Ceding the Stage - Lessons in Leadership

I've been engaged in a lively discussion with other legal marketers in which two topics I love, basketball and leadership, have come together nicely.  You don't have to be a basketball fan, or even a sports fan, to benefit from the leadership lessons that are often played out, literally, on the courts and fields for all to see. Many sports teams succeed because of superstars, those supreme talents who lead their teams in numerous statistical categories. Some achieve an even higher, supernatural, level, like NBA stars past and present Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant, both of whom have earned the league's top offensive and defensive accolades and are considered, respectively, the greatest player of all time and in the running for 2nd greatest of all time.  Jordan won the league scoring title a record 10 times and earned all-defensive first team honors 9 times. Bryant also earned all-defensive first team honors 9 times, led the league in scoring twice, has the 2nd highest scoring game in league history, and is the youngest player to score 25,000 points. Notably, while Jordan won 6 championships and Bryant has won 5 (so far), neither has been able to win a ring without the contributions of other stars and significant role players. Jordan had Scottie Pippen, voted one of the top 50 players in league history, and Kobe had Shaquille O'Neal, another top 50 player, and Pau Gasol, a former NBA rookie of the year, two-time Olympic silver medalist, and two-time European player of the year. Enough with the basketball history lesson. What's the larger leadership lesson?

On some teams, transcendent talent is enough. For most of us, we need a team around us in order to succeed. But what happens when the leaders refuse to cede the stage, when the leaders won't sacrifice their personal statistics for the larger good, saying they want to win but doing everything they can to erect obstacles to success?  I was engaged by a law firm that had plateaued in its growth and wanted my help "shaking the cobwebs" from some of its weaker junior partners so they'd generate more business and "put a little fear" into the associates who were coasting by doing work the partners brought in but who weren't developing their own books of business.  Sure enough, just as with every law firm, there were some junior partners and associates who needed assistance getting out of the office to network and create some visibility for their practice. But the more we explored avenues for networking, the more I learned that these were "off limits."  Upon further discovery, I learned that the most successful partners had established a framework that perpetuated an us vs. them mentality. They honestly and earnestly believed the compensation plans were thoughtfully designed to foster collaboration, but had they specifically set out to erect barriers to collaboration they could not have devised a more insidious scheme.

Many leaders want success, but only on their terms. The constraints they place on winning are often the very inhibitors to success. This firm implemented a compensation structure and operating practices that include the following constraints:

• There is no formula for sharing origination credit. Partners are left to decide how, and if, to allocate credit, with the not unexpected outcome that few partners ever share credit
• The originating partner receives all origination credit for all future matters in perpetuity, whether that partner is involved in delivering any of the work, up-selling or cross-selling new matters, or has any interaction whatsoever with the client ever again
• Partners are not required to introduce any lawyers into their relationships, so as not to "muddy" the origination credit issue. After numerous complaints from other lawyers who not surprisingly wanted a share of new matters, the partners responded not by providing guidance for collaboration but by specifically instructing relationship partners to limit client interaction with other lawyers so as to avoid internal disputes
• No lawyer is allowed to write articles or present at conferences or events, except for partners. This is designed to provide "quality control" and protect the firm's reputation
• Partners who are heavily involved in client industry associations, and many are, may prohibit other firm lawyers from participating. So if a partner serves on the board of an association, she or he may forbid more junior lawyers from attending or participating at any level, so as not to create any confusion over origination credit generated from clients in this sector

Switching back to our sports metaphor, when superstars refuse to cede the stage, often in the form of individual stats or playing time or compensation, even though they profess an all-consuming desire to win, they often, and not surprisingly, don't win. This reluctance to allow others to shine is specifically what's holding back the team. Any objective observer can review the above policies and identify numerous opportunities to improve collaboration, share credit, and grow client relationships at multiple levels, just as any casual observer can watch a basketball game and recognize a ball hog who refuses to pass to the open man.  When I confronted the senior partners on these issues, their advice to the junior lawyers was to "find your own category to make a name for yourself, and then you too can reap the rewards and benefits of 'owning' your own client niche."  Despite my several attempts at illustrating the benefits of collaboration using simple mathematical formulae, the partners were too protective of their own stats to change.

Note: Plot the expected value of generating 100% credit for a limited number of matters against the expected value of generating partial credit for matters that increase in both volume, size, and repeatability due to collaborative efforts, and the result will invariably demonstrate that collaboration is far more lucrative in both the short-term and long-term.  Said another way: 100% of nothing is still nothing. Often infecting this expected value calculation is both a failure to grasp the difference between optimism and probability, and a tendency to see winning as a zero-sum game.

Eventually all stars fade. In sports, we often see some former superstars sign on to another team as role players in a last ditch attempt to win a ring before their careers are over.  Many others retire, often unwillingly, because they can't convince their own team, or any new team, to rely on them to be the superstar. I can imagine the partners in the above firm bemoaning "the youth of today who don't want to work hard" or losing work to competitors when their one-to-one relationship with a key client fails to survive the arrival of a new general counsel. I can also imagine these partners getting pretty nervous as they approach retirement, particularly since their unfunded pension requires the firm to not only survive, but to carve out a significant portion of future earnings to fund the partners' retirement incomes. Who in their right minds, let alone any on their current staff, will willingly divert a portion of their income to support these stars who are doing little now to grow future rainmakers? A more likely outcome is that those junior lawyers with potential will move on, taking their income potential to greener pastures. Today's leading partners who won't cede the stage are tomorrow's disgruntled retirees, reliving their glory days.

This isn't a generational issue.  This is a leadership issue.  If your firm has erected barriers to entry for potential future stars to get playing time or to score a few baskets, take a hard look in the mirror. Will you allow them to blossom on your roster, or would you prefer to compete with them in the future when they're at the top of their game and you're at the end of yours?

Timothy B. Corcoran is the 2014 President of the Legal Marketing Association and an elected Fellow of the College of Law Practice Management. He delivers keynote presentations, conducts workshops, and advises leaders of law firms, in-house legal departments and legal service providers on how to profit in a time of great change.  To inquire about his services, contact him at +1.609.557.7311 or at tim@corcoranconsultinggroup.com.

Predictive Analytics - Gaining a Competitive Edge

Law firm leaders who embrace predictive analytics to manage their businesses and their practices can establish a sustainable competitive advantage over competitors who rely on gut instinct and sheer intellect to leader their enterprises.  There are multiple opportunities to employ predictive analytics in a law firm:  to run the business more efficiently and effectively; to pursue more lucrative clients and engagements; to recruit and train lawyers for success and longevity; and to practice law in such a way as to be a step ahead at all times.

Join me in New York or Boston as I discuss the role of Predictive Analytics in a law firm: Register 

Michael Lewis, in his book Moneyball, later made into a movie, uses baseball as a metaphor for the power of predictive analytics.  Many people assume the book is about baseball.  In fact, baseball is just the setting.  The point of the book is to demonstrate how insightful leaders, using data that may be readily available but ignored by most, can gain a competitive edge. But one doesn't have to know anything about or even like baseball to gain valuable lessons.  During my tenure as a corporate executive, I would purchase this book for all of my senior managers in order to foster a culture of predictive analytics in our business.

In a recent talk delivered at the LSSO Raindance Conference, Boston Celtics president Rich Gotham discussed the role of predictive analytics in managing a major sports franchise.  He acknowledged the heavy use of analytics on the court – the Celtics coaches regularly analyzed opponents’ tendencies and then devised game plans to exploit weaknesses. But Gotham went on to describe the critical importance predictive analytics play off the court as well.  As he explained, team management has to know who to target in order to sell the most tickets.  They need to know which combination of price and amenities will appeal to different target markets.

For example, by rigorously studying patterns in renewals and cancellations of luxury boxes, Celtics management discovered a critical miss in their sales strategy.  The target demographic for luxury box suites is high net worth individuals and corporate executives, but these buyers are also the most likely to have other commitments, including regular out-of-town travel, which limit their availability to attend multiple home games.  The Celtics addressed this problem in part by creating a secondary ticket market for luxury suite owners. If a luxury suite ticket holder can't make a game, the team will help resell that ticket. This approach removed the box holders’ concerns about a wasted investment and significantly improved the luxury box renewal rate.

How does this apply to law firm leadership?  Very simply, there are data available today that leaders ignore, instead relying on instinct and intellect to manage their enterprises.

In Moneyball, the crusty old baseball scouts who eschewed data but could recognize a “baseball body” were, statistically speaking, wrong far more than they were right.  This is not unlike recruiting in the modern law firm, where top grades from top law schools are used as a proxy for quality, when other factors are likely to play a stronger role in the recruit’s chance of success and longevity in the firm.

In countless practice group retreats when we list our client targets for the coming year, inevitably we identify multi-national companies with big legal budgets, or existing clients who have represented large billings in the past.  In fact, deeper analysis may reveal that our most lucrative clients are, for example, companies with less than $0.5 billion in revenues, doing business in a narrow range of SIC codes, with a certain geographic footprint and a management profile that suits our lawyers’ personalities.  Yet we ignore those prospects in lieu of the fruitless pursuit, along with hundreds of competitors, of the same old FTSE 100 or Fortune 500 companies.

And yes, these concepts apply even to the practice of law.  The increase of project management and process improvement has illuminated for lawyers that while every matter may be unique, each is likely comprised of tasks that we’ve tackled countless times previously.  As we learn how to break matters into component tasks, we recognize that reassembling these tasks into new combinations for purposes of budget forecasting gives us a competitive edge – not only can we confidently price a matter based on past performance, but our deeper understanding of how these tasks have interoperated in the past helps us minimize surprise as the matter progresses.  Start layering in knowledge about specific adversaries and even judges and jurisdictions, and our reasoned analysis of what’s likely to happen based on what’s happened previously will look like voodoo to an outsider.

I will discuss the role of predictive analytics in two upcoming sessions. The first is in New York on Wednesday, November 6, and the second is in Boston on Thursday, November 7.  I will lead an interactive discussion for law firm leaders, practice group leaders, law firm c-level executives and those leading business development and strategy. This will be followed by a reception hosted by Thomson Reuters, the event sponsor.  For more details and to register, click here.

Timothy B. Corcoran delivers keynote presentations and conducts workshops to help lawyers, in-house counsel and legal service providers profit in a time of great change.  To inquire about his services, contact him at +1.609.557.7311 or at tim@corcoranconsultinggroup.com.

The Death of Information Asymmetry

One concept I discuss in my workshops is "information asymmetry."  It refers to the information gap facing one or both parties in a transaction. Think about online dating profiles and how the information presented is rarely sufficient to make an informed decision -- the "tall, 30-something, athletic type" might turn out to be a frumpy, late middle-aged couch potato!  Or how real estate ads tend to mask deficiencies -- a "fixer-upper!" Or what used car salesmen say, or don't say, to entice you to buy some perpetually disabled lemon.  The internet fundamentally changed how consumers purchase new cars, since we now have ready access to manufacturer pricing information and can comparison shop for similar models and accessory packages across multiple sources. It has also impacted airfares, with transparency creating greater competition for airlines when potential travelers can make informed choices.  Why are we surprised, then, to learn that tools and practices have emerged to aid buyers in the purchase of legal services? Corporate counsel and procurement managers have access to a broad range of tools and best practices to inform their outside counsel selection process.  Law firms accustomed to promoting brand and pedigree as a proxy for quality now face informed buyers who can precisely define what quality means to them and then measure individual law firm providers against that standard.  And not surprisingly, many lawyers have discovered that their rates, their approach to client and matter management, and yes, even the quality of their legal work product, are wanting. Ouch. To be clear, I am not stating that lawyers are discovering that they're poor lawyers - but they may be learning that their clients define quality in different ways, and lawyers must first know and secondly measure their own performance against these quality metrics.

This is still an emerging field.  While some tools have existed for years, many buyers -- in-house counsel and procurement alike -- are still finding their way.  It's as common to find a selection process geared to lower law firm rates as it is to find one engineered to identify the optimal firm for a given engagement based on non-financial matters. It's as common to find a law firm embracing a flexible approach to alternative fees and project management as it is to find one merely offering discounts as the solution to all client concerns.  So it's a learning process for all parties.

So, how can I learn more, you say?  I'm glad you asked!

Attend a webinar

I will be presenting a webinar on this topic shortly, along with veteran sourcing consultant Susan O'Brien, produced by my business partner Integrated Management Services.  We will discuss how law departments and law firms often face similar challenges, namely to demonstrate value to their stakeholders and clients.  Comparing billing rates is a starting point but may not paint the whole picture.  Successful relationships begin with both parties understanding how value is defined and then tracking and measuring the key performance indicators.  And even then the in-house counsel and outside counsel may have different interpretations of the same results, so regular communication is critical.  We'll discuss the challenges in identifying and tracking the right metrics, and we'll share real life experiences from contrasting viewpoints - law firms, law departments, and business units.

The Flip Side of Dashboard Reports: How Clients Perceive What You Measure will be held on Tuesday, 10 September, at 1 PM ET.  To register for the webinar, click here.  Note that there is a fee to attend but if you include promo code ims2013, the fee is waived.

Attend a workshop

I will also be presenting a keynote talk at the upcoming TyMetrix LegalView Forum at the Terranea Resort outside Los Angeles. In the talk I'll connect the dots between the seemingly opposing goals of client satisfaction, law firm profits and work product quality, and we'll demonstrate how alternative fees, project management and process improvement are good for law firms.  There will also be sessions on negotiation skills and the role of data in the decision process.  Then we will embark upon a collaborative exercise to demonstrate how in-house counsel, corporate procurement managers, and partners, marketers, finance and pricing managers from outside law firms can achieve mutually satisfactory outcomes in a negotiation.  This session builds upon the earlier LegalView forums held in New York, Washington, DC, and Chicago. Each of these prior sessions resulted in a white paper, which I strongly encourage you to read (click here, and select each of the prior forums to download the white papers).

Negotiation Strategies for Corporations and Law Firms will be held at Terranea Resort on Monday and Tuesday, 23-24 September. To register for the workshop, click here.

We're all in this together.  Through improved communication and collaboration we'll find that the interests of in-house counsel and outside counsel are more in alignment than might otherwise appear obvious.  Law departments embracing an outside counsel selection and management process informed by data have everything to gain by inviting their trusted law firm partners into the tent.  Law firms that are ahead of the curve gain a strategic advantage by helping their clients make better hiring decisions.  Let's get going.

Timothy B. Corcoran delivers keynote presentations and conducts workshops to help lawyers, in-house counsel and legal service providers profit in a time of great change.  To inquire about his services, contact him at +1.609.557.7311 or at tim@corcoranconsultinggroup.com.

Related consulting experience:

• Advised multiple law departments on the creation and improvement of preferred panel programs 
• Conducted collaborative workshops between in-house counsel and outside counsel on alternative fees and project management
• Conducted collaborative workshops between in-house counsel and business clients, including "factory tours" and understanding the business
• Advised legal software company on market appetite for features/functions and market entry tactics for information solution  
• Multiple speaking engagements related to improving client satisfaction by embracing the "new normal" (see Speaking page for examples)

Measuring ROI in a law firm - even if it's possible, does anyone care?

Many organizations do a poor job of measuring the return generated by their various investments.  As a result, many initiatives fail to deliver impressive results even while the organizations as a whole are performing well.  Imagine a professional sports team that measures only wins and losses and ignores individual statistics such as points scored, penalties assessed or defensive lapses.  How do the coaches know who needs help?  How does the general manager know who to reward handsomely with a new contract?  How do the players know what skills to hone in the off-season?  Obviously a quality sports team will focus on a myriad of individual elements that, combined correctly, produce wins, and, combined poorly, tend to produce losses.  Measuring the return on investment (ROI) of our various expenditures should be viewed in the same light.  After all, if we don't measure how well or how poorly our many initiatives are doing, how can we improve our performance?  As the late legendary Coach John Wooden used to say, "Failure is not fatal, but failure to change may be." I conduct workshops on this topic regularly to different audiences, including law firm technologists, marketers, directors of finance, partners and in-house counsel.  While the ROI discussion may vary depending on the stakeholder, there are a few common themes.

Measuring ROI may not require heavy math, but it very likely involves stepping out of your comfort zone.  The classic example comes from the advertising world where the creative types at agencies devise compelling advertising that catches the eye but may not provoke buying behavior.  As one CEO scoffed when presented with a visually rich and quite expensive campaign idea, "I don't care about creating art, I care about moving units."  In a law firm, a technologist may feel upgrading to the latest voice-over-IP phone system is long overdue, but given the considerable expense and time needed for a firm-wide upgrade, it may require a financial analysis plotting the cost of maintaining an older phone system against the cost and benefits of the upgrade.  A law firm marketer asked to produce a client alert for a news item that every competitor discussed weeks ago may have to (gently!) push back by demonstrating that the optimal window to maximize "click though rates" has long since passed.  ROI discussions often involve the mastery of different dialects to make the case to others.

ROI is a relative measure, not an absolute measure.  In a basketball game if Joe pulls down 5 rebounds per game and Andre pulls down 6, who gets the coach's praise?  What if we learn that Joe is 6 feet tall and Andre is 7 feet tall?  If all other factors are neutral, we should expect Andre to significantly out-rebound his shorter peers.  In this light his performance is not very impressive.  If a law firm hosts a seminar that draws 15 people, is that good?  If we invest $2 million in three lateral partners and they deliver $2.5 million in new billings in year one, is that acceptable?  There is often not a specific hurdle past which everyone can objectively state that "We achieved a successful ROI."  It's only by comparing the ROI of an initiative to alternatives that we can ascertain whether the ROI is acceptable or not.  If the 15 attendees of our seminar represent top-level decision makers at target prospects, this might be a much better investment than a larger event with 90 client attendees representing staff lawyers with no input on outside counsel selection.  What if we delayed implementation of a key client program by two years in order to invest in our lateral recruitment, but even a conservative estimate of our cross-selling forecast suggests that we could have generated $5 million in new billings from existing clients?  Were the lateral recruits such a good investment after all?  Good organizations compare the relative ROI of various initiatives and the best ideas must earn the capital investment.

ROI can only be measured over time.  Law firms generally operate on a cash accounting basis, which involves counting revenues and expenses one year at a time and distributing excess (a.k.a. profits) to partners annually.  This forces a one-year-at-a-time mindset, whereas most businesses operate on an accrual basis, which makes it much easier to consider investments over a longer period.  Imagine the junior partner, looking to improve his networking at the country club, who takes a golf lesson.  At the end of the lesson if he hasn't dropped his handicap from 30 to 5, he typically doesn't quit in disgust because he recognizes that improvement takes time.  Yet this same partner may sit on a cost-cutting committee that votes to "eliminate the trust & estates practice group because last year it wasn't as profitable as other practices."  But simple analysis may indicate that 35% of our highest-revenue litigation cases come from companies whose CEOs are T&E clients.  And of these CEOs, 60% were T&E clients first, indicating that the T&E practice is an effective feeder for the litigation group.  Removing this feeder skyrockets the "cost of sales" for the litigation group, instantly eliminating any savings from disbanding the T&E group.  Your mileage may vary, of course, but only by studying trends over time can we make these connections.  By viewing ROI as a snapshot in time, we tend to make flawed decisions.

There's so much more to say on this topic and it's particularly needed now, as law firm leaders are scrutinizing expenses across the board and struggling to find the right formula to generate profits.  One universal challenge is that measuring ROI forces us to address sacred cows, those pet expenditures that we just know are good ideas but that no one can prove.  Telling a partner that he cannot continue to invest in a luxury sports box is a lot more challenging for the executive committee than laying off secretaries, after all. But the bottom line is that measuring ROI allows us to make informed choices about where and how to spend the firm's capital... even if some of the final decisions are dumb ones.

For legal technology readers, feel free to join me as I conduct a webinar with ILTA on August 7, 2013 at 12 PM ET on this topic.  For more information and to register, click here.  Others can click here to read a recap of a recent presentation I delivered to legal marketers in Chicago, thanks to Sania Merchant and the National Law Review.

Timothy B. Corcoran delivers keynote presentations and conducts workshops to help lawyers, in-house counsel and legal service providers profit in a time of great change.  To inquire about his services, click here or contact him at +1.609.557.7311 or at tim@corcoranconsultinggroup.com.

The Cost of Getting it Wrong vs. the Cost of Getting it Right

Famed UCLA basketball coach John Wooden is credited with saying, "If you don't have time to do it right, when will you have time to do it over?"  Quite a lot lately I've been hearing a related theme from lawyers struggling with adapting to the new normal:  "We can't afford to get it wrong, but we have no budget to bring in help to get it right."  They refer, of course, to the age-old tendency to suffer with the devil you know rather than take the costly path -- in financial, time or distraction terms -- of trying something new.  How do we know when it's time to devote energy and resources to adapting to the changing legal marketplace?  What indicators should we watch for to indicate the tipping point is upon us?  The stark reality is that when it's abundantly obvious to everyone else, it's far too late to gain a competitive edge.  It may also be too late to survive. I've written previously about the cost of doing nothing.  Simply put, any organization should establish an explicit trajectory for its financial performance.  We made $x last year, next year we will make $y and the year following we will make $z.  This isn't voodoo, it's a calculation based on key performance indicators, both internal and external, that results in a forecast, with ranges based on our confidence in the underlying data.  Most businesses operate with some combination of recurring revenue streams and transactional revenue streams.  In a law firm, repeatable revenue may take the form of retainer arrangements, with established financial commitments for a fixed period of time.  But long-term engagements such as a complex litigation matter that spans multiple years and provides recurring billable tasks can be forecasted with some confidence.  At the other end of the spectrum is revenue associated with new engagements or new clients.  We may know our historic success rate at cross-selling existing clients, and we may know our historic success rate at winning beauty contests for new work, but there are many unknowns so our confidence to forecast this revenue isn't nearly as high.  The point is, one way or another healthy organizations have a clear sense of their financial fortunes and the factors which will impact, positively or negatively, that trajectory.  Without it, how can you possibly know if you're on track or off track?  Like the family that piles into the SUV for a an old-fashioned driving vacation, if you leave without a map and without a destination in mind, how will you know if you're lost or behind schedule?

Based on my long experience providing strategic counsel to law firm practice groups, many readers are shifting uncomfortably as they realize they lack a map, though luckily they have a clear destination.  Allow me to drop a wet blanket by suggesting that meeting or exceeding last year's PPeP is not a destination.  It's an outcome. And it's an outcome we can influence through a variety of financial shenanigans that mask significant under-performance.  It's like stating that our vacation destination at day's end is a nice hotel in a nice location, and strategically manipulating our speed, direction and restroom breaks to ensure that at day's end we have arrived at a location meeting our vague objectives.

Time to be more direct.  The world has changed.  And no, law firm partners, despite the perverse incentives of hourly billing, despite the $1,000 an hour rates charged by some "rock stars" and despite the supposed culture of bill churning by some, you didn't cause this seismic shift.  The balance of power would have shifted eventually.   It's an economic reality that all goods and services are on an inevitable and inexorable march toward commoditization.  Buyers always, and I mean always, seek lower costs for the goods and services they need, and failing that they will seek substitutes.  It's an economic certainty that circumstances change.  It's also, sadly, a certainty that some players refuse to acknowledge that change is possible, let alone that change is upon us.  And this is what causes the reluctance to adapt.  The legal marketplace adds a few multipliers to this impact:  lawyers are generally risk-averse, so working harder at what we know is far easier to absorb than embarking upon a risky new approach to practicing law; and the constant reliance on precedent makes it more difficult to recognize alternative courses of action because we've never seen any.

Time for the upside.  Every industry on the planet, including other professional services segments, have found ways to survive, and often thrive, in the face of a changing climate.  There are lessons to be learned from others.  In short, law firms can rely on deep subject matter expertise to create competitive differentiation; lawyers can charge profitable fees based on the value of the outcomes rather than the cost of production (a.k.a. hours); lawyers can deliver services in the way they know best without clients meddling in the process (e.g., no more restrictions on young associates assisting in matters); lawyers can significantly improve client loyalty through service and work product quality, and not merely by offering discounts.  Don't know how?  Get in line.  It's not that challenging, but you're not expected to know how instinctively, or to read a blog post or two and grasp the nuances.  But you may have to spend some time, and spend a few dollars (or Euros, or Pounds Sterling, for my global clients) to get the help you need.

In a recent conversation, a partner lamented that his practice group's realization rate was 6 points below its all-time high, and 3 points below the firm's average. The net effect was a loss of between $8M and $12M in top line revenue in recent years, despite the same lawyer headcount and the same mix of rainmakers and service partners.  However, the practice group chair was unable to spend any money on a consultant to help address the problem because the management committee had forbidden any extraneous expenditures in order to preserve profits... even investments that would restore the realization rate!  Predictably, the several consultants who were invited to participate in the practice group retreat on a pro bono basis were forced to decline the kind invitation.  A variation on this theme is the request to provide an outline of topics the lawyers can discuss amongst themselves at a retreat, a request I receive several times per month.  My impertinent response to such requests is to ask how often the firm's lawyers agree to such an arrangement with clients:  "Yes, Mr. CEO, we are quite familiar with high-stakes securities fraud investigations and we're sorry to hear that you and your management team are under indictment.  However, we'll send over a couple of our client alerts with some insights that might prove helpful, and maybe we can spend an hour over lunch giving you some tips so you can handle most of the lawyering yourself.  After all, you're smart and this isn't all that complicated." 

Some of you may be chuckling at how preposterous this sounds.  I assure you, it happens all the time.  More challenging is that clients know that some law firms are actively resisting change, and they're shaking their heads in despair and disbelief.  Despite what you may have heard, nearly all in-house counsel and corporate executives I work with are quite happy for their outside counsel to be happy, thriving, profitable businesses.  In fact, many of them need just as much help adapting to the new normal and they're desperate for trusted advisers to provide guidance along the way.

If you don't have a clear sense of your firm's financial future and the factors influencing that future, how will you know if you're on track?  If you don't have a plan to adapt, how do you expect to compete with the many firms who are devoting significant time and energy to delight their clients... and yours?  If you don't have the answers but refuse to spend time, energy or money to find the answers, what are you saving for?  The rainy day is upon us.  Now, more than ever before, the cost of getting it wrong is far higher than the cost of getting it right.

Timothy B. Corcoran delivers keynote presentations and conducts workshops to help lawyers, in-house counsel and legal service providers profit in a time of great change.  To inquire about his services, click here or contact him at +1.609.557.7311 or at tim@corcoranconsultinggroup.com. – See more at: http://www.corcoranlawbizblog.com.