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The Maroons & the Grays: An Update
Back in 2019 we published a three-part series introducing and fleshing out our model of the competitive market segmentation of law firms. We posited that the two primary segments of BigLaw are the “maroons,” go-to firms for bet-the-company matters garnering... read more +Moore’s Law vs. Flesh & Blood
Most of the ink on the topic of outsourcing by law firms has been understandably devoted to back-office functions such as HR and tech support desks. I view the trend to house these functions elsewhere than in, say, midtown Manhattan, as eminently sensible and...
Don’t Take My Lockstep Away
I have often written on the tension between lockstep compensation and eat-what-you-kill, and I'm coming to the view that a nuanced, subjective, and openly ad hoc approach is probably the best, all things considered. Each of the polar end-points on that spectrum...
“There’s No Crying in Baseball”
Cut me a break on this one, folks. Opening Day is scant weeks away, but all the baseball headlines are about lately are steroids, Congressional inquiries, allegations and denials, asterisk'ed records, and taking-the-Fifth's. But sometimes, from a situation that...
The Eternal Disequilibrium
Lockstep vs. eat-what-you-kill: Joined at the hip? Legal Week argues, using the apparently unending saga at Clifford-Chance as a journalistic "hook," that the boundary zone between the two models is wide and flexible, not narrow and bright. Now at one...
Twilight of the Boutiques?
Despite the stupefying fact that The Wall Street Journal reported late last year that 45% of Americans believe "literally" in the Biblical story of Creation, whereas only 31% subscribe to the theory of evolution (have you thanked a teacher today?), Darwinian...