by Bruce | January 13, 2008 | Articles, Finance, Leadership, M&A, Strategy
Regular readers, or simply those with good memories for the jovial Cornell University economist Alfred Kahn, who briefly served as Jimmy Carter’s czar over wage-price controls, as well as the last head of the unlamented Civil Aeronautics Board (where he...
by Bruce | January 9, 2008 | Articles, Compensation, Cultural Considerations, Finance, Leadership, Strategy
Text #1: "He was recruited as a very senior director in a very large City law firm. His work went well but the thing that really bugged him was the pass he had to show every time he went into the staff restaurant. The words ‘non-lawyer’ were printed...
by Bruce | December 31, 2007 | Articles, Cultural Considerations, Innovative Managing Partners, Leadership, Strategy
"You’re too smart for your own good." How quickly we dismiss that snide accusation as revealing the ignorance and probably the intransigent know-nothingness of the accuser. But could there be a grain of truth in there? If you believe in the...
by Bruce | December 27, 2007 | Articles, Compensation, Finance, Leadership, Partnership Structures, Practice Group Management, Strategy
As many of you know, back in November I was in London for a week. Among other activities—many other activities—I was pleased to be invited to participate in a panel discussion hosted by Guy Beringer of Allen & Overy, who was on the panel,...
by Bruce | December 26, 2007 | Articles, Compensation, Cultural Considerations, Finance, Leadership, Partnership Structures, Strategy
Our text for today, Dear Reader, coming from The American Lawyer, is as follows: "There’s nothing like a fund-raiser at a private school in Manhattan to define your social station. Time was, lawyers were near the top of the heap. Investment bankers...
by Bruce | December 20, 2007 | Articles, Cultural Considerations, Globalization, Leadership, M&A, Strategy
Why do law firms merge? The fact is, I wonder sometimes myself. More seriously, there is typically an array of stated and unstated reasons, among them: Growth for the sake of growth: Inadvisable. Size alone doesn’t guarantee anything particularly...