At the risk of being mistaken for an Ayn Rand devotee, one of my favourite moments in The Incredibles comes when Helen (Elastigirl) is admonishing her son Dash, who’s upset because he’s not allowed to use the super-speed that makes him special. “Everyone’s special, Dash,” says Helen, to which Dash mutters under his breath: “That’s… Read more »
Posts Categorized: Clients
Twittering your clients
Every so often, a topic explodes into the legal blogosphere and gets everyone talking. We’re seeing one of those explosions right now, thanks to Twitter. If you haven’t heard of Twitter, or if you have but you’re not sure just what it is, you can read the Wikipedia entry for a general backgrounder. If you’re… Read more »
Burn your newsletters
Ah, the law firm newsletter. The simplest and humblest of law firm communication vehicles – a collection of lawyer-written articles on new statutory or case law developments, bundled together into a stiff, saddle-stitched document that’s mailed out to clients on a regular basis (or more recently, placed online and e-mailed). What could be a safer… Read more »
Life after lawyers
We need to start thinking about what the post-lawyer justice system is going to look like. I can see how this might be an absurd or even heretical notion to some people. But there’s reason to believe that lawyers won’t be an essential part of the legal system in the future — and if so,… Read more »
Why your client’s generation matters
In one of last week’s posts, I talked about inter-generational tension within some law firms and how it can undermine these firms’ succession planning efforts. But as important as it is not to alienate good young talent through something as silly as generational resentment, law firms that are clueless about demographic differences risk an even… Read more »
Lawsuit investment and the limits of innovation
As you probably know by now, I’m a big fan of innovation in the law. But there’s good innovation and there’s bad innovation, and what’s emerging in the litigation field in the US and the UK looks to me like it belongs in the latter category. LegalWeek reports that UK hedge funds are lining up… Read more »
The view from the client’s side
Going through the stack of materials from my recent week of conferences, I was re-reading the notes I took at the Opening Plenary of the Canadian Corporate Counsel Association’s Spring Conference in Toronto, and thought you might be interested in some highlights from what was really a riveting panel discussion. The panelists, who offered valuable… Read more »
NALP: the future of law firms
Back from a lengthy trip, I have a lot of catch-up blogging to do. Just to get the ball rolling, here are my speaking notes from last Friday’s plenary session at the NALP Annual Education Conference in Toronto, in case they’re of interest. I was honoured to be part of a distinguished panel of speakers,… Read more »
There’s no such thing as work/life balance
There are a lot of reasons to dislike the term “work/life balance.” It’s grammatically absurd, for one thing, implying that work and life are two equal sides of a coin, which is a far more disturbing concept than any 2,500-hour billable target: work is part of life, not its opposite number. “Work/life balance” has also… Read more »
The perils of client interviews
Via Larry Bodine comes this Legal Intelligencer article about law firm Ballard Spahr Andrews & Ingersoll, which has hired a 30-year veteran journalist to be a full-time client interviewer, asking clients about their needs, perspectives and complaints about the firm’s services. It’s a good, innovative idea, not least because it involves a tactic that too… Read more »