Rick Howell, CIO, and Jennifer Bluestein, chief talent officer, of Perkins Coie.

Perkins Coie knew early on that it would likely be affected by the new coronavirus. Because of its presence in China and headquarters in Seattle, the Am Law 50 firm saw before many others that it would need to get its lawyers and staff set up to work at home. 

"It does feel that we did it all in 10 days, but the reality is our first COVID-19 call was on Jan. 26 because we have offices in China," Rick Howell, CIO of Perkins Coie, said in an interview. "Our continuity plan did have a pandemic aspect, so we ran scenarios of what we needed to do for remote work."

That scenario manifested in a 10-day rollout, starting with the Seattle headquarters March 6, that saw the entire firm become virtual by March 16, when Perkins Coie announced the transition to its clients.

But that 10-day deployment was made possible by discussions that had been happening at the firm for a year, ever since Jennifer Bluestein came on board as the firm's chief talent officer. 

Bluestein said that because of the early prep work, while other firms were still looking at who would be virtualized first and putting them into workable groups, Perkins Coie was already looking at moving the whole firm in a span of a few days.

The firm had originally started looking at remote capability several months prior for more traditional reasons than dealing with a global pandemic: Office space is expensive.

"We were examining remote work because of the cost of physical space," Howell said. "The opportunity here is that we can come back with a social fabric that is just as strong if not stronger than it was before."

That examination led to an assessment of both the physical equipment—such as laptop computers for those who had traditionally worked on a desktop in the office—and working conditions, as the firm placed an emphasis on showing its workers how to maintain social and work ties while in separate spaces.

Bluestein said the firm has been encouraging things like "walking meetings" where, if possible, participants do their calls while taking a walk, and virtual coffee dates to keep people connected.

"The next thing we are working on is boundaries. Don't sit in front of your computer working all the time," Bluestein said.

From a technology and logistical standpoint, the firm had to figure out potentially overlooked issues like remote phone call routing from reception, scanning all incoming mail to a digital format and sending to the appropriate recipients, and even educating staff and attorneys on videoconferencing systems they may not have utilized until three weeks ago. 

"We ramped up our supply chain purchases, figuring there may be shortages," Howell said. "In February, we had about 5% of our workforce that didn't have remote capability. By March, we knew we had the inventory to work from home or drop-ship equipment to them."

Once the logistics were figured out, the next step for Bluestein and Howell was figuring out how to keep the firm's collaborative culture in tact, while showing understanding that for most, this is a new way of working. Howell said one important consideration was the shift of working hours, especially for attorneys and staff who are parents.

"As communities went remote, there became a natural challenge with families as hours shift to more mornings, evenings and weekends," Howell said. That raised the question: "How do we adjust our support schedules to meet those demands?"

Bluestein said that, in addition to adding support for those new working hours, the firm has implemented two new policies for those working from home who also have family matters to handle.

"We added emergency care time," Bluestein said, but not just for care related to children being sick. It also provides for things like picking up children from college, she explained. "We wanted people to not worry about having to take time off for things like that."

The firm also initiated a back-up child care program as well as crisis care. If the employee needs day care or support, they can pay anyone in their circle, such as a parent or friend, to take on the responsibility, and the firm would reimburse the employee for the costs.

Bluestein said as they have gone through this process, there have of course been hiccups, as old habits die hard.

"We issued a lot of communications for partners on how to stay in touch with their legal assistants," Bluestein said. "Some were resistant at first, wanting to still come into the office and have their assistants there as well."

For many firms that have successfully rolled out virtual environments, once the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic has passed, questions will likely arise about whether expansive physical office space is a true necessity in the future. For Perkins Coie, those questions were already bubbling, and the firm is prepared to move forward if going back to the old way of working isn't possible anytime soon.

"We built this with the idea that we may be working remote long term," Howell said.

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