Tackling this subject, I admit, may simply be an excuse to achieve a long-held goal of using an Alan Parsons Project album as a post title. (Next up: finding a way to smuggle in a Supertramp reference.) But in truth, I was pointed in this direction by a couple of recent developments that revisited the… Read more »
Posts Categorized: Big Firms
The lawyer vs. the law firm
So I’ve been thinking a lot about law firm mergers lately (especially between large Canadian firms and their much larger international counterparts). That in turn has led me to think about cross-selling, why it’s so important to the success of these newly merged firms (and others), and about the relative failure of firms to make… Read more »
Why is your law firm merging?
What do you think of when you read the phrase “a large law firm”? What type of law firm comes into your mind? How many lawyers does it have? In how many jurisdictions is it located? What is its annual turnover? How you answer these questions will vary according to your own market and how… Read more »
Law firm profits in the process era
Large and midsize law firms appear to have an “expenses problem.” Profit is weak, flat or in decline at many midsize and large law firms, says the Hildebrandt Institute. It reports that demand slacked noticeably in the second quarter of 2012 following decent but uneven growth in the first quarter. More problematically, however, expenses soared… Read more »
Walking away from a losing game
And suddenly, everyone’s talking about Procurement. Not that long ago, warning lawyers about the rise of the corporate purchasing function was a little like a medieval parent telling their children about the goblin who lived under the floorboards: you’d better behave, or he’ll come and eat you up. Now the goblin is loose: Procurement’s importance… Read more »
The “non-lawyer” gap in law firms: narrowing or widening?
I’ve had the opportunity to speak with several groups of law firm professionals this summer, principally in presentations to the Private Law Libraries Summit at the American Association of Law Libraries and the International Legal Technology Association’s annual conference. In these venues, I’ve spoken to and heard from law librarians, knowledge managers, IT professionals, training… Read more »
Too big to succeed
(Note: This article is reprinted with permission from the July 10, 2012 issue of The Legal Intelligencer. © 2012 ALM Media Properties, LLC. Further duplication without permission is prohibited. All rights reserved.) What do we talk about when we talk about “BigLaw”? Let’s be honest: we’re not actually discussing specific law firms at all. We’re… Read more »
The dying cult of the corner partner
Let’s start with an odd fact: the self-interest of a law firm is fundamentally opposed to the self-interest of its most powerful partners. Here’s how I see it. The more influence a lawyer wields over a given client, the more stature, leverage and tactical advantage that lawyer gains within his or her firm; these benefits… Read more »
Rebundling the law firm
Perhaps most importantly, unbundling has the immensely positive effect of removing from lawyers our self-imposed burden of omnipotence. Our intense dislike of risk and our fervent striving for control has left us vulnerable to taking on more responsibility for our clients’ outcomes than we often should. The modern view of clients — one they share… Read more »
What mergers can’t achieve
Back in my university days, I remember walking past the Graduate Students Office and seeing a photocopied diagram taped to the door. It was called “The Doctoral Candidate Flowchart,” and it provided a series of turns and directions for graduates struggling to get their thesis finally completed. My favourite entry on the flowchart was in… Read more »