by Bruce | September 15, 2008 | Articles, Finance, Globalization, Strategy
Pete Peterson, former head of Lehman Brothers, co-founder of Blackstone, and secretary of commerce under Nixon, described this weekend’s events on Wall Street with what almost amounts to understatement: "My goodness. I’ve been in the business 35...
by Bruce | September 13, 2008 | Articles, Cultural Considerations, Finance, Leadership, Strategy
This is how the cover story of the current issue of Fortune starts out: It was the second week of October 2006. William King, then J.P. Morgan’s chief of securitized products, was vacationing in Rwanda, visiting remote coffee plantations he was helping to...
by Bruce | September 6, 2008 | Articles, Finance, Globalization, Leadership, M&A, Strategy
Best of times or worst of times to make some acquisitions? This is one area where the head/heart divergence may be more radical than usual—and where it could really cost you. Here’s how McKinsey poses the dilemma: "As the credit crunch threatens to...
by Bruce | September 1, 2008 | Articles, Cultural Considerations, Finance, Globalization, Innovative Managing Partners, Leadership, Strategy
Time to take stock. This dratted credit crunch has now celebrated, if that’s the word, its first birthday, and there is no clarity about when it may end. What’s a law firm to do? If you believe McKinsey, and if you believe that where investment...
by Bruce | August 22, 2008 | Articles, Compensation, Finance, Globalization, Leadership, M&A, Strategy
We have our first comprehensive report on how 2008 is shaping up financially, courtesy of The American Lawyer, and Dan DiPietro of Citi’s Private Bank, and it paints a picture of what are soon going to be, if they aren’t already, vastly diminished...
by Bruce | August 16, 2008 | Articles, Cultural Considerations, Finance, Leadership, Practice Group Management, Strategy
One of the most famous management books in recent history is The Balanced Scorecard, published in 1996 by two Harvard Business School professors, Robert Kaplan and David Norton. If you’ve never heard of it, you should at the very least become familiar with its...