Legal Rebels

Help Us Find Our 2012 Legal Rebels

Lawyers as risk-takers and innovators? We know they’re out there. In fact, we’ve profiled 70 since launching the Legal Rebels project in 2009. In our 4th year, we’re scouting for a new crop of Rebels, and we invite your nominations to help us identify those actively remaking the profession. Using…

May 8, 2012 3:45 PM CDT

A Trusted Adviser in the New Normal Must Be Like a Symphony Conductor

When I started practicing law in 1982, a good lawyer was one who possessed superior substantive knowledge of an area of the law. Those lawyers read cases and law review articles. Their ability to advise clients on what the law was made them masters of their craft. Things have changed.…

May 8, 2012 3:24 PM CDT

Don’t Give It Away: Value Doesn’t Mean Cheap or Free

Scott Bishop wrote a worthy post on his blog, Real Time Marketer. It’s his position that you shouldn’t give away what you do for free or for a discount in order to generate future client business or loyalty. I have to agree. In this market—in which so many clients are…

May 2, 2012 6:47 PM CDT

Is Your Firm or Legal Department ‘Old Normal’ or ‘New Normal’? See Our Checklist

When we first started this series, there were many lawyers who thought the New Normal was overdue, others who thought it had already happened, and perhaps still a majority who thought law was just in a short-term blip and that we would “return to (the Old) Normal.” Now, several years…

Apr 24, 2012 1:30 PM CDT

If Lawyers Sell Legal Expertise to Clients, Who Owns the Resulting Product?

I’m still mulling over the implications of an article by Mark Hamblett in the New York Law Journal about some lawyers who have filed suit against Lexis-Nexis and West Publishing for what these lawyers say is the “unabashed wholesale copying of thousands of copyright-protected works created by, and owned by,…

Apr 17, 2012 1:30 PM CDT

A ‘Valorem Dozen’: The Ingredients for One New Normal Firm

Several recent posts by Paul Lippe have highlighted the problems currently being encountered by Dewey & LeBeouf. Already this year, more than 45 partners have abandoned the firm, and American Lawyer recently restated, rather dramatically, Dewey’s revenue and profits per equity partner for 2010 and 2011. Comparisons to Howrey abound:…

Apr 11, 2012 1:30 PM CDT

The Dewey Dozen: Capital Sufficiency and Survival

When news first broke about troubles at Dewey LeBoeuf, I wondered whether problems like Dewey’s are an outlier or representative of broader trends. Then, I explored the long-term trends that are likely to lead to more Deweys. In this third piece, I want to describe what happens in the very…

Apr 3, 2012 9:20 PM CDT

Stanford Law School Dean: We Aim to Teach Our Students Not Just to Spot Problems, But to Solve Them

While failings of legal education have been much in the news these past few years, the need to change long predated the economic downturn—which mainly accelerated trends that have been unfolding for years. Stanford began revamping its curriculum in 2004 and already offers a program that does most of what…

Mar 29, 2012 1:00 PM CDT

The $60-Per-Hour Lawyer—Why Dewey Isn’t Ab-Normal

When structural change happens, we like to look for individual agency – find someone who made a mistake and blame them. But Dewey’s problems are more indicative of basic changes happening in law (driven by the broader world) than they are unique boo-boos by Dewey. The best description of the…

Mar 28, 2012 2:05 PM CDT

Dewey or Don’t We: Abnormal or New Normal?

The continuing revelations about uncertain accounting and significant partner defections at Dewey & LeBoeuf, have me mulling whether the problems at Dewey are unique or emblematic of broader trends. Back in the day, coal miners would take canaries into the mine because the birds were more sensitive to build-up of…

Mar 27, 2012 1:29 PM CDT

Changing Stripes: How to Work Collaboratively on Alternative Fee Arrangements

I was just at the Ark Group’s AFA conference Thursday in New York City, and the sentiments that Roya Behnia details in the New Normal column “Alternative Fee Arrangements Are a Tool, Not a Strategy” were in the fabric of pretty much every conversation we had with speakers and participants…

Mar 23, 2012 6:19 PM CDT

Alternative Fee Arrangements Are a Tool, Not a Strategy

Earlier this year, I met Pat Lamb, one of our fearless leaders in the New Normal, for coffee near his office. Given his success in delivering high-quality legal services under alternative fee arrangements, I wanted to hear his thoughts about their use in practice. Pat emphasized that lawyers should be…

Mar 21, 2012 1:49 PM CDT

Where Are the Legal Jeremy Lins?

The best news of the last decade has been the emergence of Jeremy Lin as the point guard of the Knicks. It’s good news because his style of play makes the whole team better, because he confounded expectations, and because he is a decent, hardworking, humble human being. (Full disclosure:…

Mar 13, 2012 2:49 PM CDT

The Legal Innovation Ecosystem: 10 Actors & Their Roles - An Early Review

With Apple’s stock and overall performance continuing into the stratosphere, Steve Jobs has attained the status of a secular saint. But it doesn’t take anything away from Jobs’ accomplishments to say that he wasn’t necessarily the lead musician of every part of the orchestra so much as the conductor. As…

Mar 1, 2012 10:00 PM CST

What a Physics Professor Can Teach Us About Collaborating with Clients

Usually, when my alumni magazine arrives in the mail, I skip the articles to go straight to the class notes section and catch up on my classmates. This time, however, I stopped on a headline proclaiming the “twilight of the lecture” and that a “trend toward ‘active learning’ may overthrow…

Feb 28, 2012 3:13 PM CST