I suggest that your mission statement is really saying 'this is who you are and this is what the world can expect from our law firm' Yes, this sounds a bit lofty given the obvious lack of connection between the statement and the reality that yours truly has encountered in a few shops.
And this is where the drama begins. A Mission Statement is not an advert or a mere puff, it is a contract between your firm and its employees on the one hand and your firm and its clients on the other hand, something similar to a corporation's Memorandum and Articles of Association.
It really only counts if it can be depended on, if strangers can call you out on it and there is no where for you to hide and no excuses to offer.
If you don't use it then...
Another thing, in this business of marketing your legal services,you simply cannot be everything to everyone, you cannot service all clients across all industries and you most definitely cannot eat an elephant whole. And yet, vague, omnibus Mission Statements proudly set out to do just this with the result that these Mission Statements have no relationship whatsoever to reality. They are ideals that will never be met on this side of the river.
Here is an idea: let your clients decide your mission statement for you and you will find it more useful, you will know what type of law firm you are, you will be more able to plot midcourse corrections by it and will be able to truly assess your usefulness and growth as a law firm.
Try not to think about Mission Statements as attempts to express your highest levels of commercial nobility. It is a simple, specific and clear statement of what you will do for the marketplace.
In the final analysis you do not determine when you have 'made it' as a law firm, the marketplace does no matter what you say to the ether.
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