March 3, 2008 by David Sorin.

How many times have we heard the above saying? It usually refers to lawyers who are a party in a lawsuit. But what about law firms that handle their own legal work? What about those firms that don’t do the things they advise their clients to do? Aren’t they just as foolish?

I can’t tell you how many law firms I have spoken with who do not have a policy and procedures manual. This is shocking to me. How many lawsuits do they have to hear about before they protect themselves?

How many law firms keep their corporate minutes up to date? Draft resolutions for shareholder or partner actions? Use their bylaws to govern their actions?

Like doctors, lawyers probably treat their clients better than they treat themselves. Law firms should probably have outside counsel review their documents. It could be done the way professional golfers keep score for each other.

Law firms need to operate like businesses and in a business-like fashion. Managing partners need to set the tone for firm behavior. No shortcuts, please.

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February 8, 2008 by David Sorin.

Law firms are starting to discovery a disturbing trend. Their associates do not all have a desire to be partners. In fact, more and more associates are looking at having a balanced lifestyle rather than the “secure” future of partnership. Firms need to wake up to this fact and reconsider their operational model before it is too late. Instead of being able to choose future partners from a group of associates all of whom want to make partner, firms may have to choose from among a small percentage who want partnership and then decide what to do with the others.

In the near future, there will be more jobs than applicants. It will be a candidate’s market. And candidates may be choosing firms not on the basis of their prestige or high starting salaries and benefits, but on their culture and the quality of life they afford their employees.

Wake up firms!! Look at your cultures. Consider how you treat your associates and staff. Give some thought to whether you have a mentoring program, offer development plans, give serious feedback and performance reviews, listen to what your employees want to be doing and in other ways think about your firm from an employee point of view.

And remember, what you are not doing, some other firms will do. And when future employees have a choice, where do you think they will go?

Posted in Firm Culture, Strategic Planning, People Management | No Comments »

January 24, 2008 by David Sorin.

How many law firms do yearly checkups on their clients as a matter of course?

I know of many firms that do transaction work, for instance, that never urge their lawyers to connect with clients between transactions. This is true, even if the last transaction ws a year or more ago.

What would it hurt to  make annual contact (or semi-annual) with each client, and run them through a checklist of what is going on in their companies? Chances are you will find something on which they may need help (and they don’t realize it) or you will jog their memory about something about which they have been “meaning to call you.”

This is a great client service and is also a way to develop business from people with whom you already have a relationship, who already trust you.

Posted in Profitability, Marketing, Strategic Planning | No Comments »

January 24, 2008 by David Sorin.

I have spent this past week with an aerospace company at their annual management and sales meeting. They have done some things remarkably well during this meeting. What they have doe could be an example for any number of law firms.

First, they were singleminded in their focus. They stayed on message throughout and hammered it home every chance they got. The message was “Execution.” Strategy without execution is worthless. In order to execute well they need to focus on certain areas, such as really listening to their customers about their wants and needs, being innovative in every aspect of their jobs to find solutions, working collaboratively more than ever before; and they have to be results driven. “Nice try” doesn’t really cut it.

How could your law firm apply these tenets?

Law firms are businesses and they must apply business practices to be successful. Law firms need to develop their own set of best practices and learn to apply them across the board and enforce them in the same way.

Strategy-execution-accountability-results.

Posted in Profitability, Strategic Planning, People Management, What You Didn't Learn in Law School Seminar | No Comments »

January 24, 2008 by David Sorin.

There is an interesting article in the NY Times today by Lisa Belkin about the issue of billable hours. It talks of annual billable hours requirements rising from 1,600 to 1,800 in the 1970s-80s to 2,000-2,200 today. And, the article goes onto say that lawyers are “overworked, depressed and leaving.” It should be noted that the article is in the Fashion and Style section.

Apparently, many firms have only just discovered this and they are beginning to swing into action with alternate plans. The article offered five separate ideas for compensation, based on the acronym FACTS, which is the brainchild of a woman by the name of Deborah Epstein Henry.

FACTS stands for fixed, annualized, core, targeted and shared. The different options allow lawyers to choose their own hours plan and to have their compensation matched to the plan.

It is clear that this youngest generation just entering the legal job pool has less interest in working long hours than any generation before it. law firms can begin changing voluntarily, or come kicking and screaming into the future at the back of the pack where they will not be an employer of choice.

What do you think?

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