'm getting the feeling you don't love law firm life and want to go in house -- any way I can be a help to you in doing this?" sort of thing. That's the equivalent of a horrible review when a midlevel hears it (it half sounds like 'the talk'), but also makes you not-the-bad-guy for biz dev purposes going forward.

[Anonymous User]

I'm going against the grain here but I'm actually of the mind that you should not leave a bad review. At least not if it can be traced back to you.

Assuming you want to become a senior partner, you just need to do good work and bring in business. This doesn't help either of those goals and actually hurts the second. Bob is the type of the guy who is going to go in-house very soon. You want Bob to love you because he's going to give you business someday.

Otherwise, you stay as a junior partner and Bob sends business to the senior partners.

source: I am a nonequity partner but will bring in 1MM in business this year. My book is like 75% associates who used to work for me.

Devil's advocate - if Bob doesn't seem to care about OP, why would Bob would bring business to OP rather than Sr. Partner after he gets pushed out? I get that this would apply to a mid that OP has a good relationship with, but just doesn't have the horsepower to do good work. But this sounds different - Bob is short shrifting only OP's matters.

[nealric]

His ignoring your work in favor of the more senior group members may make rational sense from his perspective. He may be selectively difficult because he doesn't particularly want to work with you.

Do you give him less interesting work than the senior partners? Do you take time to mentor and develop him, or just drop a giant assignment in his lap and tell him to come back with work product next Tuesday? Are the senior partners (especially the big rainmakers) giving him urgent assignments that your work is interfering with his completion of? Do you just not mesh from a personality perspective? Have you asked him about why he's not doing good work for you?

The question is what you are trying to accomplish. If you need/want his support, then you need to do the things that will make it worth his while to help you out, such as giving interesting work and mentoring him. If you just never want to work with him, are there other options such as just working with other associates instead? Or have you completely exhausted all other options and just want him replaced?

I'd only hammer him in a review if you've already talked to him directly, honestly worked on the solution for a while, and have decided the situation is irredeemable. But if the senior partners don't want him gone, then you are going to have to live with an associate who hates your guts.

[Anonymous User]

Have a talk before with the guy before trying to get him fired.

If it's your pride that's wounded, you can assert dominance over him by threatening to end his career with a bad review.

But you should do that first before backstabbing, if you're genuinely concerned about fixing a situation instead of killing some guy who you think insulted your dignity.

[Anonymous User]

Following along because I'm curious about this too. I have a team member who is just overly conservative and often freezes client conversations with theoretical risks. Not sure how to talk to him about it -- he seems to view it as his ethical responsibility to extensively rant about any possible risk.

[Anonymous User]

You never know where people will end up. If you burn a bridge and he or she goes to a client or goes somewhere that could be valuable, he or she will remember the negative review and you will not get the work, etc.

[Anonymous User]

Prepping to nuke Bob on review without first saying it to his face, if you havent, would be underhanded.

Have you considered that your work doesnt deserve his attention as much as that of senior partners?

Maybe his only sin is not being direct with you. "OP, I am not going to even attempt to meet your deadline because X, deal with it." But how many associates have those kinda balls?

[Anonymous User]

Unless you have a good relationship it’s weird to blame an associate for prioritizing the work of more senior/important partners. This assumes, of course, that they are actually busy.

[Anonymous User]

My rule of thumb is never say something in a formal review that you have not ever mentioned to the person previously. That’s a coward move and they deserve to hear it from you before hearing it from you anonymously.

[anon3030]

I echo everyone who have said you need to tell Bob all of this to his face before writing his review. There should be zero surprises for Bob once he reads the review.

I’ve had to let a few people go over the years and it’s much easier experience when they know it’s coming and they have already made all their counter arguments prior to the final meeting and knew the objective final straw.

[Anonymous User]

It depends on what you want to accomplish here--this associate sounds like they aren't going to stay long term anyway and he won't work on your cases (either because he thinks less of you or because he's lazy, who knows). You will gain nothing trying to school this guy, other than saving your ego, especially if it is already an open secret that he's not really invested. You will burn a bridge, and may risk it backfiring on you. One possibility is that Bob goes in house and trashes you; another more immediate possibility is that Bob trashes you at the exit interview. Depending on Bob's demographic, this can trigger HR concerns. I'd personally err on the side of not trashing someone in a formal review and not doing the dirty work myself.