Better Law Practice Through Better People Management
So you’re not really feeling the love? Or even the compassion? How about being nice–can you at least get into being nice?
Fitting nicely into our recent blog posts about the more heartful arts, the November/December 2013 issue of the ABA Law Practice Magazine is entitled “The Business of Giving,” and features a story entitled…
Mindful of Rev. King’s exhortation to leaven power with love, remember the Doonesbury character Woodrow proclaiming “By God, I love the law!” Well, there’s a perspective afoot in the legal industry that may take that sentiment and turn it on its head. It sounds something like “the law is all about love!”
According to an…
“It is much safer to be feared than loved,” Machiavelli wrote in “The Prince,” a 16th-century treatise advocating manipulation and even cruelty as the means to power.
For effective leadership in the 21st century, is that still true? Is it better to be feared or loved?
The Machiavellian approach is still being vigorously advocated today–in,…
As if we needed any further confirmation of the dropping demand for legal services, TyMetrix, the giant electronic billing clearing house, recently reported their “LegalView Legal Market Index,” based on the purchases of legal services by the LegalView 70. These are 70 large corporate clients across eight industries, 21 of which are Fortune 500, with…
The Emergence of the C-Suite
Today’s law firm looking to achieve a more business-like operation is often replicating many of the senior officers that businesses have, setting up or bulking up a C-Suite. In addition to a Managing Partner or CEO, there may well be a Chief Operating Officer, Chief Financial Officer, Chief Information Officer,…
A flurry of reports this month on law firm financial results for the first half of 2013 have come in with fairly uniformly disappointing news.
Flat Growth
Citi Private Bank’s Law Firm Group reports that “while the industry is no longer in freefall… tepid demand and intense pricing pressure continue to plague most firms.” Rate…
As a comment on the future of Big Law, the New Republic ran an expose of sorts last month using Mayer Brown as a whipping boy. Without citing sources, the article asserted that, given the significant pressures on the business model, only 20-25 big law firms like Mayer Brown (or 10% of the current 2oo+)…
While workers with high emotional intelligence are consistently the best performers on all steps of the corporate ladder, interestingly enough it is those at the top level of management who have the lowest overall average emotional intelligence (EI or EQ) in organizations. Prompting one journalist to contend that “Your Boss Probably Wouldn’t Pass Yale’s Emotional…
In a followup to our earlier post asking whether firms should raise the profits of partners, it looks like, for at least one prominent firm, the answer may be “Yes!” At least, for some partners.
We noted that according to the latest AmLaw 100 data for 2012, “[t]he largest PPP drops were Fried Frank’s 16.8%…
A recent survey of 75 managing partners of mid-size firms, i.e. mostly 20-75 lawyers, gave an interesting picture of the challenges those leaders are facing. For starters, these MPs have no job description, no identified successor and no exit strategy. They are provided with no leadership training, and do not have a finalized firm strategic…