by Bruce | March 19, 2005 | Articles, Compensation, Cultural Considerations, Finance, Globalization, Partnership Structures, Strategy
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...
by Bruce | March 17, 2005 | Articles, Compensation, Cultural Considerations, Finance, Leadership, Partnership Structures, Strategy
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...
by Bruce | March 16, 2005 | Articles, Finance, Globalization, Leadership, M&A, Partnership Structures, Strategy
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...
by Bruce | March 6, 2005 | Articles, Cultural Considerations, Finance, Globalization, Leadership, Partnership Structures, Practice Group Management, Strategy
To risk stating the obvious, a major downside of acquiring powerful lateral partners or small groups thereof is that they will not stay. Now The American Lawyer has a piece covering the story of same over the past five years or so, complete with a helpful and...
by Bruce | March 1, 2005 | Articles, Compensation, Cultural Considerations, Finance, Globalization, Knowledge Management, Leadership, M&A, Partnership Structures, Practice Group Management, Strategy, Technology strategy
Hildebrandt and The Law Firm Group of the Citigroup Private Bank, with help from Baker-Robbins, are out with their 2004 year-in-review together with some prognostications for 2005. The New York Times, in its wisdom, headlined the story, "Partnerships More...
by Bruce | February 8, 2005 | Articles, Cultural Considerations, Leadership, Partnership Structures, Strategy
Succession planning is part of the Management 101 toolkit that law firms ignore at their peril. Too many firm leaders are reluctant to attend to it, either intentionally ("it will all work out") or simply through preferring not to take up a potentially...
