Comments on: The new leverage

By: Dan

Dan — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 09:01:49 +0000

I have found that most in-house lawyers talk a lot about alternative fee arrangements, yet are oftentimes afraid to go with them. I cannot count the times in-house lawyers have declined our flat fee offers in favor of normal hourly billing, while all the while telling us how much they would “love” to do the flat fee arrangement, but it is “just too difficult.” I would estimate that those companies with in-house lawyers do flat fees 10% of the time while those without in-house lawyers do it about 95% of the time. Makes me think in-house lawyers deserve at least as much blame as law firms for the old way of doing things. Would love to hear what others think about this.

By: Colm Brannigan

Colm Brannigan — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 04:02:44 +0000

Brilliant overview!

But:

“Topics of inquiry included client satisfaction surveys, value billing, outsourcing, commoditization, automation, consolidation, and social networking.”

What about ADR? Once again it seems to have been overlooked that mediation is a very low risk and cost effective dispute resolution mechanism, especially in these uncertain economic times!

By: Richard Granat

Richard Granat — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 02:52:07 +0000

There is no question that solos and small law firms will be forced to re-position themselves as more routine work becomes commoditized by moving up the value curve to do more complex legal work, while using technology and outsourcing to lower their cost of doing more routine tasks. Consumers continue to turn towards non-lawyer alternatives to the legal profession such as nolo.com and legalzoom.com which actually offer little value when compared with the accountability and expertise of dealing with an attorney. However solos and small law firms that serve the consumer market segment are stuck in an obsolete pricing formula (hourly billing), for less complex tasks, that turns off many consumers. The present recession will accelerate these trends forcing solos to change or face a severe compression of revenues and profit margin. Our advanced software-as-service technology at directlaw.com is designed to enable solos and small law firms to operate as a virtual law practice over the Internet without a large capital investment and to level the playing field with disruptive players such as legalzoom.com.

By: What about clients? : Binary Law

What about clients? : Binary Law — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 21:39:48 +0000

[...] The new leverage This is the future of legal work, configured not to be an end in itself (a profit center for lawyers) but as a means to an end (better service for clients). [...]

By: Carolyn Elefant

Carolyn Elefant — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 15:19:00 +0000

Jordan,
Thank you so much for such a complimentary link. But more importantly, thank you for making solos part of the conversation about where the law is headed. While of course, I read everything Bruce Macewen and Aric Press write about the legal profession, the future of the profession doesn’t depend solely on what happens at big law. (I don’t blame them for their focus – that’s their beat just as sololand is mine). All lawyers regardless of where we work must follow these trends closely because of the implications they have for the quality of legal services provided to clients and the ability to expand access to law – which is really the only reason why any of this matters in the end.

By: Susan Cartier Liebel

Susan Cartier Liebel — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 15:12:12 +0000

Outstanding, Jordan.

I wrote a post ‘Will Lawyers As We Know Them Exist in 100 Years?” http://tinyurl.com/6xdgzq a year ago. It was based on a series of articles by Susskind.

The other year old post worth reading is “A Lawyer in Every Stop & Shop?” http://tinyurl.com/5qmun5 which further discusses the commoditization of the legal profession.

Yes, major changes are afoot. The question is, who wil survive?