More Small Firm Leaders Embrace Succession Planning
July 01, 2016
As partners and firm leaders from the baby boomer generation have begun to reach retirement age, legal consultants say succession planning has become a subject of increasing concern at small law firms, and is a topic they encourage those firms to prioritize.
Firms Increasingly Making Partners Pay to Leave
July 01, 2016
As law firms look to protect themselves from cash walking out the door in a low-demand market, they are increasingly looking at methods to discourage lateral departures and, perhaps more importantly, are enforcing those methods more frequently.
Traits of Future Equity Partners
June 01, 2016
In the last 10 years, I have coached hundreds of attorneys as an internal career coach at Holland & Knight. Some of those associates left law entirely and are now writing novels, playing professional baseball, and flying airplanes. Others have gone in-house or to work for the government. Many of the associates have become non-equity partners, and some are equity partners. Here are some things I have learned about the ones who aim for partnership in a large firm.
The Panama Papers: A Small Part of a Larger Challenge?
June 01, 2016
The Panama Papers has become a new buzz phrase. Information contained in the Panama Papers ' the unprecedented leak of 11.5 million internal documents from the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca ' illustrates the dangers of noncompliance for U.S. taxpayers and for citizens of other countries with whom the U.S. has exchange of information agreements.
Building the Better Buy-Sell Agreement
June 01, 2016
Buy-sell agreements are arrangements between owners of a business where one or more owners agree that they will purchase the interest of an owner who withdraws or becomes deceased. Essentially, a buy-sell agreement is similar to prenuptial agreement between business owners, which details the financial aspect of the unwinding of the business relationship.
Associates May Have Closer Eye On How They Are Billed Out
June 01, 2016
Hourly rates can be a moving target as clients negotiate down firms' published rates, but in a low-demand era where lawyers need every dollar they can bring in, it seems associates are the ones troubled lately with how rates are set.
Embracing Culture As a Path to Survival
June 01, 2016
Regardless of how technology continues to help the legal industry reinvent itself from a mature industry to a young and thriving one, culture and people will remain a key driver of any firm's long-term success. As a strategic imperative, creating a constructive culture of success takes much more than words with no actions. .
