There’s an adage that goes something like "He who quotes the first number in a negotiation loses."
The same is true for legal fees … when you quote an hourly fee, there will always be someone who is cheaper.
I just glanced through a book, Blue Ocean Strategies … A key piece of advice is not to think out of the box, or even break the box, but rather never put yourself in the box.
Eliminate your competition entirely. Be different. Offer something that your competitors don’t or can’t. Create something new that your clients need or want.Think about what this might be in your own practice. If you can’t think of what makes you unique, you’ve lost, you’re really nothing more than a commodity to your clients and you may "soon" be out of business.
Alternative fees continue to be a prominent topic among lawyers. Our next several podcasts will feature interviews that Ed has conducted over the last 18 months with prominent thinkers on this subject.
Jeff Carr, General Counsel of FMC Technologies, responds here in the first of two interviews with him.
In today’s world, the preeminent method of billing is still based on the hour. It’s not the way that lawyers have billed traditionally. It used to be that bills were given on a bottom line for value rendered services.
Changes resulted largely by corporate counsel and insurance counsel in the 1970s, or perhaps more so in the early 80s, when people were frustrated with that kind of billing system. We went to the billable hour as a way to impose some cost control and as a way to understand the way law firms were billing us. Now of course we’ve got a whole generation of lawyers who know nothing else at this point.
Rees Morrison suggests a very interesting concept … sort of a blend of hourly rate billing and value billing … Perhaps we need this intermediate step to get to true value billing.
"What would be the result if a law firm asked its lawyers to charge their time not at a single hourly rate (say, $400 per hour) but at three levels. At the lowest level, where the service was simple or inefficient or travel, perhaps the rate would be 20 percent less ($320 an hour). The typical rate, for work in the comfortable sweet spot of the lawyer, would be at the standard rate. For work over the weekend, rushed, or demanding special teamwork research or creativity, the rate would be 20 percent above ($480)."
Did you know that, in Outlook, you can create a task item from an email? You can also add a due date, reminder date, and recurrence date, among other things, including sending it to someone else, in this task … just as you can in any new task?
How to Hurt California’s Lawyers: Mandatory Malpractice Insurance Disclosure
The unusual "How To" theme of this month’s column addresses a vital issue for all California lawyers. The State Bar of California has sought public comment on a proposed rule of professional conduct and rule of court that would require all attorneys to make disclosure to their clients when they do not have professional liability (malpractice) insurance. (more…)
Jim Michalowicz, is the Litigation Program Manager for Tyco Corp. Formerly, he was with DuPont in a similar capacity for 13 years. Our interview with Jim also includes two other folks from the Tyco Legal Department who will also focus on development the best business practices for their legal department – developing the most effective and efficient approaches to handling the legal affairs of Tyco. Jim combines information management, relationship management and best business practices in his role as manager. Listen as Jim explains further about Tyco’s approaches and what he expects from outside counsel that work with and for Tyco.
In a follow on article to an earlier blog wherein I commented on the UK Minister’s presentation on diversity, Reed Smith made the following announcement:
"Reed Smith, a top-25 international law firm, has launched a new programme to help its female staff make their way up through the traditionally male-dominated profession.
The firm has created a series of workshops to expand opportunities for women at work in an industry that is notoriously "male, pale and stale".
I love that last phrase; never heard it before!
In a Phoenix, AZ publication, the assertion was made that more than 80% of women lawyers leave their firms because of getting stuck in meaningless work with no visible advance in sight. Perhaps that quoted phrase has meaning beyond the surface starkness!
The following is my statement of opposition to The State Bar of California’s proposed rule requiring attorneys to disclose when they do NOT have professional liability (malpractice) insurance.
Should you have any comments or new ideas, please e-mail. (more…)
