Tag Archive: Management
Mike Roster, former chair of ACC, and Susan Hackett, current General Counsel of ACC, presented their thoughts at a recent meeting of the Los Angeles Chapter of Legal Marketing Association.
My earlier post summarized their comments and included a few of my challenges to their concepts.
Susan has given permission to include her notes from their Power Point presentation.
The discussion has been joined. Please email your thoughts to me. We all will have a hand in the shaping of the future of our profession.
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This was the title of a program offered today by the Los Angeles chapter of Legal Marketing Association, with panelists Susan Hackett, General Counsel of the Association of Corporate Counsel, and Michael Roster, former chairman of ACC, General Counsel of several major corporations, and managing partner of a major law firm.
ACC, at its annual meeting in Seattle, WA in October 2008 intends to roll out an effort to relate law firm billings to client perceptions of value. To some degree, the panelists suggest that they seek to roll back the clock 40 years, when there was a “professionalism” about billing, a stronger and more effective bridge of communication between the client and its relationship partner at t he law firm and less emphasis on increased profits per partner. ACC is not quite sure how they intend to get there nor what the “it” will look like. But, the discussions with stakeholders has begun. And the ride promises to be interesting, to say the least.
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Ed Poll was interviewed by Rob La Gatta of LexBlog.
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As a follow up to our last posting, see item #2 therein, about the need to supervise both your staff and all attorneys in your firm. This is a requirement that is being studied with greater intensity by the Bar throughout the country.
In furtherance of this issue, you may want to see Carolyn Elefant’s commentary about a contract attorney who is being prosecuted by the Illinois Bar for overcharging.
My question takes a slightly different perspective: Why wasn’t the large law firm charged with breach of rules of professional conduct that require adequate supervision? Why only the contract attorney who overbilled? If the contract lawyer overbilled, the “supervising” attorney in the larger law firm is equally responsible as though the contract lawyer were in the same law firm, on the same payroll. After all, it is this latter principle that allows the larger law firm to bill at their normal hourly rate rather than at its cost for engaging the contract lawyer.
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Bill Strauss, the creator of Capitol Steps died at the young age of 60 years. Not only was he and his troop fabulous satirists, Bill was also an author who focused on generational differences. I first was introduced to the Capitol Steps at an ABA gathering in Washington, D.C. I couldn’t remember when I had laughed so hard.
Without knowing his connection to the Capitol Steps, I invited him to be a keynote speaker at my Managing Partners Roundtable’s Diversity Conference in 2006. During his presentation, he talked about his theory of “5 generations.” Paraphrasing him, he said that every 4 (5?) generations repeats itself. The first generation creates a new world, the 2nd generation sustains this new world, the 3rd generation enhances or expands or grows the world, the 4th generation destroys the world and the 5th generation starts with a new world again. While my paraphrase clearly does not do Bill Strauss’ comments justice, the concept of “history repeating itself” is important. Bill said that one can trace and support this theory merely by looking at the history of the world.
With his theory, he drew certain conclusions about the differences among today’s generations, what we call the generation gap. His comments resonated well with the managing partners, the partners and the younger associates in our audience of more than 200 lawyers.
With increasing longevity, and therefore more generations co-existing than ever before, it’s essential that we understand these issues if we’re to cooperate and continue to grow as a society. With his death, we have lost an important contributor to this conversation.
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The business cycle of practicing law includes getting the client, doing the work and, finally, getting paid.
David Leffler, in GPSolo Magazine (Oct/Nov 2007) suggests that there are five stages to paying a lawyer’s bill:
1. Denial – Client says this couldn’t be my bill, the charges are too high.
2. Anger – Client says lawyers are way too expensive for what they achieve.
3. Bargaining – Client seeks to negotiate a reduced fee with the lawyer.
4. Depression – Client doesn’t contact you and is unavailble for your calls.
5. Acceptance – When Client sends you a check that clears the bank.
David talks about the importance of the beginning of the lawyer-client relationship. I agree. The intake process is what essentially sets the tone of the relationship. In my opinion, your success in the intake process at the beginning will determine your success in collecting your fee at the end.
For more about suggestions about lawyers’ collections efforts, see my book.
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What do we mean by success?
In my mind, whether your law firm can survive the departure of the firm’s leader is a critical element of success. The “leader” may be the primary rainmaker, the managing partner or the sole practitioner who has built significant goodwill over his/her years of practice.
One study shows that “…only about one-half of public and private corporate boards have CEO-succession plans…” Even fewer law firms have succession plans.
Stephen Miles, managing partner of a leadership consulting practice, said “‘Succession planning is often done looking at the rear-view mirror … when it should be done looking out the front windshield.’” (WSJ, page B1, November 26, 2007)
When writing Disaster Preparedness & Recovery Planning for Law Firms, the executive directors in our group realized that our focus was on business continuity, not just recovery. And continuity requires succession planning … In one event, the succession will come naturally by aging; and in another event, the succession will come suddenly, without warning! Will you be prepared in either event to continue your law firm into the next generation of leadership?
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In a recent interview, Scott Drexel, Chief Trial Counsel for The State Bar of California, made the following suggestions to stay away from trouble with The State Bar:
1. Know the rules of professional conduct of your State. For example, in California, whenever there is a complaint against an attorney, he/she has a duty to cooperate with the investigating body. To me, this sounds like a violation of one’s Fifth Amendment rights; but, failure to cooperate is analogous “obstruction of justice” and is a separate violation of the rules. Also, settling a malpractice action cannot contain a provision for withdrawal of a State Bar complaint without becoming a separate complaint by itself. I think many attorneys would fail the quiz if these questions were on it.
2. Supervise your staff. Failure to supervise your staff properly has become a major issue in California. Too often, staff is deemed to have “practiced law” by their actions – a clear violation of the rules.
3. Create a law practice management plan. More than 50% of all complaints against attorneys have a connection to the management of the office. Failure to pay attention to The Business of Law® will cause much grief for the lawyer.
4. Communicate! Failure to respond to clients is still the number one complaint against lawyers. A 1994 Oregon Bar study showed that confidence in one’s lawyer as evidenced by their responsiveness is more important than the results achieved. Sounds like a good bed-side manner covers many ills.
5. Don’t delegate. Contrary to the rule of delegating authority to perform tasks, one cannot delegate responsibility for your office, including trust accounts. Embezzlement occurs all too often because the lawyer failed to retain control. Despite the criminal action of a staff person, it is the lawyer who will be disciplined by the Bar, it is the lawyer who must make restitution, and it is the lawyer whose reputation will be sullied. From my perspective, this is a very sad way to end one’s career; it can be an economically disastrous way to end one’s career as well.
These are 5 lessons that should be learned well by every lawyer, irrespective of one’s State.
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According to a recent study by Altman Weil, Inc., the closer to retirement a lawyer gets, the more likely he/she is to oppose mandatory retirement ages. Interviews with a number of aging lawyers suggests that they don’t want to retire, but they do want to work only part-time and they no longer (if they ever did) want to be responsible for rainmaking.
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The President said that “the State Bar shouldn’t base policies upon what will or won’t be popular … Ultimately, our responsibility is to do the right thing." With this remark, the President of the State Bar of California justifies requiring 30,000 mostly small firm and sole practitioners to disclose to clients when they do not have malpractice insurance.
I find this remark of particular interest because it is usually said by one who wants to justify an act that is opposed by the vast majority of his very own organization. It is also offensive because it fails to address the very issue at hand. This statement is like Mom’s or Dad’s "…just because …" response to a kid’s inquiry as to why he should or shouldn’t do something.
In this case, the statement is used to justify an action that will prejudice an isolated group of lawyers who practice in the small firm environment. They need assistance from the Bar … and they don’t get it. Instead, they get slapped in the face. We might just as well place yellow arm bands around these folks and say they are "bad" people. There is no empirical evidence that this group of lawyers is subject to more malpractice claims than others. There is no empirical evidence yet set forth that suggests any reason to isolate this group of lawyers and identify or punish them in this fashion.
Yet, this very same organization has not, to date, honored its earlier (2005 Board of Governors Retreat) stated commitment to its members to provide them with help in their businesses (The Business of Law®) because it might antagonize a few legislators or other special interest groups or cost a few dollars or place additional demands on the staff. Where is the Board when they’re needed?
This attitude explains why members of the legal community, generally, have lost confidence in its governing body. Why the Board of Governors would anticipate that lawyers in this State would support it in any future disagreement with the State Legislature or with the Governor is beyond understanding. One can “turn one’s cheek” only so many times before the resentment rises to the point of action.
The perception amongst small firm attorneys that the State Bar is the enemy and not the friend clearly gains traction with actions such as taken now by this Board. John Dutton of the Board of Governors perhaps said it best. “Dutton argued that some county bar associations, a few State Bar committees and most of the members of the Conference of Delegates of California Bar Associations have joined critics in opposing disclosure. ‘And here we are,’ he said, ‘saying, ‘We’re going to jam it down your throat. We don’t care what you think.’”
Of course, the very Governors voting on this issue also fail to disclose any personal financial interest they may have in this issue, and several do. They also fail to address more important issues for disclosure if we were truly interested in client protection. And, most importantly, they fail to create an affordable insurance program that would allow economically marginal (but very good) lawyers to buy the very product the Board is promoting! (Dare we remember that the State Bar obtains several million dollars each year from the insurance program it promotes?)
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