Holme Roberts Expands in Calif., Plans to Close Gap Between Last Year's $380K PPP and $450K RPL
With a new managing partner at the helm and advice from a well-known legal consultant, Denver-based Holme Roberts & Owen expects to reverse a downsizing trend that saw the firm’s attorney roster decrease from 192 lawyers at the outset of the year to about 165 now, reports the Am Law Daily.
The loss of virtually its entire Salt Lake City office a few months ago was “a pretty big wake-up call,” managing partner Randall Miller, a 39-year-old commercial litigator, tells the legal publication. However, the firm continues to grow in California, where both its Los Angeles and San Francisco offices increased 30 percent in the last month or so.
With the help of consultants from Altman Weil, the firm has been focusing on the fact that “our overhead was entirely out of whack,” says Miller, who notes that a number of midsize law firms face such issues.
While income and the firm culture remains strong and corporate work is picking up, the firm can and will work to deal with what he describes as a “disconnect” between average profit per partner of $380,000 last year and average revenue per lawyer of $540,000.
The profits distributed to partners are “something we can improve, although they’re still pretty solid given our peer group and geographic base,” he states. “But we should be able to achieve a profit ratio that’s more competitive.”
Related coverage:
ABAJournal.com: “Holland & Hart Expands by 29 Lawyers in Salt Lake City”
ABAJournal.com: “Tax Practice Leader Exits Holme Roberts for MoFo”
