Law21 Twitter Updates- Slater & Gordon/Russell Jones & Walker aims to "dominate" consumer legal services market in UK: http://t.co/6Na2ZNbR
- RT @grbeaton Slater & Gordon, Russell Jones Walker - not just another acquisition http://t.co/6Wotgv7l
- Crazy Like A Fox: Why Non-Equity Partners are More Valuable Than Associates: http://t.co/NYZAHfvQ
- It's not "lateral hiring" anymore; it's poaching: http://t.co/M43yyhOz Firms poached often enough will be in real danger.
Category Archives: Innovation
The franchised future of small law firms
Today’s dispatch from England & Wales, the world’s legal laboratory, informs us of a new company called Evident Legal that is setting up the latest in a series of law firm franchises. Simplify the Law (STL) aims to create a national network of law firms with between 2 and 20 partners that serve both individual [...]
Also posted in Solo & Small Firm 2 Comments
Goodbye to all that
Last week, having written about the rise of online disruptors and the emergence of super-boutiques, I promised that the final entry in this de facto trilogy would identify how lawyers and law firms can ensure their profitability in this new environment. But then I spent three days at ILTA’s Rev-elation, the 2011 annual meeting of [...]
Also posted in Big Firms, Clients, Technology 12 Comments
The rise of the super-boutique
Yesterday, I advanced the notion that lawyers’ profitability now depends on what they do and how they do it. One reason is disruptive internet-based providers that not only are grabbing commodity work and profiting from it, but more dangerously, are also changing the values clients associate with “good legal service” to emphasize speed, affordability and [...]
Also posted in Big Firms 4 Comments
Here come the disruptors
Lawyers used to have the Midas Touch: whatever we did, however we did it, we were profitable, because no one else could do it (and no one else was allowed to try). From now on, lawyers’ and law firms’ profitability hinges completely on what we choose to do and how we choose to do it. [...]
Also posted in Technology 16 Comments
Innovation pays
I’m willing to wager that the one phrase most frequently spoken in partnership meetings, when the subject of potential new initiatives comes up, is: “Are any other firms doing this?” Law is virtually the only industry where a negative answer to that question is met with disappointment. Doing what everyone else is doing will get [...]
Also posted in Solo & Small Firm 1 Comment
Legal outsourcing’s AFL moment
It’s July, we’re in the middle of a record-breaking summer of heat, and the major-league baseball trade deadline is just days away. So naturally, I’m going to talk about football. This isn’t entirely a propos of nothing: the National Football League lockout recently ended with a 10-year collective bargaining agreement, and a frenzy of free-agent [...]
Also posted in Outsourcing 2 Comments
Countdown: it’s time to enter the 2011 InnovAction Awards
Lawyers are supposedly averse to innovation. Apparently, someone forgot to inform these law firms and companies. Allen & Overy, whose FIG Global Compensation Tracker helps banks and hedge funds monitor compensation reform initiatives Campbell Law Group of Boulder, Colorado, which is developing a global distributed legal support infrastructure for social enterprises Choate Hall & Stewart [...]
Posted in Innovation 2 Comments
A changing of the guard
Legal historians might look back at the spring of 2011 and judge it the time when the old law firm model began to pass away and a new one began to take its place. Specifically, they might contrast last month’s dissolution of Washington-based global firm Howrey LLP with today’s announcement by 300-lawyer Irwin Mitchell LLP [...]
Also posted in Big Firms 2 Comments
The stratified legal market and its implications
An extraordinary conversation has emerged among multiple authors in the blawgosphere over the past few days. It revolves around a pressing question: in light of the huge changes in the marketplace, what will become of law firms? More specifically, given the increasing segmentation and stratification of the universe of legal work, how can law firms [...]
Also posted in Big Firms, Clients 14 Comments
The year of living dangerously