Do We Need A Change In Courses?

This from CNNMoney:  MBA programs are changing the curriculum to add courses on interpersonal skills. MIT for one is dialing back on pure quantitative skills and adding more interpersonal coursework. Also, Wharton, Tuck, Chicago, the University of Virginia's Darden, and Berkeley's Haas School, among many others, have also started stressing teamwork and are paying more attention to "soft" skills like listening to colleagues.

It is brilliant really.  As much as this is probably needed in MBA programs, it is likely needed more in law schools across the country.  With all of the concern about jerks, asses, Rambo lawyers and the like of late, what is needed is more training in the "soft" skills of dealing with other people and other attorneys by lawyers coming out of school.  Too much emphasis is placed on the adversarial system with not enough training on effectively deal with others.  If the practice of law is anything, it is about interpersonal skills.  To many students, teaching them to be adversarial without teaching them interpersonal skills is like handing them a gun without teaching them how to use it properly.

Comments

[Clint James]

To be honest, I think law schools really need to be teaching courses in firm management. As an undergrad who has worked through high school and through college for lawyers I have seen some pretty abhorrent practices when it comes to the treatment of staff and how some lawyers run their firms. Whether it be management by memo or out and out telling someone to not socialize with a former member of the firm on their own time, some of the best lawyers just don't get it when it comes to running the personal and personnel side of a business.

[Gary Zeiss]

Fascinating concept - teaching manners and social skills to attorneys. My last law firm job (and in many ways, I mean last) even had "firm values" that included treating people with respect. Too bad that the partner that I worked for, however briefly, didn't bother to read them - nor did firm management bother to tell him to read them.

I'm sure this is true at other firms, where management committees hire consultants to come up with "firm values." These are put on the firms intranet and touted to prospective hires. Those of us (and I include myself) fool enough to believe them are quickly disabused of that notion - as partners, particularly rainmakers, find themselves "above the law."

Thank heavens for the third wave!

Gary.