There is a modicum of coincidence attached to The Mikes, if we may call them that for the moment. First, their first names. Then, a shared passion for the environment; election victories last fall in Seattle city government races; and bicycles — they ride everywhere, often together. It’s a commitment.
They were once employed at the same Seattle law firm — Stokes Lawrence. And there’s this thing they have, or had, for something of a disheveled, rumpled appearance; at least prior to the campaigns. We’ll get to that later.
Coincidence? Okay, maybe there is some alignment here. Kelly Noonan, managing shareholder for Stokes Lawrence, nods and pauses for a minute while she thinks about it. She worked with both Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn, a former Stokes Lawrence partner, and the firm’s onetime chief financial officer, Seattle City Councilmember Mike O’Brien.
She knows first, however, what isn’t at work here. “I don’t think of our firm as being overly political,” Noonan says, referring to The Mikes opting to run for public office. And despite their mutual involvement in the Sierra Club and other organizations, “I don’t think anybody would think of us as an environmental firm,” she says. What it is, she believes, as does colleague Bradford Axel (another of the firm’s attorneys, who also worked with the new politicos), has everything to do with the culture of Stokes Lawrence.
“We’re not a homogeneous place,” Axel says. “Politically, culturally, lifestyle, practice areas — we’re kind of all over the map. People don’t fit into neat little boxes. There are some traits that are universal. We have a pretty entrepreneurial spirit here, so people are drawn to the idea of developing, creating and managing their practices.”
“The idea of people having interests outside of the practice of law and being drawn to this firm, at least in part because they’re going to be able to pursue those (interests), that is common here,” Noonan says.
And therein lies the germ of a development greater than any coincidence could conjure. Ask and you will hear the same answer from McGinn, O’Brien, Noonan and Axel. They all went to work at Stokes Lawrence, they say, primarily because of the excellent quality of the work and the people. But another reason they were drawn to the firm is because there is a genuine appreciation for life outside the office.
Stokes Lawrence requires fewer billable hours of its attorneys than any number of large firms, according to Noonan, precisely because it wants its attorneys to become more in touch with their communities.
“What I liked,” says McGinn, “was that they seemed to recognize that most lawyers had some other interest outside of work. The expectation (at the law firm) was that people would engage the community in some way, whatever it was, that provided a better balance.”
Those interests on the part of Stokes Lawrence employees are all over the ballpark, Noonan says, “whether (they’re) being active in the Sierra Club like Mike McGinn was, or running and competing in triathlons or volunteering at their kids’ school or coaching one of their sports, or being involved in bar and professional activities. It’s not that people couldn’t do any of those things at other places, but they have a little bit more freedom to do that here.”
What does an emphasis on fostering outside interests gain? Well, political aspirations aside, Noonan says, “We attract people who genuinely care about their community. From a business perspective, having attorneys who are visible in the community in addition to being excellent at what they do is a great combination.
“But we also believe that well-rounded people make better lawyers and can understand their clients’ issues better. We want our attorneys to have time to spend with their clients when they’re not on the clock. That matters. It matters a lot to our clients.”
Most likely the powers that be at Stokes Lawrence didn’t have to give McGinn, for one, much of a shove to go after that well-roundedness or to serve his passions.
Already keen on student government, and housing and healthcare for students while in law school, McGinn says that after about two years at the law firm — his first job out of law school — he answered a Sierra Club ad for committee work, and went from there. He tackled positions few others wanted in the organization, he says, eventually becoming a leader in the club’s Washington efforts. He organized voter education campaigns and fostered efforts to evaluate and rate candidates and issues. The list goes on.
In addition, he was a member of a number of advisory committees to the Seattle mayor’s office. He was active, too, in his neighborhood of Greenwood, at one point becoming president of its community council.
O’Brien, for his part, started at Stokes Lawrence two weeks before his first son was born (he and his wife now have two boys). It isn’t hard to imagine what quickly became his outside interest — at least at first.
“I was learning how to be a dad and part of a growing family,” O’Brien says. “They (Stokes Lawrence) were great in allowing me the time and flexibility to be the kind of dad that was important to me.”
Once the boys reached school age, however, O’Brien resurrected his other interests. A river guide, backpacker and kayaker, he had a passion for the environment. McGinn invited him to a Sierra Club meeting and that did it. Years of involvement there led him to become a Sierra Club chairman and a key player in squashing a statewide, mega-transportation initiative, and then in backing a successful bid to expand light rail in the Seattle area.
How all of that and their work with Stokes Lawrence will serve the two of them as they embark on their new, and public, jobs remains to be seen — at least by city residents who know little of the pair.
But Noonan and Axel have a pretty good sense of it. Of McGinn, Axel says what you see is what you get. “There’s no posing in him. If he was a talker not a doer, he wouldn’t be riding his bike a gazillion miles on the campaign trail. He has very, very deep convictions, particularly about the environment.”
“Mike’s word is good,” Noonan says. “If he commits to doing something, then that’s what he’s going to do. And if he changes his mind, there’s going to be a good reason for it and he’s going to be able to articulate it.
“As Mike’s partner for many years, I know that he will be making decisions based on a full review of the facts. He will listen to different viewpoints and the position he advocates will be truly one he believes is in the best interest of this city.”
And O’Brien? He was the MBA guy, the non-attorney in a room filled with attorneys. He was the CFO, the non-owner in a room filled with owners, especially evident when those owners met in regular session to manage their business affairs.
Noonan remembers that O’Brien more than held his own at those meetings. “When Mike had something to say, he had the ear of everybody in the room. What he said was smart and well-thought out, and often considered the issue from a different point of view.”
That may not sound like much, Noonan says, “but for a non-lawyer, non-owner to be viewed as truly a peer, and in some ways even more insightful than a peer … he brought something very, very special to the interaction between the owners.”
O’Brien remembers, too. “Sitting around the table of shareholders for 10 years and watching those people make decisions, … balancing the need to have the firm make enough money to be able to pay respectable wages, … and yet foster the culture that they thought was so important, I learned a lot about making decisions based on values.”
It’s something, he says, he’s carrying with him to City Hall. “One of the things I really want to bring is this sense of open and collaborative but very value-driven leadership at city level and all throughout the city,” O’Brien says.
For his part, McGinn says he brings a commitment to confront the choices Seattle faces in the years ahead. “I’m trying to elevate the debate about the challenges we face and the choices we need to make,” he says. “Let the chips fall where they may in how we answer that.”
Oh, and that rumpled look? The pair are noted bikers. They rode to work regularly at Stokes Lawrence. They dressed, well, like bicyclists. McGinn would tack a note to the door of his office when he was changing into a suit he kept there for courtroom use: “Just a second, I’m changing my shirt.”
O’Brien? He got a little fashion advice when he was running for City Council — something about wearing pants with creases in them, and, if there wasn’t time for an iron, at least shaking out his shirt when he took it out of the dryer.
Noonan and Axel would say it’s all part of the “authenticity” that is part of the McGinn and O’Brien make-up. It’s a word they use over and over again when describing the pair: What you see is what you get.
And now it’s Seattle’s turn. A chance to see just what it was that Stokes Lawrence saw and fostered for so many years.
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