The widely experienced and catholically curious Lee Pacchia (formerly of Bloomberg Law, now at his own Mimesis Law) asked me to stop by his studio last week and talk about the role of culture in law firm combinations. I also touch on the issue of “deal momentum,” how to really try to get a handle on another firm’s culture, and the phenomenon of the rich getting richer.
Take a look:
As always, Bruce, a fascinating ‘unpacking’ of your earlier comments about culture.
I agree about the difficulty of assessing culture from the outside. In addition to the sources that you suggested, I think some suppliers to law firms will have real insight into different cultures. They will know, for example, how purchasing decisions are made (how much autonomy do support managers have? when does the partnership step in? and so on), which will shine a bright light on the way the firm is run. Getting at that insight could be tricky, especially before a proposed merger has been made public, but could be managed through proxies and appropriate confidentiality obligations.