The Point A company’s legal needs can be short-term or long-term, steady or fluctuating, recurring or one-off. But whatever they are, quality is non-negotiable. Sadly, the legal profession’s traditional offerings for business have been of just two types: Retain a law firm for a time-limited engagement at excessive hourly rates,…
The “2022 Report on the State of the Legal Market“, most recent in a series of highly regarded annual reports on that subject, issued by Georgetown University Law Center and the Thomson Reuters Institute, came out in January. For the business client, I see three main takeaways for 2021: 1.…
The Point My posts of February 16, 2022 and February 19, 2022 quoted Microsoft’s Jason Barnwell on how to allocate — or “segment” — law function resources: First Class: “There will always be a slice at the top that is premium work, and it’s always going to make sense to go to the law…
Further to my post of February 16, one more insight conveyed by Microsoft’s Jason Barnwell in his keynote at the Strategic Knowledge & Innovation Summit for the legal industry on January 13: “Honestly, we need to get lawyers out of the middle of stuff when it’s a low-value thing“. A corporate…
Three years after my posts describing Jason Barnwell‘s personal journey from MIT-trained enterprise software engineer to Assistant General Counsel of Microsoft (in three parts: here, here, and here), he gave the keynote (begins at 9:30 and ends at 40:20) January 13 at the Strategic Knowledge & Innovation Summit (SKILLS). ……
Three and a half years after my earlier post describing their work, lawyers Nicole Auerbach and Patrick Lamb continue to transform pricing and service delivery for corporate clients at their law firm, ElevateNext. Together with their affiliated law company, Elevate Services, they are making some history. Here’s how Reuters…
The Point A surgeon friend of mine once explained to me how her profession’s CPT Codes describe specific medical procedures in a way that’s commonly accepted across the medical industry. For each such procedure a fixed fee is charged — regardless of the time consumed or complications encountered in performance…
The Point EY Law, the law practice division of the Big Four accounting firm Ernst & Young, has just announced (subscription required) that it’s adding up to 800 lawyers in the next 3 years. Patrick McKenna identifies the Big Four’s chief advantage in law practice over law firms: “A strong…
The Point From The American Lawyer, January 31 edition (subscription required), reporting on an annual survey of U.S. law firms by Wells Fargo Private Bank Legal Specialty Group: “Firms also told the Wells Fargo researchers that they expect to implement standard rate increases of between 6% and 7% this year,…
News Item From the American Bar Association Journal, January 27, 2022: “Goodwin Procter is providing ‘thoughtfully curated weeklong’ trips to associates and some other billers, so they can get relaxation time on the law firm’s tab … The trips are valued at $5,000 to $10,000, depending on lawyer seniority. “Those…