Resilience and the Post-Covid World Part 2 (Build Back Better)
What will differentiate winning firms from “mere” survivors is adaptability. As the Organization for Economic Development wrote in 2019: Resilience centers on the ability not only to resist and recover...
View ArticleResilience & The Post-Covid World (Build Back Better): Part 3
When we ended Part 2 of this series, we had discussed the data showing (1) that the conventional wisdom about the AmLaw firms growing relentlessly to the sky was, uh, Fake News (h/t to Jae Um), (2)...
View ArticleEasing Out Under-Performers–Gracefully (Build Back Better)
The following column is by Janet Stanton, Partner, Adam Smith, Esq. One of the most vexing issues for law firms is that of under-performing lawyers. And, let’s be clear from the get-go, we’re talking...
View ArticleBack to the Office! (What’s the Rush?)
We have a theory. Abandoning the office—as one Managing Partner put it, “like the fire alarm went off, everybody out now”—was the easy part. Going back will pose one of the most complex management...
View ArticleThe Problem with Partnerships
THERE was never any thing by the wit of man so well devised, or so surely established, which (in continuance of time) hath not been corrupted: as (emong other thinges) it may plainly appere by the...
View ArticleYou’ll Save $$ on Real Estate: So??
Universally, everyone is hearing that firms plan to make significant cuts in real estate spend starting, well, starting as soon as the next office lease comes up for renewal. How “substantial” might...
View ArticleBook Review: “BigLaw: Money & Meaning in the Modern Law Firm”
Across my desk a few weeks ago came BigLaw: Money & Meaning in the Modern Law Firm by Mitt Regan and Lisa Rohrer (U. Chicago Press: 2021). (I have known Mitt, a law Professor at Georgetown, for...
View ArticleEarnings Season: What Would the Haruspex* Say?
Every year around this time—earnings season for law firms—we’re fond of saying, “Averages mislead.” When the trade media report that, overall the entire industry had a great year, or the AmLaw...
View ArticleLegal Services “Intensity” Around the Globe
We find ourselves from time to time wondering about many things: Will Moore’s Law ever hit a wall? When will the last print edition of The New York Times be published? Could Lord General Cornwallis...
View ArticleThe US is a Net (Im/Ex?)Porter of Law?
For the armchair economists in the crowd, the geopolitically curious, or faithful leaders of law firms wondering whether they should plant a, or more, flags abroad, how would you instinctively answer...
View Article“We’re Insanely Busy!”
If we’ve heard that once over the last couple of months….. It’s getting to the point where we wonder if those words threaten to become the lyrics of the Great Summer of 2021 Breakout Pop Hit Single....
View ArticleWe Have a Scal(ability) Problem
We’ve written at fair length about our “maroons/grays” model for segmenting the law firm industry. Essentially, the model rejects customary or traditional dimensions of “compare and contrast”...
View Article“We’re Insanely Busy” (Update), Plus: Who’s Getting the Work
Scorching new data out on the volume of deal-making over the last 12 months or so, from Refinitiv courtesy of The Wall Street Journal (“Cash-laden companies are on an M&A Spree”). Ready for some...
View ArticleBack to the Office! (Say What?)
We’ve written that leaving the office was trivial, at least in retrospect–“fire alarm’s going off, everyone leave the building”–but that returning is going to pose one of the most complex...
View ArticleLeadership Notes From All Over
We’ll be brief. Two thumpingly different examples of leadership behavior crossed my desk in the past 24 hours, one unforgettable in its inspirational caliber and the other equally memorable, but for...
View Article“Golden handcuffs: dealmaking lawyers weigh up their own Faustian bargains:”...
In today’s FT, Andrew Hill, their gifted and prolific management essayist, published a column of that name (link works only for FT subscribers) discussing the unheard-of pressures on corporate deal...
View ArticleQuestion of the Month: Your “Back to the Office” Policy?
It’s been awhile since we’ve offered you all up a “Question of the Month,” but we never promised our readers consistency. We hope you have come to appreciate variety, however, so in that spirit, you...
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