by Bruce | June 22, 2015 | Articles, Business Models, Leadership, Strategy
Jimmy Lee, 62, died last week of a heart attack after working out, at his home in Darien. If that name doesn’t ring a bell, he was a vice chairman of JPMorgan Chase, where he had spent his entire 40-year career. He started right out of Williams College at...
by Bruce | June 16, 2015 | Articles, Client Relationships, Cultural Considerations, Marketing, Practice Group Management
We’ve written before about law firms’ nearly universal use of the terms “collegial” and “collaborative” to define what makes their cultures, each and every one, special. So indiscriminate is this usage that we find it not just...
by Bruce | June 14, 2015 | About the Site, Adam Smith Himself, Articles
Today is Adam Smith’s birthday: 1723, so he would be 292 today. Well, at least we think so. His birth was registered at the church in Kirkcaldy, Scotland (just across the Firth of Forth north of Edinburgh, not 10 miles as the crow flies) on 5 June 1723, so...
by Bruce | June 10, 2015 | Articles, Finance, Leadership, M&A, Strategy
The industry standard in tracking law firm mergers, Altman Weil’s Mergerline, has had this to say about activity in the wake of the Global Financial Reset (emphasis mine): 2011: “There were 60 law firm mergers and acquisitions announced in the United...
by Bruce | May 27, 2015 | Articles, Finance, Globalization, Strategy
With the annual publication of the AmLaw 100 and Second Hundred, it’s rankings season for BigLaw. Think of it as our little industry’s equivalent of earnings season for public companies—we having become a “quasi public” industry, as one of my...
by Bruce | May 26, 2015 | About the Site, Articles
Nothing can possibly accompany a silent captioned picture of Arlington, so I publish this separately and for your reflection at your leisure and as with all things only if you wish. But for those of an historic bent, the tradition of annually setting aside a day to...
by Bruce | May 25, 2015 | About the Site, Articles
by Bruce | May 19, 2015 | Articles, Client Relationships, Marketing
When we last left our intrepid band at St. Michael’s Episcopal Church interviewing law firms for advice on the church’s vacant, crying-out-for-development, corner lot (here’s the original column), we had just finished meeting with firms. Since then...
by Bruce | May 4, 2015 | Articles, Leadership, Strategy
A slightly briefer version of this column appeared in Bloomberg Law’s Business of Law. I republish it here with their kind permission, and with a small amount of additional elaboration. Fact: For the first time, Latham & Watkins took the top spot for...
by Bruce | April 30, 2015 | Articles, Client Relationships
I’ve attended my fair share of live theater and more than my fair share of opera (the Met is within walking distance of where I live and work, a miracle for which I’m woefully unappreciative), and I hope you have as well. But how different would your...
