Mike, a corporate associate at a large law firm, had been working on a series of due diligence projects since he started on the job about a year ago. One day, Mike picked up the phone and a junior partner, Carol, asked him to join her on a deal. Mike and Carol met later that day in her office. She gave him the deal sheet, talked him through its details, told him where he could find the relevant templates, and asked that he take a crack at first drafts.

Throughout the meeting, Carol was present, attentive and patient, and Mike felt excited and grateful for the opportunity to work with her. A day later, they both met again in her office, sat at a circular working table by the window and went over his drafts. As she marked them up, she explained with deliberate care her rationale for the corrections and checked in with him at regular intervals for his understanding.

Later that week, Mike was on his way to another scheduled drafting session with Carol. As he walked down the hallway, he noted the frenetic energy outside Carol's office. Carol was speaking in a pressured manner to her secretary who sits at a station across the hallway as two other associates looked on tensely. Carol glanced over at Mike as he got closer, forced a thin smile, and waved at him to come in. "I'll be right there," she said as she turned back to her secretary.

Mike had been sitting in her office for about ten minutes, when Carol walked through the open door, and said "crazy day." As she sat down to her desk, the phone rang, and she picked up. Her brow furrowed, and she spoke into the phone with obvious irritation for another five minutes. "Sorry," she said as she hung up. "So where were we?" Mike began to speak when Carol's secretary walked in through the open door and asked Carol a question about documents she had just received. Carol replied curtly, and the secretary turned to walk out as Carol began typing. "This'll just take a minute," she said. A few minutes later, Carol looked at Mike and shook her head as her shoulders dropped. "This is not going to be a good day for this. I'll email you later today," she said.

A couple of days later, Mike got an email from Carol asking him if this was a good time to meet. A few minutes later, Carol and Mike were back at the round table by the window in Carol's office. During this time, Carol showed the same deliberate, attentive care she had shown in their initial drafting session, but the meeting was cut short after ten minutes. A senior associate appeared at the doorway and asked "Got a minute?" "What is it?" Carol asked with a trace of impatience. The associate gave Carol an update on another deal, and Carol then asked that she and Mike reschedule.

Mike and Carol met twice more for drafting sessions on this transaction, and they made headway during one of those meetings. During the other, Carol seemed preoccupied. Instead of sitting at the round table, she sat at her desk while Mike sat on the chair facing her desk. There were repeated interruptions: some "quick" phone calls, her secretary asking questions from the doorway, a few "quick" emails that Carol banged out. Despite these interruptions however, Carol was consistently kind, would say "sorry about that," and seemed invested in the teaching process.

Closing on the transaction a couple of weeks later, Mike felt elated. After a celebratory dinner with the client, Mike did not however hear from Carol again for another five months. They sometimes crossed paths in the hallway, and she was invariably friendly as they walked past each other. Mike found himself wondering what happened. Did she not want to work on another transaction with him? Had he done something wrong? Did she think he lacked potential as a corporate lawyer?

"Outer Walls"

This narrative is a composite of my experience and that of other associates who told me their stories. Some version of this story has likely happened innumerable times at law firms in New York City and across the country: A senior associate or partner who is knowledgeable, patient, and interested in associate development decides to mentor a young lawyer, but the realities of law firm practice intrude. When realities intrude in this way however, mentoring relationships don't develop.

Mentoring relationships under those conditions don't develop because mentoring without proper boundaries is like working on your family relations in a home with its outer walls missing. As committed as a senior lawyer might be to mentoring, dealing with the "elements" will take priority. What then are these "outer walls" that safeguard mentoring against the "elements"? They are the same ones that are fundamental to any of the helping professions: time, task, place, and membership; time (at what time are we meeting? How often?); task (what are we doing?—exclusive of all other tasks); place (where are we meeting?); membership (who should be present—and who shouldn't?).

Research in organizational development show the benefits of mentoring relationships in the form of higher productivity, higher job satisfaction, increased organizational commitment, and increased socialization into the organization. But organizations can't reap the benefits of such relationships if the boundaries that make the relationship possible are not safeguarded.

To illustrate the significance of these boundaries, I'll refer to another professional meeting with which most of us is familiar: the visit to a physician. Physicians are generally adept at maintaining all of the above boundaries—except one: time. Now consider the effect a physician's recurrent tardiness has on the doctor—patient relationship. In my case, I get gradually more irritated as the minutes tick past the agreed upon appointment time. I feel irritated as I sit in the waiting room because I feel my time is being disrespected—as if I were being told that the doctor's time is more valuable than my own. Now imagine how the doctor—patient relationship might be impacted if the physician, in addition to not protecting the time boundary, didn't maintain the other boundaries of the visit either: different people coming in and out of the exam room (membership); the doctor working on other patient charts during the visit (task); having part of the conversation about the medical complaint take place in the hallway (place).

The doctor-patient visit is in most respects not analogous to mentoring but it is analogous in one essential respect: they are both dyadic helping relationships. When boundaries are not safeguarded, the implicit message to the mentee and to the patient is also the same: you are not a priority. You are not important.

Instituting Norms

So, who is responsible for safeguarding these boundaries? The responsibility rests only partially with a mentor such as Carol. Carol could have agreed with Mike to meet on a recurrent, regular basis at the same time on the same day of the week. She could have reserved a conference room and closed the door. She could have told her secretary to hold her calls for the duration of the meeting and to interrupt only under specified circumstances. If something came up during the meeting, she could have asked herself "can this not wait 30 minutes?"

In the event of an emergent matter, Carol could have notified Mike ahead of the meeting time. Lastly, Carol and Mike could have held a post-closing feedback session after the closing, and Carol could have told Mike what to expect about future projects and mentoring meetings. But Carol juggled the parallel responsibilities of mentoring and lawyering the way she did because her firm's norms molded her behavior. And Carol has been very successful at navigating those norms – after all she was made partner. So if Carol starts to safeguard the mentoring boundaries, it'll be in great part because those with influence over the firms' norms will have updated the firm's "building codes" and "zoning laws."

Instituting norms that prioritize mentoring could yield significant payoffs for law firms in regards to attorney job performance, job satisfaction, and commitment to the firm as referenced above. Prioritizing mentoring would also capitalize on the talent, know-how and commitment that senior lawyers like Carol can bring to the mentoring process. In addition, promoting a law firm culture of mentoring would, I believe, go a long way towards minimizing the isolation that so many attorneys at law firms experience—an isolation that can serve as a breeding ground for symptoms of depression and anxiety. By prioritizing mentoring, safeguarding its boundaries, and fostering norms for respectful, attentive professional interactions, law firms could get to work on rooting these symptoms out.

Peter Lobl is a clinical psychologist and founder of Lobl Law Health, a service consulting to law firms on wellbeing and health. Formerly, he was a law firm associate.  He can be contacted at http://www.lobllawhealth.com. The names and identifying characteristics of the attorneys referenced in this article were changed in order to protect their privacy and confidentiality.