How a growing law firm recruits and retains talent

How a growing law firm recruits and retains talent without adding HR headcount

With Insperity providing support for multi-state HR administration and compliance, Lagerlof, LLP’s lean People Services team puts its time into the employee development and career growth that drive recruiting and retention.

Lagerlof, LLP is a full-service private wealth law firm based in Pasadena, California. The firm took its current form about six and a half years ago, when a three-way merger combined three practices under one name. Before the deal closed, Chief Operating Officer Dr. Corey Castillo and the firm’s equity partners spent a weekend defining the culture they wanted to build.

They settled on two priorities. The first was a collaborative, cross-practice way of working that lets a full-service firm cover every client need. The second was philanthropy, a value all three legacy firms shared. The partners created Lagerlof Cares, a 501(c)(3) that runs two community events a year and has become part of the firm’s identity.

Castillo has continued to grow Lagerlof through mergers and acquisitions, vetting each deal for cultural fit as carefully as for financials. “The worst thing that we could do to culture is make decisions that are comfortable on the front end but catastrophic on the back end,” he said. Each acquisition brings on more people, and with them more payroll, benefits and HR compliance work. The firm now employs about 97 people across five states: California, Illinois, Arizona, Ohio and Wyoming.

THE CHALLENGE

HR compliance support across five states

Human resources at Lagerlof is run by Lisa Nuss, the firm’s Director of People Services. Nuss came from accounting and banking and joined through a 2022 merger. Lagerlof renamed human resources as People Services on purpose, and Nuss leads it with a clear view of the role. “It’s not the HR you read about on the internet, where HR is not on your side,” she said. The job is to support and develop employees.

Growth through mergers made that more of a challenge. As the firm expanded, it added employees in California, Illinois, Arizona, Ohio and Wyoming. Each state has its own employment laws, and the rules change constantly. Keeping current with all of it is a specialized job in its own right. “For a people services department to keep track of the laws, it would be very cumbersome,” Nuss said. Run in-house, that work would pull time and attention away from the part of the role Lagerlof valued most: developing and keeping its people.

The stakes raised the bar further. Lagerlof is a law firm based in California, one of the most heavily regulated states for employers, and Castillo holds a deliberately low tolerance for that kind of exposure. “I am more risk-averse than most,” he said. Across five states, one missed requirement can become a costly problem, and Castillo wanted specialized HR support to help manage that risk.

THE DECISION

Peace of mind wins the math

Castillo’s original firm had been an Insperity client since 2018, so the partnership was already running when the practices merged. Lagerlof does not take it on faith. Castillo and Nuss reassess it every year, pricing out what running HR fully in-house would cost and weighing it against the partnership. Bringing HR fully in-house would mean hiring HR staff to replace what Insperity does, and every year the math comes out the same way.

For Castillo, the partnership buys a focused People Services team instead of added headcount, specialist support for managing multi-state HR-related risk, and the hours he and Nuss would otherwise lose to managing HR compliance.

Through the co-employment relationship, Insperity helps support the employer-related compliance load across all five states. That is the assistance Castillo most wanted. With Insperity providing that support, he can put his attention where it does more for the business.

THE SOLUTION

Full-service HR built on co-employment

Lagerlof runs its people operation on the Insperity® HR360 solution, the full-service HR offering that takes on many day-to-day, employer-related HR responsibilities through a co-employment relationship while the firm runs its business. Insperity helped support the firm’s multi-state HR-related compliance efforts, along with payroll, benefits and the routine demands of leaves and employee questions. That gave the People Services team room to concentrate on developing and keeping people.

A partner that large has a resource for almost everything, though the firm has to go looking for it. “There’s an answer and a resource for everything,” Castillo said, “but it’s just a matter of asking.” A single point of contact at Insperity makes that practical, tracking down the right specialist or building what the firm needs.

Over time, Lagerlof drew on more of what the partnership offered. The firm moved its annual performance reviews onto Insperity’s platform and built a close working relationship with its Insperity performance specialist. That relationship became central to how the firm develops and keeps its people.

THE PARTNERSHIP

Proactive guidance and an experienced HR professional on call

Lagerlof has no shortage of legal expertise, and it keeps its own outside counsel for legal decisions. What Insperity adds is a sounding board for HR best practices and a second check on the details a busy people team can miss.

Nuss uses the partnership this way often. She comes to her Insperity contact with an approach already in mind and tests it before acting. For Castillo, the value is in the tone. Asked to describe the partnership in one word, he chose “candid.” That candor lets the firm lay out what is going on and what it needs, then get a direct answer without the usual back-and-forth. “It’s well-received on both sides, and it allows us to very quickly solve for matters,” he said.

THE RESULTS

Time back, greater accuracy, and lower risk

Time returned to the people work

The first result is capacity. The partnership lets a focused team do more than its size would suggest. Without it, Lagerlof would have to add HR staff to cover the HR compliance and administrative work Insperity handles now. Instead, that capacity goes into developing and keeping employees, with resources the firm could not easily assemble on its own.

With Insperity providing support for HR administrative and compliance, Castillo and Nuss have had the time to build a development program that few firms their size offer. Every employee has an individual development plan, a mentor and a clear path to advance. In some stretches, the firm has run two or three workshops a month, built with its Insperity performance specialist around employee feedback, and it tells candidates about that professional development as a reason to join.

Attracting and retaining talent

For attorneys, the firm designed a career model that fits every stage of practice – early, mid and late – with clear paths for advancement, control over performance and earnings, and real professional autonomy. The model, Castillo said, “has really helped us recruit the right talent.” One attorney who joined two years ago from a very different firm has, in Castillo’s words, “just been hitting home runs,” with gains in performance, network visibility and confidence.

The same approach reaches entry-level staff. Castillo describes an administrative hire who came in with a narrow view of where the role could lead. The firm spotted skills the employee had not recognized, talked it through, and mapped out a five- to six-year path. As Castillo puts it, “these lights went on for the employee, who hadn’t pictured that future.”

Hiring for strengths

The same idea drives recruiting. “Find 80% spare parts and build the remaining 20% together,” Castillo said. The firm hires for strengths and builds the rest together. The shift shows inside the firm: when Nuss started, few employees came to her with questions. These days the opposite is true: people seek her out constantly. “It’s almost like take a number,” she said.

Looking ahead

A foundation for growth Lagerlof plans to keep growing through carefully vetted mergers and acquisitions, and its HR foundation supports that growth. Insperity helps manage the HR compliance exposure that comes with expanding to each new state, and shares the administrative load that would otherwise sit with a one-person team. Each acquisition adds another state and another group of employees. With Insperity providing support for HR compliance and administrative work, Lagerlof can keep its attention on the development and career work that helps it attract and retain people.