Combatting Law Prof Free Agency With Leadership, Incentives, and Joy

Clayton Gillette's new article, Law School Faculty as Free Agents, 17 J. Contemp. Leg. Issues 213 (2008), which I originally blogged here (along with commentary by Al Brophy and Larry Ribstein), continues to generate a great deal of thoughtful discussion in the law prof blogosphere. Yesterday I blogged Bill Henderson's post proposing "School-Specific" Capital as the solution to the law prof free agency problem, as well as contributions by Jim Chen, Jeff Lipshaw, and Mike Madison.  Today, Jeff Lipshaw, Gordon Smith, Larry Ribstein, and Christine Hurt weigh in:

Jeff Lipshaw (Suffolk):  Joy, Inspiration, Leadership, and Free Agency:

I truly believe that what inspires people to great performance is a sense of mission, purpose, creation, posterity, whatever, and contracts or other legal or rule-based commitments are the tail of that dog. Cool. Do five year contracts or commitments. But do it within an institution marked by inspired and inspiring leadership.

Gordon Smith (BYU):  Joy in Legal Academe:

Good organizational design alone does not produce joy. But it seems to me that Bill is saying something closely related, namely, that bad organizational design can suck the joy right out of a job. (Perhaps this is the source of Jim Chen's and Julius Getman's frustrations?) My takeaway from Bill's post: give joy a chance.

Larry Ribstein (Illinois):  Law Profs as Free Agents Part Deux:

Bill Henderson responds that the answer is building firm-specific capital. He predictably uses the law firm analogy, and recommends contracts. ...

Jeff Lipshaw points out that there's a chicken and egg problem – you need the culture, or the contract will quickly unravel in a prisoners' dilemma. Of course how to create the culture has bedeviled organizational theorists. When you move to non-profits, and the problem of finding a pie to split, it gets a lot harder, and the contractual solution less realistic.

Gordon Smith responds that maybe joy is the answer. Oy, isn't it hard enough to create a culture without having to worry about joy, too?

So what's my solution? At the most simplistic level, there are things you can do. Incentives matter, and they don't have to be mutually exclusive. How about building into the general compensation and promotion system incentives to mentor, comment on colleagues' papers and constructive attend workshops? Note that none of these things interferes significantly with individual achievement. Also, schools should (like Illinois) hire with a view to creating synergies – groups of colleagues forming centers of excellence. The group then provides some of the glue for its members.

But I want to emphasize that these aren't magic bullets, and that they operate within the much larger universe of organizational science I referred to above.

Christine Hurt (Illinois):

I remember someone telling me a long time ago that no one wants to teach at an institution that is basically a mall. Professors are mall tenants who have a slight preference for keeping the lights on, etc., but no real shared goals because the tenants will come and go when better space opens up at a different mall. In the meantime, they focus their energies on their own enterprises. I think this is obvious in schools that only base raises on whether someone gets outside offers. Perhaps this is to incentivize professors to write and engage in the community, but it also wastes resources if your professors are flying around interviewing all the time. Although the cross-pollinization is nice, I would think a school would want professors to spend some time on their joint enterprise.