Business efficiency has invariably come into question in the last few months. Is the pro-independence culture of the partnership model working to the detriment of the firm? Dennis Sherwood expands the issue

You have probably been to one of those ghastly, mind-numbing awaydays where the facilitator asks you to identify the song that most aptly describes your firm. Gritting your teeth, while typing on your BlackBerry and avoiding eye contact, you mutter "My Way", "We Are The Champions", or – in an attempt to second-guess what that oh-so-junior-and-not-even-a-lawyer facilitator is wanting you to say – "With A Little Help From My Friends". But have you ever thought of "Walk On By"? Let me explain.

Imagine that one quiet evening, you pass a closed office door. You hear two voices you recognise. It is quite clear that Sam is bawling out Alex, in a way that is not only rude, but highly aggressive. What do you do?

It probably depends on who 'you' are, and indeed who 'Sam' and 'Alex' are. Or rather not so much on who you (and they) are, but on what you (and they) are.

For example, if 'you' are an equity partner, 'Sam' is a senior associate and 'Alex' a trainee, 'you' probably instruct 'Sam' to come to your office, and then inform 'Sam' in no uncertain terms that bawling out trainees is not the way we do things around here, and that if you, sunshine, want to become a partner, you'd better get your act together.

But if 'you' are a salaried partner, and 'Sam' an equity partner at the top of the lockstep, would you do the same thing? Given how salaried partners are beholden unto their equity 'partners', you would be a saint if you did. Far safer not to interfere, to let the sleeping dog lie, to walk on by.

During the 19th century, scientists developed a body of knowledge known as thermodynamics, which explains how to get the most efficiency out of steam engines. Now in the 21st century, we are wrestling with organodynamics – how to get the most efficiency out of organisations. And just as thermodynamics has three main laws, so does organodynamics – whose third law is appropriate here: 'organisations end up with the cultures they deserve'. Of which a culture of 'walking on by' is a powerful example.

One of the key features of professional partnerships is the freedom and independence afforded to the partners – no corporate entity would empower so many people at such a young age. This of course is one of their great strengths: endowing partners to be dynamic and creative. But it can also be a weakness – the freedom to develop new clients and new lines of business is the same as the freedom to be lazy; the independence to 'do my own thing' is also a signal to management to 'get off my back'. Indeed, taken to a (not so extreme) extreme, the concept of 'management' within a professional firm might be seen by the independent-minded freedom-relishing individual as nothing less than an infringement of human rights.

And therein lies the dilemma. As a firm grows, how does it coordinate activity? How does it regulate itself? How does it seek to achieve a state in which the whole is significantly greater than the sum of its parts?

There is a solution to this apparent riddle which plays to the key strength of what a partnership truly should be. The solution is peer group pressure: for peers to interact with each other in a fully professional and collegiate way; in a way that delivers sensible self-regulation and coordination, as well as the 'connectedness' that is so vital to true teamwork.

Easily said, but much less easily done. Especially in a two-tier partnership where there is no way the salaried partners are true peers of those holding equity – what salaried partner would dare to engage with a senior equity partner in the kind of dialogue where peer pressure might be expressed? And even among the equity partners, it is much easier to walk on by.

Does your culture rely on a complex network of mutual non-aggression treaties? A culture driven by the realisation that if I seek to influence you, then this sets the precedent for him to influence me. Now that is something I can surely do without. So it is far safer for me to do nothing: to walk on by.

Dennis Sherwood is managing director of The Silver Bullet Machine Manufacturing Company.