What’s Your Theory of the Business?
Year-end is often seen, understandably if somewhat arbitrarily, as a time for reflection. Actually, in my book there’s never a bad time for reflection, so I’ll take an arbitrary peg over no peg. I hope...
View ArticleThe “Big Three” Annual Reports on Law Land
With the release last week of the Annual Report from Georgetown Law’s Center for the Study of the Legal Profession, the “Big Three” annual reports—Altman-Weil’s Law Firms in Transition,...
View ArticleWhither the Big 4?
Late this past week my partner Janet and I had the opportunity to participate in a panel at the 23rd annual Thomson Reuters Marketing Partner Forum (held this year in Orlando) on the “rise of the Big...
View ArticleLessons from GE: Depth not Breadth
Though none of us can sanely claim to know what the future holds (I leave that to the fanatics), it’s abdicating your responsibility as a leader not to think about it. How do you go about that? In the...
View ArticleFive Management Styles: Lessons from Silicon Valley
On a cross-country flight this week, I read most of Smarter Faster Better, by Charles Duhigg, currently on the NYT’s top 10 hardcover/nonfiction list of best-selling books. It’s fair to characterize...
View ArticleAlienating Clients in One Easy Lesson
A bit ago here in New York a dinner was held with the legendary Ben Heineman (GE SVP/GC from 1987 to 2003, Harvard BA and Yale JD [editor-in-chief of the Yale Law Journal], Rhodes scholar, Potter...
View Article“Agile Working” and Office Design
Having spent last week in London, where every firm worthy of its PR news feed has at least mentioned “agile working,” it’s worth spending a few moments reflecting on what’s behind that shorthand. The...
View ArticleA Take on the 2016 AmLaw 100
Compared to what we were once used to, BigLaw’s 2015 financial results can pithily be described as “crummy”—at least as reported in the just-released 2016 AmLaw 100 figures. We won’t go into the...
View ArticleThe Bottom Line Is, Well, The Bottom Line
Alex Novarese, editor-in-chief of the UK-based publication Legal Business, some time ago granted us permission to republish a few of his articles as we see fit. The following is one where we most...
View ArticleLetter from London
Back in New York from a solid week of meetings in London (17 in five days) and a few observations, reflections, musings, and speculations come to the fore. And no, these will pointedly not include...
View Article“Remaking the Law Firm: Why & How”
I recently finished reading George Beaton’s and Imme Kaschner’s Remaking Law Firms: Why & How (ABA Press: 2016) (George, who I’ve known for years and count a friend, was kind enough to have the ABA...
View ArticleNew York to $190K!
Well, not quite. “New York To $190!” was, of course, the long-running headline Above The Law printed frequently in more innocent and/or palmier days, with (we suppose) a combination of hope and...
View ArticleSomething (Macro) Looks Wrong
“Something looks wrong.” So begins Greg Ip’s most recent column in The Wall Street Journal. What exactly “looks wrong?” Well, the economy, stupid. Specifically, as Ip points out, consumer spending has...
View ArticleHappy Birthday, Adam Smith!
Born June 16, 1723, Kirkcauldy, Fyfe, Scotland Today he turns 293.
View ArticleFinancial Centers Can Shift
Some time ago In my online travels, I came across “Delancey Place,” a marvelous site that gives new meaning to the word “eclectic.” Delancey Place describes its mission as follows: Delanceyplace.com is...
View ArticleHappy 4th! (Even to George III)
With the world seemingly departing from the familiar for parts unknown almost anywhere one looks these days (the Middle East’s evidently insatiable crescendo of chaos, Brexit, the paranormal US...
View ArticleBrexit: Deep Breath
No, I didn’t see that coming either. But since the preferences of elite opinion-makers seem to be taking it on the chin around the world, perhaps we shouldn’t have been so surprised. From the perhaps...
View ArticleWhat is the “Global 100″ Telling Us?
With the release a bit earlier this month of Legal Business’s annual “Global 100,” we have more data to scrutinize, should we care to. I’ll give you the highlights of the numbers here but even the most...
View ArticleNote to Readers
Some of you may have perceived a drop-off in the frequency with which I publish columns late this spring and early summer; your intuition would be correct. Don’t worry! I have not gone to the Hamptons...
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