Think for a minute

Law Society Psychological Services has launched its innovative ‘Time
to Think’ career-support service for legal leaders. Mary Hallissey hears what solicitors have to say about it

Law Society Psychological Services has launched a thought-provoking initiative for general counsel on how to create a ‘thinking culture’ as part of organisational life.

The Law Society’s ‘Time to Think’ series, piloted with in-house and public-sector leaders, posits that creating a thinking culture also naturally generates the conditions for respect, diversity, and inclusion. Thus it can offer a compelling solution to help solve several thorny organisational problems at once.

This new Law Society career-support service, designed with leaders in mind, has the goal of enhancing leadership capacity and cascading good practice throughout key areas of legal practice.

Influential voices from the sector are already participating in the pilot programme, which forms part of a range of peer-support initiatives provided by Law Society Psychological Services. 

The programme aims to radically improve the depth and quality of thinking in law firms. The goal is to increase collaboration, encourage innovation, and enhance good decision-making by legal leaders. 

The ‘Time to Think’ approach recognises the connection between excellent professional services to clients and high-quality thinking. Critical thinking is an essential tool in a lawyer’s toolbox and the programme calls upon the Thinking Environment™ schema to create a broader and deeper approach to independent thinking. 

“Everything we do depends for its quality on the thinking we do first,” declared its founder Nancy Kline. She analysed the conditions we need to think well together. And this is what clients pay lawyers for – their ability to think well and to offer thorough analysis, critical thinking, evaluation, logical argument, problem-solving, and clear communication. 

The Thinking Environment™ asks how the essential tools of the trade can be honed, sharpened, and improved. 

Evaluative thinking

Lawyer/client relationships can only increase in importance in the AI era, as Antoinette Moriarty (head of Law Society Psychological Services) points out. Therefore, it has set out to support lawyers to use their thinking minds – to full capacity.

The programme draws upon neuroscience, group analysis, and organisational psychology to probe deeply the analytical, critical, and evaluative thinking that is at the heart of legal training and practice.

This approach is embedded in ‘The Complete Lawyer’ course, delivered by Law Society Psychological Services to trainee solicitors as part of their Professional Practice Course. The Law Society is now offering this programme to all members.

Lawyerly strengths are at their peak when combined with socially-based thinking and communication, such as that found in building effective relationships, and in leading, managing, and mentoring others. A climate of trust, acceptance, and collaboration is more fertile than thoroughgoing scepticism in certain set-ups.

Threat situations

Lawyerly strengths can be negatively affected in threat situations, when a calmer assessment of difficult circumstances might work better. Neuroscience shows that threat responses also have a bearing on cognitive performance. 

The ability to spot problems, risks, and downsides is a highly-prized lawyerly skill, but overuse can limit ability to think independently or creatively, or to fully listen to the views of others. 

The Law Society’s ‘Time to Think’ series is examining in detail why that sense of threat in work settings must be reduced in order to facilitate a good thinking culture that is both productive and respectful of different personality types.

Clear expectations and communication help to mitigate these threat situations. Nancy Kline’s work offers a means of maximising the quality of thinking and creating a culture that harnesses the best workplace thinking.

At the heart of the Thinking Environment™ is the practice of ‘generative attention’. This means giving full attention to the person and speaking in a way that is purely focused on that person’s ‘emergent’ thinking. 

It is not waiting for your turn to speak, or formulating your response, and it is never, ever interrupting while someone is completing their train of thought. Expressing rather than repressing feelings increases relatedness – thus releasing energy for cognitive work. 

Cognitive overload

Legal workplaces often combine both long hours and demanding mental work. The danger of cognitive overload is real because of biological limits on the brain when making difficult and complex decisions.

Understanding these limits can improve performance, bearing in mind the following:

• Actual high-quality brain work is probably limited to five hours per day. Taking breaks to refresh and replenish the reserves is physically necessary in order to continue to think well.
• Effective brainpower is a limited resource, and the brain is not capable of doing two things at once.
• Priorities should be set first, before dealing with more mundane tasks.
• Brain-hungry tasks should be done when energy reserves are highest.
• Doing small things well, such as listening, saying thank you, being approachable and generous, and spending social time with team members can all make a huge difference to a thriving workplace.

Putting this knowledge and this practice together consistently will create a culture that promotes, encourages, and supports independent thinking, inclusive of, but going beyond the purely analytical and critical.

‘Real’ thinking

‘Real’ thinking can save enormous time in clearer communication and more effective meetings, as well delivering quality decision-making, inclusivity, and better relationships.

Alison Nolan, in the journal Modern Legal Practice, writes that the frenetic and sometimes fearful nature of organisational life has forced us into taking part in a round of interactions that nobody likes or values, and we often don’t know how to stop.

The opposite is a meeting where everyone contributes, everyone gets full attention, thoughts are taken to their full conclusion, no one feels the need to grab the limelight, limiting assumptions are brought to light, fresh thinking takes the place of stale repetition – and the meeting finishes ahead of time!

The Law Society is committed to supporting the legal profession and enabling solicitors to thrive by building psychologically healthy legal workplaces. Peer networks, such as that provided by Time to Think, are an invaluable resource and offer support throughout the many challenges and opportunities of professional life.

For more information, contact ps@lawsociety.ie.

Mary Hallissey is a journalist with the Law Society Gazette.

STRATEGIES FOR BETTER OUTCOMES

Participants in Time to Think have been warm in their praise for the training. “The sessions with Hannah Carney were personally fulfilling, thought-provoking, and introduced new strategies for working in teams and developing better outcomes. I would highly recommend it,” said Yvonne Kelly (Dublin City Council Law Department).

Ciara Murphy (assistant chief state solicitor at the Chief State Solicitor’s Office) added: “While I had never heard the ‘Ten Components of a Thinking Environment’ described as such prior to Hannah’s workshops, the components were quickly recognisable to me as consistent features of our best days here in the CSSO and, no doubt, in many other legal practices. The workshops have given me the tools and motivation to incorporate those components into more and more of our daily interactions.”

AIB lawyer Rob Walls commented: “I would absolutely recommend this programme for leaders of in-house teams. The programme showed us why, in busy workplaces where the ability to make quick decisions is desired, creating more opportunities for quality thinking time for our teams is essential. But, more importantly, it provided us with practical tips for how to create those opportunities.”

Sinead Keaveney (lawyer, Bank of Ireland) said: “I really valued the opportunity to participate in the Law Society’s ‘Time to Think’ pilot initiative. Hannah and Chris provided a comprehensive introduction to the main principles and behaviours of Nancy Kline’s ‘Thinking Environment’, which has the potential to provide enormous benefits for individuals, teams and organisations.

“The pilot demonstrated the value of listening well, not interrupting, supporting each other, valuing all voices and opinions – all within an environment where there is an overriding sense of ease, trust and respect. I encourage colleagues to avail of the opportunity to participate in this programme.”