Law Firm Management

Features

Has the importance of billing time all but eclipsed the potential gain of going out to lunch with a prospective client? As profits per partner keep skyrocketing, the case needs to be made for the old-fashioned business lunch. Clever 'rainmakers' have a keen eye for business development. They have realized that this forum presents a brilliant opportunity for networking and smoking out new opportunities. New clients aren't lining up outside your office so get smart and get out of that chair!

Features

e-Commerce records may have less legal protection from disclosure than traditional commerce records ' a situation that might cause some concern for e-commerce company principals, their counsel and customers ' even after the companies, and the law firms representing them, no longer exist.

Features

Do your current clients provide a steady stream of work that keeps all your lawyers busy? Are new clients constantly knocking at your door with new work based solely upon your firm's reputation? If that's your situation, stop here and read no further. You are in law firm nirvana.<br>Unfortunately, the other 99% of you managing partners are not so lucky.

Features

In last month's issue, we covered the best of MLF from February to and including June 2006. In this issue, we will take a look back at July through November.

Features

The proliferation of flash drives, iPods, camera cell phones, Black-berries, and similar electronic devices has put all companies at added risk for insider theft. With the use of these devices, downloading significant amounts of data is easy, virtually instantaneous, and often very difficult to detect. These risks apply to essentially all companies that allow employees access to electronically stored, confidential, and proprietary information.<br>So what is today's company supposed to do to protect its valuable, sensitive information in the face of the risks posed by new portable devices?

Features

Benchmarking has long been a difficult undertaking for private service providers and for law firms in particular. While firm partners historically have tracked firm-wide metrics such as billings, profits per partner and individual productivity, firms have until recently not had the means or opportunity to benchmark performance at the practice group, office location and timekeeper level with any accuracy or currentness.<br>This article, as the title implies, discusses how refined performance measures are made possible by a new benchmarking tool, West Peer Monitor' from Thomson West

Features

Improving client service is especially important, as general counsels of large companies have revealed to BTI Consulting that more than two-thirds would not recommend their primary law firm, 50% plan to try a new law firm for a substantive matter this year and they plan to cut nearly 40% of their outside firms by 2008. With decreasing client loyalty, firms need to spend more time improving client service as well as building barriers to entries to other outside law firms.

Features

Two firms from the MLF 50 are standouts in the area of client-centric marketing activities and for different reasons. <br>The first, Winston &amp; Strawn, led by Director of Business Development and Marketing Partner Barbara C. Sessions, embarked on an overall visibility campaign with an overarching theme on client-focused service and they did this via their Web site.<br>No less outstanding in harnessing client-centric based marketing is the firm of Holland &amp; Hart. In 2006, the marketing department, led by Director of Marketing Mark Beese (or as he refers to himself the 'Marketing Guy') engaged in several new initiatives; each of them intimately involving the firm's clients, with the goal of deepening Holland &amp; Hart's relationship with current clients and attracting new ones. The firm's advertising campaign has evolved to highlight innovative and successful clients as part of the Holland &amp; Hart trademark western wilderness.