Cyberinsurance for Data Security Risks
October 29, 2007
The harms that can result from computer security breaches are largely uncovered by the types of insurance policies most law firms maintain. Combined with the inadequate security most law firms provide for client data, the resultant risk exposure arguably violates legal professional ethics. A firm's failure to adequately protect computer-based master files, time-and-billing records, court filings, wills, powers of attorney, corporate records, and other client-related materials is a violation of bar association requirements to preserve client files and more generally a failure in the firm's overall duty to act competently in the best interests of its clients.
WHAT DID NOT WORK
October 25, 2007
WHAT DID NOT WORK - 1. Offering to handle and manage what inside counsel already have the skills to manage. 2. Relying on good results but not working on the relationship. 3. Offensive humorous comments. Conducting comprehensive research on your clients and prospects, both as individuals and on their companies is one of the single most important components to successfully closing a new engagement. Yet it is one of the major reasons in-house counsel do not retain firms. Sure,…
Gotta Go, My Cell's Ringing
October 01, 2007
I was probably the last human on the planet over 5 to get a cell phone. I didn't want one. I didn't want to be part of the Great Cell Phone Conspiracy that currently over-rides every ounce of courtesy left in even the nicest people. Of course the first time the commuter train broke down, leaving my teenaged son alone in the house with no notion where his Mom was, I bowed to the inevitable and'
Detailed Billing
September 28, 2007
Today's bills are as thick as case files, and at least as detailed. Concerned over what lawyers are doing with their time and who's working on a matter ' whether to track diversity or to keep expensive but inexperienced first-year associates off the case ' clients demand exhaustive accounting from their outside counsel.
Cyberinsurance for Data Security Risks
September 28, 2007
The harms that can result from computer security breaches are largely uncovered by the types of insurance policies most law firms maintain. Combined with the inadequate security most law firms provide for client data, the resultant risk exposure arguably violates legal professional ethics. A firm's failure to adequately protect computer-based master files, time-and-billing records, court filings, wills, powers of attorney, corporate records, and other client-related materials is a violation of bar association requirements to preserve client files and more generally a failure in the firm's overall duty to act competently in the best interests of its clients.
Normalizing Mix Variables in Financial Data
September 28, 2007
Most law firm managers understand the importance that business analysis plays in steering a firm toward success. However, as with so many things in life, a little bit of analysis can be a dangerous thing. Management reporting processes typically collect, organize, and ultimately combine data sets from different practice areas, offices, industries, etc. Superficial reports compare aggregate characteristics (<i>e.g.</i>, top-line results) without identifying the varying components contained within the data sets and normalizing for these variables. This can lead those who examine such reports to draw misleading or even totally wrong conclusions.
How Widespread Is Unethical Billing?
September 28, 2007
Aside from a few sensational disbarments and criminal prosecutions for overbilling, most evidence of billing irregularities is anecdotal. In order to provide a more precise assessment of the scope of the abuse of time-based billing by attorneys, I conducted nationwide surveys of outside counsel in 1991, 1995, and 2007. The large majority of respondents to all three surveys ' 82% in the most recent survey ' indicated that time-based billing was their dominant method of billing.
Products As Witnesses
September 28, 2007
Because of the importance of the 'crown jewels,' litigants should be assiduous in trying to locate and preserve the accident-involved product and in trying to assure the integrity of its custody and condition from the time of the accident. Indeed, a failure to do so can result in spoliation-of-evidence sanctions.
