Walker Clark
Worldview Archives
Is your partner compensation system a strategic liability?
The legal press this week gave us two interesting examples of how partner compensation systems, and the cultural assumptions and values that they represent, can thwart the efforts of excellent law firms to achieve their strategic objectives.
Is your law firm's partner compensation an asset in your efforts to achieve sustainable business success, or is it an obstacle?
The Incredible “Shrinking” Law Firm
The law firm of the future will have only three things: a lawyer, a computer, and a dog.
Too Good to be True?
A lawyer's ego can be a profit center — for someone else.
I recently received an e-mail from an outfit with an address in the United Kingdom, inviting me to become an exclusive member of a worldwide legal network. Like most of these offers, the first few words clearly signaled that this amazing opportunity is not entirely credible.
“Something’s wrong.”
We all know when "something's wrong" – whether we act on it or not. There is this place of inquietude in our thoughts that tells us "something's wrong" - whether in our relationships, in our careers, or in our organizations.
Thinking Small
The phrase "big picture" usually comes to mind when one thinks about strategic issues.
This might actually be preventing us from solving some of our most important problems.
Looking Back to Look Forward
As law firms begin a new fiscal year, whether in January or at some other point in the calendar, most of them overlook one of their most powerful and reliable planning resources, last year's performance. Year-end financial data and the collective experiences of a firm's partners can help detect the probable causes of serious, often chronic, strategic, financial, and operational issues.
Is your law firm ambicultural?
A managing partner of a client law firm of Walker Clark recently told me, "The problem with our firm is that we have too many opportunities and too many good ideas. At the end of the day we are like dogs chasing our own tails."
This is a frequent phenomenon in successful law firms.
Innovation and Competitive Advantage
For law firms, true innovation requires much more than wishful thinking powered by determination. It requires a solid business rationale. It also can be very hard work.
Are you a law firm or a condominium?
This is an important question, especially for small and midsize law firms that want to have a future.
Many smaller law firms are firms in name only. The partners share a common brand, office space, and expenses, but almost nothing else.
“What if…?” - The Need for Cautious Pessimism in Law Firm Strategic Planning
It is one thing to envision the year 2025. It is quite another to know how to get there.
We have identified several very serious crises that could arise in the next ten years and could shake the financial and organizational foundations of many law firms that are surprised by them.
Innovation: The Small Firm’s Secret Weapon?
In an era when the legal profession is buzzing about what some claim to be the inevitable triumph of “Big Law,” small and midsize firms are defying these predictions of their doom.
One of the ways that they are doing this is by innovation in how they deal with clients and deliver legal services faster, less expensively, and with better results.
Resilience: Playing an Unexpected Poor Hand Well Enough to Win
"We are in a window of change right now. There are certain traditional firms that will die," said Richard Rosenbaum, former CEO and current Executive Chair of Greenberg Traurig.
How can law firms become resilient during unprecedented changes in the profession?
Level Playing Fields, Giant Shadows, and Other Cliches that can Come True through Electronic Publications
Most small and midsize law firms are missing great opportunities to improve their visibility and communicate their competitive advantages in increasingly competitive legal markets.
These firms might have thought about how to use electronic publications, such as newsletters, client alerts, and electronic guides, to extend the reach of their marketing message, but they have rejected them as something that works only for larger firms.
They are mistaken.
Could this disaster have been avoided?
The Lawyer reports today that the U.K.-based international law firm Withers has lost its appeal of a GBP 1.6 million (US$ 2.4 million) professional negligence judgment arising from an associate's defective drafting of an LLP agreement.
The plaintiff, Wellesley Partners, had been a long-standing Withers client. The trial court found that a Withers associate's "misremembering" of his instructions ultimately resulted in losses to the plaintiff of more than GBP 1.5 million in London and in the United States, plus substantial additional internal costs.
Engagement Letters: The Riskiest Documents in Your Practice?
When a new client appears at the front door of your law firm, do you see opportunities or risks?
Our firm's experience advising law firms on risk management issues demonstrates that law firms can incur substantial risks in the way that they manage the intake of new clients and matters. The focal point for these vulnerabilities is the engagement letter.
When is enough, enough?
Making a decision to leave your law firm partnership is likely to be the hardest career decision you will ever make.
How do you know when the timing is right, for you and for the firm?
The Coming Seismic Shift in Law Firm Business Development
As legal markets become even more competitive over the next ten years, commercial law firms will need to reconsider many of their long-held assumptions and practices about marketing and business development.
Some firms will negotiate the coming seismic shift well and continue to succeed. Others will not.
Social Entrepreneurship and Law Firm Strategy
The emergence of social entrepreneurship points to a promising specialty market for law firms, in which, as in other areas of legal services, an early entrant with an intensely client-focused and well-managed practice could establish a significant and durable competitive advantage. This creates a market opening for small and midsize firms with well-balanced transactional experience.
In this arena, size is not necessarily an advantage.
Coming Soon to a Law Firm Near You: Artificial Intelligence
As the next step in the evolution of knowledge management in law firms, AI promises to allow seismic shifts in practice management and profitability for law firms of all sizes, not only for large firms, but especially — repeat especially — for small and midsize firms that want to remain competitive while continuing to deliver the highest quality in legal services.
Beware consensus.
Do you and your partners pride yourselves on the fact that "as partners we never proceed unless we have consensus?"
Or that "we have voting rules but never need to use them, because we prefer to come to a consensus?"
So, what does this commitment to consensus actually say about your partners' decision making process, your professional and business culture, and the ability of your firm to adapt to, and respond rapidly and efficiently to, a changing business environment?
Surprisingly, very little and not what you might expect.
