Perhaps one of the most challenging responsibilities for today’s practice group leaders is the “people” side of the business. In our prior two posts, we have discussed the Practice Group Leader as Strategist and the Practice Group Leader as Financial Steward. While PGLs often get help from others managing the associates and staff in the…
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Most law firms have implemented a practice group structure. Even those firms that retain the traditional, larger umbrella department structure (for example, corporate/transactional, litigation/disputes, regulatory,) most break down the management of the practice into smaller strategic business units that are used to: Organize lawyers and manage talent with specific skills and specialties Develop, execute and monitor…
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Making meaningful and sustainable change will require collaboration and strong leadership. As discussed in Change Management Part 1, effectuating change in law firms is more difficult than other professions and industries and managing partners cite the reluctance or refusal of the vast majority of their partners to change. Given the dynamic shifts occurring in the…
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The instability, disruption and resulting anxiety in the legal profession at times feels like a roller coaster: ups and downs, twists and turns, peaks and valleys, fast and slow, feelings of risk, exposure and vulnerability and a lack of control over our destiny. We are more or less along for the ride, which admittedly is…
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When lawyers first started exploring the uncomfortable process of “selling” as early as the 1980s not long after the 1977 Bates decision allowing lawyers to advertise, it was uncomfortable and seen as unseemly even sleazy. Over the decades, consultants have adapted sales approaches shifting from the traditional model into consultative selling. This approach has proven effective…
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Recognizing the need to approach client problems and needs with broader and deeper substantive disciplines than just legal expertise, law firms have evolved their service offerings to include formal, integrated teams of lawyers, consultants and other professional experts. As early as the 1980s, law firms began to form separate subsidiaries affiliations and joint ventures to…
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In an effort to offer existing and new clients fuller capabilities and solutions, many law firms have developed wholly-owned subsidiaries often comprised of experts in an industry or service specialty who are not lawyers. As we reviewed in our last post, Law Firm MDPs and New Delivery Models Part 1 – A Primer, clients today…
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In our post Who Do Law Firms Compete with and Why? we described the fierce competition that law firms face today, noting that much of that competition is increasingly coming from non-law firm legal services providers, consulting firms and the Big 4, which have some of the largest law firms in the world outside the…
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In our prior post, Industry Group Strategy Part 1 – What are They and Why Have IGs? we clarified the difference between sectors and industries and discussed the benefits and goals of having them. In law firms, Industry Groups, like client teams, straddle multiple practice groups and lawyers may be members of several practice groups…
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Ask the most successful rainmakers what their secret is to their success and most will tell you that they work on it constantly and relentlessly. It has become integral to their client work and practice and they do it every day. Given the pressure lawyers feel to record billable hours, it may seem almost impossible…
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Everyone has a personal brand and it often plays a critical role in professional success, advancement and business development. Similar to a business’ brand, your brand is a promise of what others will receive from you, what you will be known for and how people react to your personality and approach. Whether or not you actively…
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The law firm model likely will change in the coming years as described in our article The Shape of Things to Come – Tradition Gives Way to a New Model! These changes may result in the hiring of fewer traditional lawyers out of law school and the advancement of fewer associates to partnership, the hiring…
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[Note: This post is co-authored by RainMaking Oasis and Jonathan Hollenberg of HawkPartners, a marketing strategy and research firm for Fortune 500 companies.] In our prior two posts Customer Experience (CX) Part 1 – Is It Different than Customer Service and Customer Experience (CX) Part 2 – Mapping the Client Journey, we discussed the difference…
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Providing exceptional and consistent client service is critical to your firm’s success, but to be a real winner, you will have to deliver an exceptional client experience (CX). With clients now in the driver’s seat and law firms aggressively competing to hold on to clients or take work away from others, we know that excellent…
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[Note: This article is being published with the permission of our client, Morgan Lewis & Bockius.] Two of our previous posts on collaboration, True Collaboration Drives Profitability and Collaboration: The Next Law Firm Frontier, discussed the benefits of collaborative cultures and approaches to client representation. But both articles also alluded to the reasons why collaboration…
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