by Bruce | March 11, 2006 | Articles, Cultural Considerations, Leadership, Practice Group Management, Strategy, Technology strategy
In 2004 James Surowiecki, a business columnist with The New Yorker, published the well-received The Wisdom of Crowds, which explored (and celebrated) the phenomenon of "collective intelligence," whereby the consensus forecast of a number of lay people was...
by Bruce | March 9, 2006 | Articles, Finance, Leadership, Marketing, Practice Group Management
A reader (partner in an AmLaw 10 firm) writes: "Most businesses know their leading indicators of sales. For example, if the company increases the number of sales calls in January, there will be more sales in April. "Has anyone analyzed empirically what the...
by Bruce | March 7, 2006 | Articles, Leadership, Marketing, Practice Group Management, Strategy
I’ve long believed that marketing is harder than it looks, and for those of you reading this who are marketing professionals, suffice to say you have my deepest sympathy, respect, and affection. (Readers who know me personally also know that...
by Bruce | February 27, 2006 | Articles, Cultural Considerations, Knowledge Management, Leadership, Practice Group Management, Strategy, Technology strategy
My professional friend Rob Cross is a professor of management at the University of Virginia and, I think it’s safe to say, the leader in applying "social network analysis" (SNA) to business and professional organizations. SNA is nothing...
by Bruce | January 30, 2006 | Articles, Finance, Globalization, Leadership, Practice Group Management, Strategy
If that call came in to your firm tomorrow morning, where would it go? If the answer is, "anyone’s guess," and if you consider your firm "a player," you have some work to do. Consider that at last week’s Davos meeting of the "World...
by Bruce | January 27, 2006 | Articles, Compensation, Cultural Considerations, Finance, Leadership, Partnership Structures, Practice Group Management, Strategy
David Maister confesses: "I have spent twenty years trying to say all professions look similar and can learn from each other, but I’m finally prepared to concede that lawyers are different – and it has nothing to do with economics." In a piece...
