Client service reaches new heights at Clifford Chance, which has obtained a 24-hour alcohol licence. According to its spokes-woman, clients can get a refreshment (code for an “alcoholic beverage”?) at any time of the day or night. wc booze.jpg Now in fairness, there are big deals that close in the wee hours and you would not want CC to be precluded from serving a little libation, would you? See the full story in today’s The Independent Online Edition: Lawyers drink in the last-Chance saloon Just when the legal news starts looking a bit dull, some firm somewhere does something to capture our imagination — be grateful. Credit to Transblawg (Margaret Marks) whose blawg alerted me to the story. *”Going the Extra Mile” is a stated value of Clifford Chance

For friends and clients in South Africa, here is a reminder of how you can register for my presentation, Rainmaking for Professional Service Firms, at The Gordon Institute of Business Science (University of Pretoria, Johannesburg Campus).

I look forward to seeing some old friends and aquaintances and making some new ones.

Date: Thursday 1 September 2005
Time: 8:00 – 16:30
Venue: GIBS Auditorium, 26 Melville Rd, Illovo Sandton

For information about other speaking engagements, including the World’s Master’s in Sydney on August 26th, check At The Podium at the Edge International web site.

You may never see the day when Shearman & Sterling or White & Case would call their fellow lawyers “money-grubbing leeches touting for business…” but their names appear among advertisers at a site that did just that today. I do not like lawyer jokes and I tire of lawyers being maligned — it seems to be a form of bigotry that is socially acceptable. I must say I was surprised to see a web site bearing the names of numerous prestigious law firms, as advertisers, attack lawyers in this way. But alas, this attack was not levied against all lawyers, only those who think that people with causes of action ought to be informed of their rights and offered legal service should they so require. For fun, guess where these little leeches practice law? (Photo from RollOnFriday’s posting) leech.jpg I will bet good money that most would guess North America. Not a chance! SURPRISE! This comment comes from Jolly Old England! I serve clients in the UK so I am going to be delicate here but North American lawyers are frequently referred to as “Crass and TransAtlantic” (ouch) by their UK counterparts. Well, I suppose Roll on Friday’s Leech story levels the playing field a bit… now it can be said lawyers are berated “everywhere”. For the record, I do not encourage ambulance chasing but at the same time the legal profession is sometimes the only way that those entitled to damages learn about their rights. Even when one of the offending firms (leeches?) apologized and confirmed that their ad was pulled as soon as they learned that the Law Society had set up a help line, RollOnFriday (usually hilarious) could not resist the following sarcastic comment about that firm’s spokesperson:

“He denied our suggestion that claims factories were simply taking advantage of vulnerable members of society for the purpose of their own financial gain. Oh no no no no no. Far from it.”

Well, after a few refreshes of the page, I had identified the following law firm advertisers (some are rotated): Travers Smith Berwin Leighton Poisner Shearman & Sterling Lovells Osborne Clarke White & Case MacFarlanes Burges Salmon Cliffird Chance Baker & McKenzie, Allen & Overy Nabarro Nathanson Ashurst I wonder if any of these advertising firms read what this web site publishes beside their names and whether any of them would wince at all, or worse, make different advertising decisions. RollOnFriday: Stick to the humour – you are great at it – leave the preaching and the sarcasm to those who populate Speakers Corner in Hyde Park on Sunday afternoons. LAWYERS WITH A DIFFERENT VIEW: If there are lawyers out there who think the RollOnFriday story is actually funny, please comment… I will be surprised but am willing to listen if you think my views are skewed.

The techniques managers use to get through a tough agenda in a business context are completely useless in a deposition. To survive the deposition, managers are trained to avoid the tactics they would have used in a business situation. Those who lead law firms are often experiencing more of a deposition environment than a business environment. Perhaps this is why some lawyers want their firms to be more “corporate“.

This insight arises from the analysis of Wall Street Journal writer, George Anders, in his July 26 article called Depositions Require A Skill Set Leaders Don’t Use on the Job (subscription required) in the July 26 WSJ (page A17 if you haven’t thrown out your hard copy yet). Anders nicely illuminates the contrast between the very different business and deposition contexts.

FASTFORWARD: Those who live in law firms know what I mean when I say that the law firm environment resembles a deposition more than it does a corporation. A partnership meeting can be as grueling as a deposition. Support professionals (like marketing directors) often feel devoured by the environment. I believe that the lawyers training, especially litigators, fosters the propensity to lawyer their way through meetings making the leader’s job next to impossible.

Lawyers must be highly critical and analytical when creating or improving documents or winding their way through the strategy of litigation. These are essential behaviors for lawyering but lousy for managing or being managed. Therefore, unless attorneys become aware of their propensities, they will bring this mode of behavior into all they do, including how they react to management, whether firm-wide or at the practice-group, industry-group or client-team level. Support professionals like Chief Marketing Officers walk away from encounters bewildered and frustrated by these strange (to them) lawyering behaviors that people outside the profession rarely exhibit (especially in corporate settings).

PUNCHLINE: Leadership requires “followership” which means that the more an internal meeting resembles a deposition (“examination for discovery” in many jurisdictions) the less productive the business meeting will be.

GOODNEWS: I have found that lawyers who are briefed about these anti-business behavioral propensities can easily transcend them. Once they are aware of them, groups self-police those who mistake the management meeting for a deposition; the noticeable increase in progress achieved is the immediate and reinforcing reward.

Bravo to Womble Carlyle Sandridge & Rice and Molden Holley Fergusson Thompson & Heard for their ingenious alliance to create and market diversity.

Molden Holley is a small and new African-American firm comprised of partners who came from major firms. In what appears to be a brilliant win-win alliance, this new firm will continue to be independent but will bolt on all of the resources of AmLaw powerhouse Womble Carlyle when and as required; meanwhile, Womble Carlyle gets to demonstrate to clients like Wal-Mart and Sara Lee that it is listening to their General Counsel who have been requiring all of their legal providers to make rapid diversity progress.

(For further particulars on those diversity requirements, see my post titled: Law Firms as “Exclusive Clubs for White Men”)

patchen.diversity.jpeg

PUNCHLINE: While other firms may not yet have diversity on their radar screens and while those who do are likely progressing slowly and in a linear fashion, these two firms are hitting warp speed.

The most fascinating part of this story is yet to unfold. It’s the marketing initiative (contained in this quote from the complete story in Small Firm Business — referenced below):

“Regina S. Molden, the managing partner for Molden Holley, said members of the two firms will meet monthly to develop a marketing strategy targeted towards existing and potential Womble Carlyle clients seeking more diversity.”

WOW! Imagine the potential here. This is not smoke and mirrors but rather a very real capacity to provide diversity to clients IF those diversity-demanding clients are prepared to accept that the alliance is genuine and truly fulfills the spirit of their diversity requirements.

Whichever firm initiated the idea, it is an illustration of strategic genius — especially if it works. If it does, it will be a pattern worth emulating.

For a more particulars, see the full story filed by Meredith Hobbs in the Fulton County Daily Report on July 29th as published in Small Firm Business: Big Firm Partners With Minority-Owned Boutique to Increase Diversity

If you read blogs relating to Law, then you already know the “Adam Smith Esq.…an inquiry into the economics of law firms” offering by Bruce MacEwen. bjm.deutscheoper.jpg Bruce has already blogged a comprehensive report on the lunch we shared on Wednesday and I have little to add except to reinforce that the food was great and the conversation better. Bruce is a rare find in that he embodies blue ribbon credentials from law school through private practice through in house practice. His insights into the economics of the practice of law are invaluable. It was fun to meet the man behind the blog… don’t miss a single post!

Richard Susskind is not short on credentials. Richard has a first class honours degree in law from the University of Glasgow and a doctorate in law and computers from Balliol College, Oxford. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh and of the British Computer Society, and was awarded an OBE in the Millennium New Year’s Honours List for services to IT in the Law and to the Administration of Justice. richard01.jpg In his article: “Why going online is better for everyone” in the TimesOnLine, Richard explores, as an example, use by Eversheds of an online service:

that automates the process of drafting employment documents. The web-based system is designed for human resource professionals in large organisations

There is a link in the article that allows you to see a demo – incredible (see for yourself). PUNCHLINE: For those who still think it’s cool not to understand technology or tease that “that’s something my kids do” maybe it’s time to remove the cranium from the sand and stand erect as we move further into this new century. There will be two classes of firms soon… which one do you think will be thriving over the next ten years?

This Belgium firm not only issued a memo that would probably not be PC in the USA but appointed a “dress czar” to boot. Picture 6.jpg Visit Roll On Friday’s full posting for a more complete story. You might want to circulate it in your own firm as a not-so-subtle hint to those who equate casual with grotesque.

Now, imagine you have the best computer in the world, a 17″ Apple G4 lap top. productshot_pb17_45x40_050131.jpg Now imagine (I get chills as I type this) that you add a 23″ Cinema Display by Apple: prodshot_23_inch_3display.jpg Now imagine that both work seemlessly together so that you can move images from one to the other effortlessly, looking at multiple files, browser windows and images at the same time… THANK YOU, APPLE!! UPDATE: I was back at the Grove Apple Store in L.A. and ran into Jose who sold me the display… it reminded me how awesome he was — knowing I was taking it about 6,000 miles from the store, he insisted we plug it in and test drive it — went like a Ferrari — Thanks, Jose!!