Law Firm Management

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Baker Tilly Virchow Krause, LLP recently welcomed John Salza as a principal in charge of tax accounting methods. In this role, Salza lends his expertise to tax engagements across Baker Tilly's industry practices.

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A recent study published by Altman Weil listed the ways in which chief legal officers would like to see their outside counsel embrace service improvements and innovation. The top four responses were greater cost reduction, non-hourly pricing, more efficient project management and improved budget forecasting. To anyone paying even cursory attention to the legal marketplace in the last half decade, these should not come as a surprise.

Become Allied With Your Client - Improving your firm's customer service can do wonders for cementing business relationships and securing future work. Throughout your business relationship, reassessing and upgrading your work will improve customer service and exhibit your dedication to providing tailored professional services. By asking questions periodically and reevaluating the client's needs, you increase client retention rates and possibly win new business.…

ASK FOR BUSINESS When was the last time you asked clients for new business? On the surface, that question may seem a bit silly. After all, asking for business once a company has signed on with your firm may feel a bit redundant. But consider this: asking for more work on a regular basis is a solid client retention tactic that could lead to botton-line dividends. Think business generation and value. If the new project involves work…

Professional survey and market research companies are generally pretty good. They use sophisticated modeling techniques and computerized formulae to tell us (with a margin of error of four or five points either way) who's going to win the next election and how high skirts are going to be next year. Highly scientific stuff ' but, unfortunately not always right. Which is why you have to take those surveys with a grain of salt.

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Rather than companies sending out RFPs to a number of law firms, they are now using a "reverse auction" to request quotes from law firms they trust. Here's how it works.

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Law firms are at great risk for financial impropriety. Funds can come up missing in any law firm, and the cause can be intentional theft that qualifies as fraud or embezzlement, or an unintentional mistake that shows poor judgment.

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Job search should be as much a part of your ongoing career management as aspirations for promotion, more responsibility, and increased compensation at your current employer. In essence, you should always be looking, if not actually taking, your next job.