Values of the Barone Defense Firm

Answer: We are very much a learning organization. So part of the benefit of employment is you have a continuing legal, or if you're an administrative person administrative training budget, which you can use at your own discretion—we have to approve it—but you get to pick your own coursework within parameters. And we're very encouraging in getting additional training because as our employees become more well trained, we can better place them within the firm to do a more specific type of employment or specific type of work. And then we also do have meetings. We have off-site events where we'll get together, maybe at a hockey game, we like to go to different sporting events downtown, have dinner together, lunch together and those sorts of things. And that really helps to encourage the type of supportive atmosphere that we want to have with one another. Because when we talk about supporting the client in that way and being empathetic and helpful and trustworthy, et cetera, it's very important; but it's important that we also reflect those morals and those values to each other. So we reward, we literally reward in front of the entire firm, people who give that type of service to one another. So if someone goes above and beyond their job category, for example, and helps someone else in the firm, they get a reward for that. And we do it in a public way. And that's one of the more, the favorite things that I have in the meetings that we have is when we announce the person that we're giving the award to. And it really helps the person who gets the award—and it's just a little thing, it's not a big dollar value—but it's an acknowledgement.