Get to Know Clients and Prospects Personally

You will develop much stronger business relationships if you take the time to get to know your cotacts one on one. While buyers of legal services may seem to make logical buying decisions, it really comes down to trust.

Clarifying Your Work Assignments

David Maister offers some good questions to ask when receiving a work assignment.

Beyond Traditional Job Hunting

High level executives are wise to mine their connections in order to identify job opportunities. Experienced attorneys should follow the same advice when looking for work.

Clients Don't Like Their Lawyers

On a national level, 7 in 10 clients would not recommend their law firm. Here are some ways to avoid this fate. Obviously, this means that marketing to individuals and companies who already have counsel is not a waste of time.

Schmooze or Lose

When you attend CLE programs or go to conferences, do you sit in the back and edit memos? Do you call clients and colleagues during every break and act like it is a regular work day? If so, you are missing a valuable opportunity to expand your network.

Finders Have More Job Security

A legal recruiter reminds us that lawyers with business have more job security. While it is okay to be a grinder as a junior associate and a minder as a mid-level associate, start learning some marketing skills so you can become a finder.

Even a few hundred thousand dollars in portable billings will make you more attractive to your firm (and to other firms) when the economy heads south.

Outsourcing to India Continues

The due dilligence in a corporate acquisition is being outsourced to India where associates earn less than 20% of their large firm counterparts in the United States. When this trend picks up steam (and clearly it will at some point), associates at large U.S. firms will be doing a lot less due dilligence work in the early years of corporate practice. While I doubt law school graduates will miss this right of passage, it is hard to imagine that this won't put downward pressure on hiring.

Are Salary Increases Justified?

72% of associates say yes according to an unscientific poll.

Justified or not, aren't the salary increases just the free market at work? Or is it that law firms are too risk averse to hold the line? Noone wants to miss out on recruiting the best talent.

But associates consistently say that salary is not the most important factor in recruitment. So why have all of the top firms followed suit?

Mismanaged Law Firms

David Maister concludes that law firms are different than other professional services firms. Lack of trust between partners, skeptical reactions to new initiatives and professional detachment all combine to make managing a law firm very difficult.

The Importance of Developing a Niche

Here is a great article on the importance of developing a niche (with some quick suggestions on how to do it effectively.)

More on Women and the Lack of Advancement

Here is a nice summary of some of the recent articles on women and the challenges they face in trying to advance at top law firms. Here the author emphasizes the problem of billable hours as a measure of one's contribution to a firm.

New Books for Your Career Library

I recently reviewed two books for Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly.

Beware of Career Service Firms w/High Fees

An article today about a law suit in New Jersey reminds us that consultants offering career services may not always deliver the value they promise. Think long and hard before forking over thousands of dollars to a firm that promises to help you tap the "hidden job market". While there is a lot to be said for this approach (I have been advocating networking in a job search for a long time), caveat emptor when it comes to paying thousands of dollars of up front fees.