Goodbye guild: Law’s changing culture

Mark Cohen’s column in Forbes, Goodbye guild: Law’s changing culture, struck a deep chord with this sentence: “Law is not about lawyers anymore”.

Rhetorically, one might ask, was law ever about lawyers? Like the other ‘original’ professions of medicine, priesthood and military service, law and lawyers – as I understand it – arose to further the interests of civil society and protect the rights of fellow human beings.

Which is what makes Mark’s commentary about law’s changing culture so important.

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Posted by on Nov 9, 2017 in BigLaw firms, Clients, Lawyers | 0 comments

Understand the rules if you want to play the game

Understand the rules if you want to play the game by Ken Grady is sub-titled ‘While you weren’t watching, techies and corps changed the rules.’

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Posted by on Oct 24, 2017 in BigLaw firms, Clients | 3 comments

New players driving value for legal departments

New players driving value for legal departments was written by Mark Cohen and Liam Brown and originally appeared in Canadian Corporate Counsel Association magazine. As I read it, the key point Mark and Liam make is that the NewLaw players, while still tiny in market share, are teaching clients new tricks. And this spells big opportunity – or trouble if they’re asleep at the wheel – for BigLaw incumbents.  

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Posted by on Oct 12, 2017 in BigLaw firms, Clients, NewLaw business models | 1 comment

tl;dr – a Primer on Managing External Legal Providers

In short, I wrote a primer for the Buying Legal Council on making service delivery reviews a core tenant of an external provider program. I think you should read it. It is probably shorter than the post that follows. For those who are not yet Internet speak aficionados, tl;dr stands for ‘too long; don’t read’ (editor). So read on…
For those who are not yet Internet speak aficionados, tl;dr stands for ‘too long; don’t read’ (editor).
Please read on…
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Posted by on Sep 5, 2017 in Clients, Law departments | 1 comment

Lost in translation: BigLaw’s communication (and trust) issues

Today celebrated BigLaw leader, chairman emeritus of Seyfarth Shaw LLP, Stephen Poor contributes ‘Lost in translation: BigLaw’s communication (and trust) issues‘ to Dialogue.  

We talk a lot about the change needed in pricing legal services. The reality, however, is that the impetus for change in pricing structures will come from the corporate buyers, not the BigLaw sellers, of legal services. In fact, law firm leaders have consistently acknowledged this in every Altman Weil survey for the past 5 years: 66% or more of firms offering services on an alternative fee arrangement (AFA) basis did so “in response to client demand,” rather than acting proactively out of a belief that new pricing models will create a competitive advantage.

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Posted by on Aug 15, 2017 in BigLaw firms, Clients | 1 comment

Law Firm Profitability + Service Delivery: What the Altman Weil Survey Says

In today’s post, Law Firm Profitability + Service Delivery Ron Friedmann analyses data from the recent Altman Weil Survey in the US to show just how internally-focused BigLaw firms can be. Ron’s message is telling: The raison d’être for any professional services firm is service to clients. Its profitability is a function of the extent a firm does this successfully and sustainably.

Law firm management needs to think more about their clients. Right now, they expend more energy on boosting profitability with inward measures than they do on client service. That cannot be sustainable. 

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Posted by on Jul 1, 2017 in BigLaw firms, Clients | 1 comment