As if law firms don’t have enough to worry about in this era of more discerning and demanding clients, pressures on rates and profitability and more stringent competition, it is estimated that over the next ten years sixty-five percent of baby boomer equity partners will retire. While some firms are using early retirement and de-equitization…
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Two things are clear right now. First, dramatic changes have already occurred and will continue to occur in the legal profession (actually, most are affecting all sectors of the economy.) Second, these and other new changes will be permanent, i.e., this is not a pendulum swing that will swing back. The marketplace is driving these…
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As law firms continue to strive to run themselves as businesses, more are hiring senior level business executives who do not have law degrees or who have joint JD/MBA degrees but who likely have more experience in business than practicing law. Most law firm CEOs in the US and UK, however, are lawyers, many of whom still…
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Like many things occurring in the profession right now, this is a trend that is here to stay. Clients want their legal work done faster, cheaper and smarter and they know that there are good practices in place in other professions and businesses that can be adapted to the practice of law. Companies like GE…
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As we proposed in our previous post Value Post 3: Like Law Firms, GCs Must Deliver More Value to Their Clients, general counsel face many of the same pressures that their outside lawyers do when it comes to demonstrating their value to their clients – the business side of their companies. Much of the legal press…
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Law firms have been so wrapped up in their own challenges that they often neglect to think about the fact that legal departments are also under substantial pressure to deliver value to the business. General Counsel may consider their outside lawyers a “necessary evil,” but many company executives and boards consider their in-house lawyers a…
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Our last post Value Post 1: What Does Value Mean in Law Firms? discussed the meaning of value in the law firm/client context including the ways that clients define and measure the value they receive from their lawyers. This second post explores how firms can articulate value to help them differentiate and excel in attracting, satisfying and…
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“Value” is one of the most commonly used buzzwords of the first part of this century. Everyone is talking about it, promoting it, writing about it, offering it, demanding it, trying to measure it and bragging about it. First, let’s start with the Merriam-Webster definition of value: 1: a fair return or equivalent in goods,…
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All the disruption, uncertainty and competition afflicting law firms today is creating a lot of anxiety and fear. Plenty of lawyers are questioning why they chose law as a profession and whether they should retool into another career, law firm leaders question how they will lead their firms through this time of turbulence, and most…
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The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines col•lab•o•ra•tion [kuh-lab-uh-rey-shuh n] as: (1) the state of having shared interests or efforts (as in social or business matters;) (2) the work and activity of a number of persons who individually contribute toward the efficiency of the whole. In today’s business environment, technology tools and platforms facilitate effective collaboration. So there…
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In our last blog post In 2013, Will More Firms Finally Understand that Client Feedback = Better Revenue and Profitability?, we discussed why it is critical to seek feedback from clients and to ensure that they are not only satisfied but extremely satisfied. Extremely satisfied clients lead to truly loyal clients who are much more profitable to…
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According to a recent ALM Legal Intelligence Survey, 68% of law firms put “Growing the Firm’s Revenue” as their top business strategy priority and 54% listed “Improving Firm Profitability” as their number three priority. “Client Performance Management and Client Satisfaction Measurement” was a fourth priority, however, only 56% of law firms said they plan to track…
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2012 brought a great deal of attention to many challenges facing and created by our current legal education system. As recently as early December, Jordan Furlong weighed in with his post “How to kill (or save) a law school.” Brian Tamanaha’s extremely well-written and researched book “Failing Law Schools,” published in 2012, describes in great detail why the system…
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This is the time of year law firms get ready to send out their annual letter to clients citing their new billing rates for 2013. Despite all of the recent coverage about legal departments cutting their budgets and forcing law firms to reduce their rates, two recent surveys find that law firms still plan to…
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This post is one of four that discusses the findings of a survey conducted jointly by the Financial Times (FT), the Managing Partners’ Forum’ (MPF) and Meridian West. The survey results were pre-viewed at a one day conference hosted by PM Forum in London on September 27. The posts reflect findings from the survey, sessions…
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