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The 'Silly Season'
Almost 30 years ago when I began my career consulting to law firms, the then managing partner of Donovan Leisure Newton & Irving used that term to refer to the months of October through December. It was his way of pointing out to his fellow partners that the necessary activities of practice management that so many of them had avoided for the first nine or 10 months of the year now had to be addressed. Clients that had not been billed as frequently as firm policy required now had to be invoiced. Outstanding invoices, many issued in the cold days of early March and April, now had to be collected and current work would not only have to be billed but collected as well!
Donovan was one of those old New York “White Shoe” firms that regrettably did not survive into the new century, but one where I first encountered afternoon tea time (“iced, two sugars and a mall-o-mar please”) and where I learned the craft of consulting and therefore will always have a special place in my memory.
Donovan, like most of its contemporaries and far too many law firms today, had poor billing and collection hygiene. Accounts receivable often totaled more than 50% of a law firm's annual revenue. Professional fees were billed 30 to 60 days after recording and collected four to seven months after that. As a result, the “docket to pocket” time for many firms was 150 to 270 or more days.
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