As a lawyer who has survived a practice group failure (insurance coverage: Buchalter); bailed from a sinking ship prior to a merger (Hancock, Rothert into Duane Morris); and, moved on to greener pastures before the collapse of the local office of an old-line firm (Pepper Hamilton’s L.A. outpost); and as the spouse of an attorney who left Heller before its collapse and after 34 years with the firm, I can pretty confidently say that these losses have not to date doomed the megafirm as an institution.

Nor are these firms all over-leveraged. Heller certainly wasn’t.

Most of the lawyers in the merged, failed or re-organized firms simply moved to other large firms — often larger than the firm they left or the ones that cratered beneath their feet.

Practice groups splinter with some members staying together; some jettisoning their dead wood; and others opening boutique firms of their own.

After more than two decades of practice, I see the same lawyers with the same clients litigating the same type of cases. Only their business cards and their geography change (downtown to century city or vice versa).

I’ve seen many large firms fail about me — in the 80’s, 90’s and 00’s. During that time, law firms in general just kept on getting bigger; salaries and billing rates higher; and litigation lengthier.

I believe that each of these firms failed for reasons unique to each, with the present economic cataclysm being the final push at each firm’s weakest point.

Granted, this is not empirical evidence.

Still, I thought you’d appreciate getting a little feedback from the street.

As always, one of your biggest fans.

Vickie

From the ashes arise new enterprises and opportunities for those with vision.

It is a cycle which repeats itself over and over, again yet one which never fails to shake people to their core.

Great post as always.

An adoring fan :-)

The disintegration of the media industry is to be expected when it became impossible to enforce the traditional copyright remedies because of technology. New business models, which are not stable, had to spring up.

But the change in the practice of law, the ones you hope for, are not likely to arrive, in my opinion. The vast majority of consumers of legal products are unable to determine the value of the services they consume. Attorneys are then forced to construct substitute – large offices, expensive paintings, absurd billing structures- measures of value. Credence goods are hard to evaluate in the marketplace.

Law, like religion, will have to tend to the more absurd forms of worship, until dispute resolution becomes a business and not a calling.