Finding Success in a Global Paradox (Keynote ALPMA Sydney 22 Oct 2010 -- Password Protected -- registered participants only)
Download by clicking on image or HERE Registered participants were provided with Password in session.
Around the World Speaking Tour (Gerry Riskin -- Edge International)
SEPTEMBER 2010
September 24th, 2010
ADR Institute of Canada National Conference September 23-24, 2010
Plenary Session: Optimal Marketing for ADR professionals
Workshop: Effective Marketing for ADR professionals
Calgary, Alberta
OCTOBER 2010
October 9th, 2010
Fordham Law School (for Prof Silvia Hodges)
Guest Lecture: Law firm management: Strategy
New York, New York
October 14th, 2010
(with Nicole Auerbach a— Valorem Lw Firm))
Making Alternative Fees Work in Litigation: How to Approach and Craft AFAs
Virtual Program… webinar: Find out how to incorporate AFAs for your litigation matters, and how to avoid the many pitfalls that can arise along the way in this information-packed audio conference. During this 75-minute program, our expert faculty will present best practices for approaching, crafting and implementing these highly sought-after engagements.
Information & Registration
October 22, 2010
ALPMA summit
Keynote address: Finding Success in a Global Paradox
Sydney, Australia
Information & Registration
NOVEMBER 2010
November 4th, 2010
Chief Legal Officer Forum, Public Sector
Auckland, New Zealand
November 5th - 7th, 2010
Plenary Session: Future Firm Forum 2010
The Management Imperative
Tongariro Lodge at the south end of Lake Taupo, on the North Island of New Zealand
Information & Registration
November 11th - 14th, 2010
(with Edge partner, Juhi Garg
GROWTH STRATEGIES 2015
LAWASIA 2010 Conference
The session will describe how Asian law firms can prepare for a flourishing economy including strategies and processes required to fuel growth both organically and inorganically.
New Delhi, India
More Information
Welcome to Edge International, Pam Woldow !
My Edge International partner, Jordan Furlong, has done a nice welcome piece on Pam Woldow already (at his Law 21 blog) but I thought I would echo that Edge International is so very proud and delighted to have her on board.
Also, thank you to friends who have joined us in congratulating Pam, like Valorem's awesome founder, Pat Lamb, who expressed delight in his In Search or Perfect Client Service blog post.
Those of you who know Edge International well can be assured that we are intent on growing in strength and capabilities.
Please make sure you follow Pam's new Blog, At The Intersection, for her continuing wisdom and counsel.
Stay tuned.
Edge International Review Winter 2010
We are very proud of our latest Edge International Review. For a complete downloadable version (or just the articles you want) click on the cover or go to EdgeInternationalReview.com
If you have any questions , comments or suggestions, please shoot me a note.
(You can also check out our Edge International web site at Edge-International.com)
Law Firm Leadership Eye Openers
Take a few moments at the beginning of your next (executive, practice group, industry group, client team) meeting and watch this piece from Australia's George and Margaret Beaton (Beaton research and Consulting). They have been friends for a long time and not only built an amazing high end consultancy but have done it with panache and imagination. You will see some data that will act as a catalyst for the thinking of your leadership team.
Enjoy: The Big (Legal) Picture video
Punchline: The legal Profession absolutely refuses to stay the same so don't let your partners treat it like it will.
Pat Lamb's added this commentary at his awesome Blog, In Search of Perfect Client Service: You'll like irrelevance even less
Edge International is on the Ground in India
Ms. Juhi Garg
Edge International is delighted to announce the addition of Ms. Juhi Garg. Juhi holds a Masters in Business Law from India's foremost law school, the National Law School of India in Bangalore and is also a graduate in media from Delhi University. With Juhi on our team, Edge International will offer our full traditional range of consulting services to Indian law firms. In addition, we will be focusing on assisting Indian law firms with their strategies to develop business in the western hemisphere and to assist western firms wishing to take advantage of the burgeoning Indian legal services market.
India is a legal services market that is attracting global attention, for good reason. It produces more law school graduates annually than any other country. Its impact with outsourced legal services in western markets has been significant and this is set to grow exponentially as western clients seek to cut legal costs in the face of the current economic recession. Also, upcoming legislation is expected to significantly relax restrictions on foreign firms and lawyers practicing in India. Several international firms have already entered into arrangements with Indian law firms in anticipation of this change.
See Juhi's biography by clicking here.
PUNCHLINE: If you are a firm based in Australia, New Zealand Canada the US or UK and are interested in exploring an arrangement with an Indian law firm and you would like counsel on the selection and vetting processes, please allow me, Juhi Garg or Robert Millard to explore helping you.
Answer Your Outsourcing Questions
Answer Your Outsourcing Questions
- Why do some corporations and law firms outsource legal work while others do not?
- What ethical issues arise in outsourcing legal services?
- Who is doing the outsourced work and what qualifications do they have?
- What type of legal work is being outsourced? What are the concerns regarding the outsourcing of patent drafting and patent searches?
- What impact, if any, will legal outsourcing have on the elite guild nature of the U.S. legal profession?
The International Out-Sourcing and the Legal Profession conference will be held on April 25, 2008 at the UC Berkeley School of Law.
I suggest you decide whether your firm can afford not to have someone attend.
For more information, contact The Institute for Global Challenges and the Law at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law:
Telephone: 510.642.7830Registration is a modest $150.
Fax: 510.643.2362
email:GCL@law.berkeley.edu
For questions or to register by phone, please contact Emily Arntz: 510-642-7830
To see a full description on line, go to the Institute for Global Challenges and Law
Offshoring in India Changing Legal Services in the West
In Three myths about legal services offshoring (The Hindu) there is some very very sobering information especially for those who hope that it means offshoring will just fade away sooner or later.
If you intend to practice law for 10 or more years then: READ THE ARTICLE
Here are some teasers/excerpts:
"Attacks on the competence of Indian lawyers and law graduates are about as valid as saying that Indian software engineers are incapable of handling sophisticated IT (information technology) work. To the contrary, the Indian IT industry is a world leader, and the same will be the case with offshored legal services."
"A recent study conducted by Harvard Law School and LexisNexis reveals that 75 per cent of US law graduates admit they do not have the necessary skills to practise law."
"So you would expect that these deficiencies would be met by rigorous training programs undertaken by Western law firms. Guess again! The Harvard-LexisNexis study reveals that 64 per cent of young lawyers receive no organised, on-the-job training."
"By contrast, reputable legal services offshoring companies in India provide rigorous training to their lawyers, and the hours spent on training do not appear on invoices to clients."
"…at least in the US, law graduates for the most part are notoriously incapable of writing effectively in English. The problem is so severe that some large US law firms now assign a writing coach to each incoming associate. However, most lawyers in the West never receive this kind of training. By contrast, reputable legal services offshoring companies in India train all their attorneys in English writing."
"The future of the legal services offshoring industry in India appears very bright."
"Corporations, not Western law firms, will drive the market in the years ahead."
"Another way that corporations will drive the market, indirectly, is by obtaining flat (or fixed) rate billing from their outside counsel, instead of hourly billing. For example, the mega law firm, Morgan Lewis & Bockius, now handles all of the litigation for Cisco Systems for a fixed annual fee."
"Every sector of the legal offshoring industry will grow dramatically, including lower end services, such as document coding and legal transcription. Ultimately, however, the biggest impact, the long-term mother lode, will be higher-value services such as legal research and drafting – services that constitute the bulk of the legal work now done in the West."
"Long-term, India’s enormous, mostly untapped population of over one billion citizens will continue to make India competitive in relation to other offshore destinations… ultimately it will not only decrease poverty, but increase the number of law graduates."
"On the most positive note, the growth and development of the legal offshoring industry in India will help bring about a major change in the way legal services are delivered in the West."
OUTSOURCING: "Lawyers are service providers. We are not gods"
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"The objective is to have only the most valuable people in London or New York, and the others in India, China or Columbus, Ohio,'' said Robert Profusek, co-head of the mergers and acquisitions practice at Jones Day in New York, who sends low-end work to the cheapest locations and plans to open a document center in India. ``Lawyers are service providers. We are not gods.''
This comes from a gem-packed Bloomberg article today titled: “Jones Day, Kirkland Send Work to India to Reduce Client Bills” co-authored by Cynthia Cotts and Liane Kufchock
Here are some additional outsourcing factoids from the article:
- “Outsourcing will move about 50,000 U.S. legal jobs overseas by 2015”
- “Companies like Dupont, Cisco and Morgan Stanley have legal departments in India”
- “General Electric Co. sends about $3 million a year in routine legal work to its Indian affiliate”
- “Kirkland & Ellis, the seventh-largest U.S. law firm, works with offshore attorneys at the client's request”
- “Law firms can earn more by using labor they can mark up without disclosure,'' said Stephen Gillers, professor of legal ethics at New York University School of Law (referring to offshoring)
- “Law firms contribute 45 percent to offshore revenue, while corporate law departments contribute 36 percent”, ValueNotes said.
"OUTSOURCING" - clients will prefer firms who do it, sooner than you think.
"…$18 million a year in savings to the world's largest law firm""…around-the-clock attention and legal advice for global clients"
This is no longer a hypothetical. Many law firms who think this will not apply to their practice for a decade or two will soon wake up behind the eight ball.
Outsourcing is neither easy nor comfortable but with approximately six times the number of lawyers graduating annually in India as in the USA and with escalating domestic support costs for labor and premises, clients will soon gravitate to those law firms who have figured out how to outsource.
Read the full New York Times story: Law Firms Are Starting to Adopt Outsourcing
