Category Archives: Leadership

Credit crisis: You ain’t seen nothin’ yet

By Jordan Furlong | Published: October 9, 2008
We’re already seeing some dominoes start to wobble in the legal community, as the short- and medium-term impact of the financial crisis becomes clearer. If you’re a law firm CFO or a law student nearing graduation, you probably won’t like what’s coming. But it looks to me like there are much bigger pieces likely to [...]
Also posted in Big Firms, Finance, Law School | 1 Comment

The culture-driven law firm

By Jordan Furlong | Published: April 9, 2008
The era of the free-agent lawyer, and the law firm lateral hiring frenzy that it spawned, is drawing to a close. The rise of the culture-driven law firm is at hand. It’s going to take me a while to explain how I got here. I’ll try to do this in two parts. 1. Followership in law firms This [...]
Also posted in Big Firms, Management, Talent | 5 Comments

Preparing for the storm

By Jordan Furlong | Published: March 25, 2008
The “About” entry in the column over on the right there states my belief that the practice of law is heading into “uncharted territory.” If you’re skeptical about that, or if you’re unconvinced of the reality of imminent upheaval in this profession, here are two items you might want to look at. The first is the [...]
Also posted in Innovation | 2 Comments

Leading by asking

By Jordan Furlong | Published: March 4, 2008
“There go my people,” said 19th-century radical French politician Alexandre Auguste Ledru-Rollin, supposedly on seeing a mob pass by the café where he was seated. “I must find out where they are going, so I can lead them.” You won’t find a more succinct summary of the paradoxical nature of leadership than that: how can [...]
Also posted in Collaboration | Leave a comment

Something’s actually happening

By Jordan Furlong | Published: January 24, 2008
There’s a lot of buzz building about an article in today’s New York Times with the rather odd title “Who’s Cuddly Now? Law Firms.” It summarizes a recent rash of new business models in American law firms, from flextime for lawyers to flat-fee bills for clients to alternative billable-hour schemes and more. It’s the second [...]
Also posted in Big Firms, Billing, Clients, Competition, Innovation, Management | Leave a comment

Is stewardship dead?

By Jordan Furlong | Published: January 8, 2008
Maybe not quite, but in the context of most professional law firms with more than just a handful of partners, it’s on life support and the priest has been called in. I honestly don’t know of any midsize or larger law firms, at least, that operate other than “to maximize the wealth of the current shareholders.” [...]
Also posted in Purpose | Leave a comment

A to Z: 26 trends for the legal profession

By Jordan Furlong | Published: January 7, 2008
This article was co-authored with Mélanie Raymond, then-Senior Editor of National, and appeared as the cover story in the April/May 2006 edition of the magazine. The legal profession is turning upside down, and many of the familiar landmarks are disappearing or bring replaced by brand-new structures. There are so many changes afoot that National’s editorial team [...]
Also posted in Billing, Clients, Competition, Generations, Globalization, Innovation, Law School, New Lawyers, Satisfaction, Technology | Leave a comment

Looking for leaders

By Jordan Furlong | Published: January 7, 2008
These days, young lawyers are often said to be joining firms and immediately expecting exciting work, handsome paycheques, flexible hours and endless compliments. Their attitude, apparently, is that they can bypass all the hard work put in by their elders and head straight for the reward, while bolting to a higher bidder on a moment’s [...]
Also posted in Generations, New Lawyers | Leave a comment

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