All lawyers want to be wanted and valued by their firms. It has become apparent that tomorrow's legal talent requires even more hand-holding than previous generations. They want to understand why and what's the payoff of their efforts. By creating a firm culture that addresses these concerns you will heighten your firm's ability to retain precious talent.
Smart business leaders compete by constantly seeking cost advantages. Yet law firm leaders compete by perpetually increasing associate compensation. As always, this will not end well.
It's Not the Number of Hours We're Billing or the Number of Hours We're Working; It's the Way We Feel About How We Spend Those Hours That Matters Working long hours, tracking those hours and feeling that we have to grind all year to hit a specific number of hours to meet a profitability target can make us feel like fungible, dehumanized automatons rather than highly trained providers of specific and thoughtful solutions to complex legal challenges.
Newly minted partners offered up some usual complaints on this year's New Partners Survey, lamenting unexpectedly low compensation, opaque performance metrics and copious administrative work. But new anxieties have arisen among Big Law's latest partner class, including the threat of a recession and growing concerns about mental health.
Clients expect sophisticated and secure systems to keep their information safe. This obviously makes your IT professional's job much harder. Additionally, attorneys expect instant performance and near 100% up time. Achieving the delicate balance between accessibility and security is a challenge.
What Does Widespread 'Deleveraging' Mean for Law Firm Health? Industry watchers say law firms have become less reliant on bank debt over the past decade, as they explore other funding options. Often, that means raising capital from partners, or turning to other, less common sources.
Baby boomers control an outsize portion of law firm business. As they inch toward retirement, how are firms preparing for the transition process?
Six Pillars of a Successful Bus-Dev Program For firms wanting to thrive through the next economic downturn and beyond, mastery of business development fundamentals is as essential as mastering legal skills. Yet training and coaching — whether done internally or through outside consultants — requires an investment in time and resources.
There is a lot of good news in the nine-month 2019 industry results. While we might not end the year with the strong growth levels seen in 2018, we anticipate that 2019 will be a decent year. For the first time this year, revenue growth exceeded expense growth.
Due to a law firm's team-oriented approach to business development and client service efforts, it is not always clear who should logically and most efficiently serve as the billing partner for a client or a particular client matter. A person should only be a billing partner if he or she is or will be performing the functions outline herein.
