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Implementing Practice Management in a Mid-sized Firm
Practice management is gaining strength as a discipline in many mid-sized firms. Long adhered to in large firms as a way to interact most effectively with clients, produce the client's work in the most timely and cost-effective manner, and generate collegiality among lawyers, in mid-sized firms many managing partners have relegated the practice of law to individual partners, reluctant to impose their judgments on how individual client matters were being performed. This results from their belief that lawyer management should not have to follow up on partners responsible for performing client work or for managing substantive practice areas.
Practice management and firm management often interact most closely when firm revenue and the net profit available to partners declines. When partners begin to feel the economic pinch in their pockets, there is a greater tendency to view practice areas and individual attorneys as profit centers. As such, firm management needs to review all of the factors contributing to profitability and to address the following questions:
- How profitable are the firm's practice areas?
- Should the firm continue to practice in these areas or redirect its efforts to other areas?
- Can certain partners and associates be re-assigned to other more profitable practice areas? If so, what training will be required to bring these attorneys up to speed in these areas? If not, what should be done with these attorneys?
- Should certain partners be assigned accountability for managing particular practice areas?
- What should be the role, responsibility and level of accountability of the heads of practice areas?
Often, the solution to the problem is development of practice management in the firm, and an increasing number of mid-size law offices have introduced and implemented practice management activities to insure partner coordination, control and accountability over fields of law, areas of practice and client matters.
The DOJ's Corporate Enforcement Policy: One Year Later
The DOJ's Criminal Division issued three declinations since the issuance of the revised CEP a year ago. Review of these cases gives insight into DOJ's implementation of the new policy in practice.
The DOJ's New Parameters for Evaluating Corporate Compliance Programs
The parameters set forth in the DOJ's memorandum have implications not only for the government's evaluation of compliance programs in the context of criminal charging decisions, but also for how defense counsel structure their conference-room advocacy seeking declinations or lesser sanctions in both criminal and civil investigations.
Use of Deferred Prosecution Agreements In White Collar Investigations
This article discusses the practical and policy reasons for the use of DPAs and NPAs in white-collar criminal investigations, and considers the NDAA's new reporting provision and its relationship with other efforts to enhance transparency in DOJ decision-making.
A Lawyer's System for Active Reading
Active reading comprises many daily tasks lawyers engage in, including highlighting, annotating, note taking, comparing and searching texts. It demands more than flipping or turning pages.
Bankruptcy Sales: Finding a Diamond In the Rough
There is no efficient market for the sale of bankruptcy assets. Inefficient markets yield a transactional drag, potentially dampening the ability of debtors and trustees to maximize value for creditors. This article identifies ways in which investors may more easily discover bankruptcy asset sales.