Features

Only 30% of Workday Is Spent on Billable Hours, Report Says
U.S. lawyers are still spending too little of their workday on billable hours, a year after an eye-opening report found lawyers devoted only 29% — 2.3 hours — of each eight-hour workday to billable hours.
Features

Cost Recovery in 2018: Predicting Winners and Losers
Back in March of this year, we predicted changes and trends the results of the 2018 Mattern Cost Recovery Survey would reveal. At that time, we got our…
Features

Salary Hikes Not So Impressive After Inflation
Law firms have bumped up starting salaries for associates at top firms over the past few years, prompting Big Law clients to raise a stink about outsized salaries for junior lawyers. But it turns out that this pay falls short of past peaks when inflation is taken into account.
Features

Litigation Funders Face Their Hardest Sell: Big Law
There Is More Money Than Ever In the Hands of Litigation Financiers, But Can They Convince Law Firms to Use It?
Features

The NLJ 500: Large Firm Growth Slows Amid Consolidation and Contraction
Lawyer Counts Increased By 1%, But Large Firm Growth Was Slowed Due to Consolidation. Just Three of the Top Five Firms on the NLJ 500 Showed Total Lawyer Headcount Growth
Features

Lawyers and Accountants: Collaborators and Competitors
Lawyers and accountants are professional allies, but who controls integration and delivery of their services is another story.
Features

Will Law Firms Be Ready When the Next Recession Hits?
<b><i>The Bottom Is Eventually Going to Drop on the U.S. Economy, and Many Law Firms Won't Be Positioned to Handle the Fallout</b></i><p>No economic expansion lasts forever. That's a hard-and-fast truth of macroeconomics, one that's on the minds of certain law firm leaders.
Features

Arbitration Impact on Attorney Fees and Film Company Principal
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit reversed a district court's award of attorney fees to Sony Corp. under §505 of the Copyright Act for winning a ruling that a lawsuit over a Sony Music songwriting contest should be sent to arbitration.
Features

Prospering in the 'New Normal'
<b><i>Raising Costs and Declining Demand are Sapping Profits</b></i><p>The “New Normal” of today is one in which raising operating costs, associate salary increases, and reduced realization rates coupled with AFAs and demands from corporate counsel for reduced rates are sapping firm profits and there is no relief on the horizon. Law firm leaders, seeing current conditions, should be asking if there is a better way.
Features

Cash Flow Drought: How to Identify and Deal with It
Cash flow management can be particularly challenging. You need to account for the time lag between cash going out and cash coming in. This requires financial and management discipline, strong internal policies and procedures for billing and collection policies, planning and attention to detail.
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