Category: Legal Recruiting

Legal News Reach Episode 4: The Perfect Storm: Law Firm Marketing & Business Development Budgeting with Beth Cuzzone, Global Practice Leader of Intapp

Welcome to Season 2, Episode 4 of Legal News Reach! National Law Review Managing Director Jennifer Schaller is joined by Beth Cuzzone, Global Practice Leader of Intapp. Together, they discuss the best budgeting strategies for legal marketing departments as firms emerge from the pandemic with a new set of priorities and perspectives.

We’ve included a transcript of the conversation below, transcribed by artificial intelligence. The transcript has been lightly edited for clarity and readability.

Jennifer Schaller

This is Jennifer Schaller, and I’m the Managing Director of the National Law Review. We’ll be speaking with Beth Cuzzone, who’s the Global Practice Leader of Intapp. Beth, can you tell us a little bit about your background and what you do at Intapp?

Beth Cuzzone

Thank you for asking, Jennifer. I think it’s an important table-setting question. So I recently joined Intapp in 2022. It’s a global technology firm, and it partners with investors and advisors to help them run their businesses. And it basically follows those companies through the lifecycle of their companies, whether it’s intake or relationship management, or deal management, or billing or marketing or risk, and so many other operational functions. But my role Intapp sits in the marketing and business development corner of those companies. So as a Global Practice Leader, I’m responsible for working with a team of subject matter experts who help clients align their strategic priorities with our solutions. It’s been an interesting and challenging shift, because I spent more than 30 years of my career in the very types of companies that Intapp now helps. So it’s been an interesting and exciting and challenging change all at once. And I think it also gives me a unique lens into what we’re going to be diving into today.

Jennifer Schaller

Okay, wow, it sounds like a spot-on match here we have today. So let’s dig into it. We’re talking about law firm budgets. So for this upcoming budget cycle, for firms who are either almost done with it, or in the process, or close to wrapping it up. What’s different this year than in previous years in law firm marketing and business development departments?

Beth Cuzzone

In one word, everything. If we take a step back and look at the easy formula that law firms have used traditionally when creating their budgets, there hasn’t been a lot of secret sauce. In its simplest form, and I am oversimplifying it for illustrative purposes, but in its simplest form, law firms for years and years and years, and year over year, would take into consideration their former budget number and give it an increase that aligned with the firm’s increase in their revenue for that year. And then the real work would begin on saying, Okay, we’re going to give ourselves a 2 or 3% increase, because we increased our revenue by 8%. So we’re going to take some slice of that, and we’re going to increase what we did last year, and then they would reallocate that number. And so if it was my budget was $1,000 last year, and you know, now I’m going to increase it by 3%, it’s going to be $1,300. And now let me just play around with the line items and see where we want to spend a little more, where we want to spend a little less. Given the years that we’ve had coming up to the 2023 budget season, we had 2020, when the pandemic hit, we had 2021, where we were still experiencing the effects of that. And then in 2022 as people tried to move back into some normalcy of spend market, you know, marketing, outreach, awareness, credibility, relationships, going back into the office, that sort of thing, the budgets are a little bit all over the place. So to answer your question, why is this coming year’s budget different? It’s because you don’t have last year’s budget that you get to just reset.

The interesting thing is that I think it actually is going to provide opportunities to relook at the way you think of your budget and think a little bit about very specific line items. You know, I do think one of the places that people are going to spend a lot of time thinking about is digital marketing. And, you know, a question I had for you is, have you seen an uptick in the digital marketing spend from law firms, where we were pre-pandemic, to pandemic to where people are moving towards?

Jennifer Schaller

That’s kind of a multi-layered question. I mean, over the last five years, there’s obviously been a switch to more digital. There’s a couple of different things going on in the larger digital advertising industry. Advertising rates right now as a whole are pretty suppressed digitally. So that’s impacting us a little bit, just because the baseline is down. But if you’re in a specific niche, like the National Law Review, where you know, we very much have the traffic and the audience, there’s always going to be a demand for it. What’s going to be super interesting to see is when cookies go away. People keep talking about that, because that’s going to make the content on the website far more relevant, as opposed to having retargeting ads and things like that. But the date keeps changing on that. So, you know, we’ll let you know when we know. And related to publishing end of it, there’s been a bit of a sea change on that. There always was sort of a pushback or a stigma somewhat attached to pay-for-play publishing. But a little bit of a difference with that is, over time, most marketing professionals, especially in legal, understand that there’s costs involved in running a quality publication, if you want to have analytics, if you want to have a responsive staff who’s around to make edits, that you have to pay for that, and that, you know, if you don’t have money coming in from subscriptions, if you’re a no login website, that there’s going to be cost. So there’s been a bit of a change there. There’s more receptiveness to it. And I think maybe because law firms themselves understand what it takes to publish, they’re a little more forgiving, and understanding that we have costs too, if that makes any sense.

Beth Cuzzone

It makes complete sense. It makes complete sense. And again, there’s no direct answer to some of these complicated questions that we’re asking each other today about where people are spending and where it’s going versus where it’s been when we’ve had this pause on so many levels. And like you said, I also just think that the lens of the marketing and business development departments and law firms are really starting to appreciate that looking at digital assets as a way to create awareness and credibility is going to be a leader in their budget.

Jennifer Schaller

Well, yes, especially since events have changed and gone away. And a lot of sponsorships have changed. And given that pandemic ripple effect of live events versus sponsoring tables at events, which used to be a part of legal marketing department spends, what’s becoming more the standard for law firm, legal marketing department and business development spend, is it changed? Is it reallocating? How is that working?

Beth Cuzzone

That’s a great question. So typically–I heard somebody say once, law firms are like snowflakes, everyone is different. And I know that when I look at industry statistics that talks about the swing of spend, that has to do with you know, the percentage of revenue of law firms, that it goes anywhere from 2 or 3% to 18, 19, 20%. And the reason that they have that swing is because in some marketing and business development department budgets, they include personnel when others don’t, okay, or in some marketing and business development, department budgets, it’s all marketing, whether it’s for the HR department, or legal recruiting, or the firm, and others. Those are each very separate departments and separate budgets. So there is this huge spread across the industry. But I think for most firms, we’re going to find that there’s that 3.5 or 4% to 8% budget target of revenue. And that’s kind of where people settle in. There are outliers on both sides. And interestingly, there’s often some surprises. I find that sometimes some of the smaller, mid-sized firms have larger percentage budgets. But I think that’s because they can’t enjoy the scales of economy that larger firms can. If you’re looking at your budget, and we can talk about this in a little bit, you know, in 2020 when the pandemic started, all discretionary budget items were removed from law firms, whether it was in marketing and business development or not. So it was like, “Unless we’re contractually obligated to pay something, we’re taking it off the table.” And so now firms are getting that opportunity to rebuild it. And again, that approach and that budgeting exercise is a real opportunity for these firms to say, “What haven’t we been asking ourselves?” Or, “What haven’t we done that we’ve wanted to? What’s not in our budget? What should be or what are the opportunities out there in terms of places or people or technology or intersections that we’ve never tried before?” So I think there’s some of those questions that are happening, too.

Jennifer Schaller

Yeah, I think if anything, this is just helpful to know, to have legal marketers or even law firm administrators, or management know how to ask questions about legal marketing budgets, that there is such a wide range, but the wide range prompts people to ask the question, “What’s in that figure and what’s not?”  I’ve never really had it broken down that well before. So thank you for taking the time to spell that out. Because it’s not spelled out a lot of different places. Many people will appreciate that.

When you’re talking about law firm marketing budgets, what’s the difference between acquisition marketing and retention marketing and preparing budgets? Should law firms dedicate more resources to one or the other? Or is it some sort of blend?

Beth Cuzzone

That is a very forward-thinking question that you’re laying out there. Because I think that law firms basically had two types of buckets, if you will: they thought of it as awareness and credibility building, or relationship building, it was one of the two. And so they had some things around awareness and credibility, we talked a little bit about it earlier, you know, it’s that one to many, the website, you know, the content, the newsletters, the big events, that sort of thing. And then the relationships are kind of those one-on-ones. It’s the spending time going out and sitting down with a prospective client to learn something, or having an entertainment budget or doing some small roundtables with thought leadership, or sitting down with different decision makers at a particular client site so that you’re staying close to them. And it was a little bit all over the place. And the shift that I’m starting to see happen is that law firms are starting to break down their budgets into exactly what you said: acquisition marketing, which is, “How are we getting new clients?” versus retention marketing, which is, “how are we keeping and growing the clients that we have, or the brands that we have, or the relationships that we have?” And by doing that, they’re also starting to do account-based marketing. And they’re able to put their budgets together and say, “We’re going to spend 70, or 60, or 80% of our budget on our existing relationships, because we know that it costs six to eight time more money, resources, people budgets to get a new client than it does to keep and grow an existing one. So when you look at the scale of acquisition versus retention, retention is going to get that bigger budget. And then the acquisition is going to have a smaller wallet share of the overall budget. But within that big budget, you’re going to start that retention budget, you’re going to start to see that being broken down a little bit by account-based marketing as therefore account based budgeting. Again, this is a little bit around the corner. And this is I think what firms are going to be dealing with over the next five years of exactly being able to measure their return on objectives or their return on investments and where their money is really being spent. Because they’re going to be tying it down to very specific objectives and very specific strategies, if you will.

Jennifer Schaller

Okay, so what would be some of the areas that there would be an overlap, like between acquisition and retention marketing, would that fall in the digital area? Or where would that be?

Beth Cuzzone

That’s a perfect example, please look at what we’re talking about like a Venn diagram, right, you’ve got your acquisition, you’ve got your retention and then there’s the place where they overlay. Digital assets are a perfect example that fall into both. It’s helping you in the marketplace. And it’s helping you find your next big relationships and clients and referral sources. And those are the same assets that you can use to add value and stay close to some of your existing relationships, places where they start to separate a little bit, again, is really by account or by client, client-based marketing versus account-based marketing. And so you might have a firm where you say, we’re going to spend a lot of our travel and entertainment budget on going to each one of their offices and doing junior executive training. So that we’re aligning ourselves with the next generation of decision makers, and that’s how we want to spend our money and our time and our budget and our resources and our people on that particular client this year, sort of thing. So it all depends, again, on the strategy. And it also depends a little bit on the firm.

Jennifer Schaller

Yeah, would it vary by practice group, or just like, if you had a firm that was, you know, just intellectual property law based, would there be differences in the ratio or the mix or network?

Beth Cuzzone

That’s a great question. So there are some firms and also practice areas where there’s annuity streams, if you will, right. There’s just an ongoing, “We represent this particular finance institution on all of these sorts of loans. And, you know, we do 5, 10, 15 a year for them.” Think about if you were actually a litigator, and you were representing financial institutions where you didn’t know how many you were going to have in a year or whether you were not going to have any for two years and how they think of you and they call us when it’s about the company or they don’t call us when it’s about the company so you have to again, look at the firm, its strategy, the cadence of those open matters, the cadence of when they’re being asked to help clients and then try to align your budget and the activities in your budget around those very objectives. Does that make sense?

Jennifer Schaller

Yeah, it does. A lot of what you’re breaking down is really helpful because people throw numbers out there, but they don’t go into the details of what moves the numbers up or down, like your example of depending on if the law firm is including the expenses for HR, or including the salaries of the marketing department in there, that should make a big difference. And nobody really spells that out. So that was very helpful.

Beth Cuzzone

What kinds of trends are you seeing…there’s this nuance that’s happening now Jennifer, where there was a period of time “back in the day” where all law firms took out one-page ads in some of the biggest business-to-business publications and journals, or like yours, very, very niche, industry-specific news-related channels. And it was “we want to be top of mind” with whoever the reader is, whether it’s our peers, whether it’s our competition, whether it’s a referral source, whether it’s a potential client, whether it’s somebody on the other side of the table, and over time, that awareness campaign started to move into that content campaign. And I’d really be interested to see how are law firms maintaining that mindshare in the marketplace? What are you seeing?

Jennifer Schaller

Some big change from print, and what’s really changed–COVID was sort of terrible for the world, but in a lot of ways good for law firms and legal publishing. Because there were so many rapid developments of a legal or administrative or regulatory nature going on, there was just a lot of content to be written on and a lot of people looking for that content. So there was inherently a lot of traffic just being driven by COVID and all the related changes to it. Now that that’s leveled out a little bit, what we’re seeing from law firms is when they do their informative writing, meeting, talking about cases that happened and why that’s important to a particular industry, or new regulations that are on the horizon, what’s a little bit different is they’re starting to impose–not impose, but impart–their personality a little bit more. We’re seeing more content come in where it talks about people’s journey in the legal profession, how they balance working from home or transitioning out of working from home in a little bit more with the content. So before there was very little of that. I mean, there was some. It’s pretty prevalent now where we’ll see many law firms just have entire blogs and podcasts and a whole kind of vertical dedicated to life balance, people’s career paths, and things like that, which is a bit different than what we’ve seen before. I think it provides a good opportunity for law firms to tease out their competitive differences just by letting people know who they are, because ultimately, with law firms, they’re buying the person and their knowledge and their background. And this is kind of a more forward way of doing it than what’s been done in the past.

Beth Cuzzone

You know, it’s so interesting to hear you say that. I don’t think I really put such a fine point on it until you just mentioned it. All law firms do the same thing. For the most part, a general practice firm does the same thing as the next general practice, you know, an IP boutique does the same thing as the next IP. But how you do it, who you do it with and the culture is what your differentiator is. And you’re right, as I’m thinking a little bit about the sorts of information that I’m seeing, either the types of information or the personality in which people are writing, it really is giving firms a way to showcase their culture and who they are and their differentiator as opposed to all sounding like really smart law firms.

Jennifer Schaller

It’s that and I think it’s a little bit recruiting as well. I mean, the whole world has experienced quite a bit of turnover. Law firms have always had more turnover than other industries. So we’d have some stuff coming in where folks are interviewing their summer associates. And they’re doing that on a couple different levels. I think it plays to people who may be interested to know how a person got a summer associate position at an Am law firm, but also, you know, it’s a big hug to that person, and it shows in a recruiting sense that that law firm really cares about folks at all levels of the organization. We wouldn’t have seen that 10 years ago, so that’s just really different.

Okay, so let’s get into the fun part: budgeting tips! You’ve been doing budgets for years, you work with an organization that helps law firms kind of balance competing things for their attention and help tease out what’s probably the best bet for the firm. Do you have a few tips to share with our readers, or our readers and our listeners today, concerning law firm budgets, what to include what to not get pushed back on?

Beth Cuzzone

Yes, I think that there are a few best practices out there that law firm marketing and business development departments want to be thinking about as they’re either negotiating their budgets with firm management, or if they’re actually putting it together. We talked a little bit about the fact that historically firms have used the previous year and that budget number is a benchmark. Ironically, in 2022 law firm marketing and business development budgets increased by more than 100%. And again, it’s because in 2020, and 2021, they were decimated, it was the place where there was the most discretion in the budget, there were things like they weren’t going to be doing sponsorships, they weren’t going to be holding webinars, they weren’t going to be traveling to see clients or things–like take it all out. So then when we started to move towards this normalcy of, “let’s get back to business in 2022”, with a kinder, gentler, more softer approach, they had to increase their budgets by more than 100%. So the first thing I would say is, do not prepare your 2023 budget based on your 2022 budget, because you’re going to show that there’s already been 100% increase, and there will probably be very little wiggle room. I would also scrap 2020 and 2021. So I think one of my tips or best practices is, use 2019 as your benchmark, not 2021 or 22. For the reasons we’ve just talked about.

The other thing, you just mentioned this in the way you asked the question, is that there is a very complex ecosystem in law firms, and the marketing and business development budget is one of many competing priorities. And I think understanding that budgeting is a long-term game, not one you win every year. And so what I’m trying to say is, take a panoramic view of where the firm is, what they’re trying to accomplish, what some of their major goals are for the next year or two, look left and look right at what other operating department budgets are going to be impacted by that, and prepare your budget within the context of what’s happening. So don’t ask for the greatest budget increase among every operations department, every year. There becomes a fatigue, where it’s like, “Nope, just give them the 2%, we’re not going to listen to why they deserve more every year, year over year than every other department.” So I think walking in and being able to communicate, “We understand that lateral growth is one of our top strategic priorities, and that you’re going to be spending a lot of our budget on legal recruiting. So this year, I’ve put in some particular items and activities that will support legal recruiting, and I’ve moved my budget request from a 6% increase to a 2% increase.” And again, you can negotiate two or three years in advance, then say, “I just ask that when we’re looking at my budget in two years, or in three years that we appreciate that I’m asking for a smaller increase this year, given where we are, what we’re doing.” You know, it also goes a long way when there’s been a down year.

So, so far we’ve said, use 2019 as your benchmark, don’t ask for the greatest budget increase among every operations department every year, try to negotiate for two or three years in advance at your firm, but also negotiate two or three years in advance with your partners or vendors, depending on what you call them. You know, to be able to say, “Listen, we want to do this. And we can’t be all-in this year because our budget isn’t going to allow us, but can we negotiate an 18-month relationship with you and spread it over a 24-month period?” Negotiate a little bit! These are companies that want to partner with you. I also think it never hurts to ask and get comfortable with, again, just partnering with your vendors. That’s why I always call them partners and not vendors. Be comfortable with partnering with them and saying, “Look here are two or three things I’m trying to accomplish. And I only see one of those things in the proposal that you sent to me. Are there some things that you can put in here that are revenue neutral? Or are there ways that you can reallocate our spend and help me hit these other budget objectives?” They’ll work with you. So negotiate with management and then partner with your vendors.

I’ve been talking with a lot of firms. And another thing that I’m seeing firms really start to do is ask themselves, “Where is the lowest risk and the highest return?” and vice versa, and making sure that your budget is representing that like, “Boy, this is the lowest risk and a really good return. So we’re going to do more of this. And this is a really high risk, very questionable return. We’re going to do less of this.” And by the way, having those conversations with your management committee or your manageing partners or your executive committee about the ways that you’re looking at risk versus return, or contextually where you are in the firm’s operational churn, if you will, those sorts of things will help you in the long run.

Jennifer Schaller

It’s really great that you point out the need to let your vendors know what your goals are. It’s very challenging sometimes when people are like, “What’s the price? You know, what, what, what is your best price?” What is important to you? It’s not really a negotiating technique, we want to know where to focus to best meet your needs. And if we have no concept of what your goals are, or what you’re trying to highlight, it makes it infinitely more challenging.

This year, or any historically, are there budget items that you would suggest CMOs pay more attention to this year than in previous years or anything that’s unique about this year that they might want to highlight other than the points that you made about using 2019 as a base point versus the previous two years? Which were just weird. Is there anything else different?

Beth Cuzzone

You know, I think this is the time everybody is peeking over the horizon wondering, “Is there a downturn? Is there a recession? Is there a down year coming? What do we do?” You know, you’ve got, you’re asking yourself all of those questions. I think this is also a year, when you’re looking at your budget, to look at things that are driving efficiencies, scalability, revenue generation, right? There’s a difference between cost and investment. Make sure that your budget has a nice healthy mix of, “These are things where we want to spend money to get more money. And then these are places where we want to spend money so that we can meet an objective,” and I call them return on objectives, and return on investments. “We want to be known in this new market. We want to open up an office in Texas. And so we’re going to be spending a lot of time and money and energy and budget on really getting the word out creating some top of mind awareness in Texas.” That’s an objective, right? If it is that we really want to get a little closer to the bottom quartile of our clients in terms of revenue and say, “How can we help them with more problems than we do now? How do we take them and really try to grow the wallet share that they spend on outside counsel?” That’s a return on investment. So you know, have that healthy mix on return on investment, and return on objective.

Jennifer Schaller

Fair enough. So briefly, your firm Intapp? How do they help law firms with their budgeting process? Are there specific things that they’re set up to do to help?

Beth Cuzzone

Thank you for asking me that and for being so gracious. Because yes, I think the answer is yes. So Intapp can help law firms create insights to find revenue, find where there’s work that’s more profitable, find where, you know, there’s whitespace, and opportunities, or be able to basically measure things, and have this one source of truth in your law firm, where you’ve got all of these technologies that help all of these different operating departments that all connect, that’s why it’s called Intapp, there’s an integration to this, and they all integrate and talk to each other. And those kinds of insights can inform law firms about the kind of money that they’re spending and the kind of return that they’re getting. And it can be as simple as looking at your marketing campaign open rate for your last email, all the way to looking at some very strategic insights of “here are some spaces or places in our firm where we could be working closer with clients, or an industry where we haven’t saturated as much as we could.” So it can go from tactical to strategic, and that’s what Intapp does. That’s why it’s such an amazing company.

Jennifer Schaller

So is Intapp more process or technology based or kind of marrying the both of them when they work with law firms?

Beth Cuzzone

That’s another great question. So it’s a technology company. And I think the thing I’ve been most surprised with is the brainpower that sits in Intapp and all of the people that are there to help clients successfully deploy, or change management professionals that help you get more engagement at your firm, or help you with use cases of smarter ways to use the technology.

So Intapp sells technology that has professionals that help you with the people in the process as well. It’s a little competitive secret.

Jennifer Schaller

Sounds like a good match. As always, we appreciate Beth’s time sharing her thoughts with us and her experience and kind of the trends that she’s seeing and marrying it with the experience that she’s had over the years. Thank you very much.

Beth Cuzzone

It was so great to see you, Jennifer. So great to see you. Thank you for inviting me and be well. True North.

Conclusion

Thank you for listening to the National Law Review’s Legal News Reach podcast. Be sure to follow us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts for more episodes. For the latest legal news, or if you’re interested in publishing and advertising with us, visit www.natlawreview.com. We’ll be back soon with our next episode.

Article By The National Law Review Editorial Team of The National Law Review / The National Law Forum LLC

For more business of law legal news, click here to visit the National Law Review.

Copyright ©2022 National Law Forum, LLC

Erasing the Stigma—Michael Kasdan [PODCAST]

Men often hide their mental health struggles deeming it not manly for them to acknowledge weakness. Michael Kasdan was there at one point in his career, but he’s long since learned better. Today, Michael is an active member of the Good Men Project, sharing his personal struggles with depression with others in the legal profession and beyond. Now, he shares his story and perspective on the state of men’s mental health with Mark Yacano in this episode of Erasing the Stigma.

Michael Kasdan is a partner in Wiggin & Dana’s Intellectual Property Group. He focuses on all areas of intellectual property law, providing his clients with full- service IP expertise that ranges from patent, trademark, copyright and trade secret litigation to IP-related transactions – including licensing and monetization – to helping companies to protect and reap maximum value from their own innovations and brands.

Michael was listed as one of the world’s-leading IP Strategists in the 2103 and 2017 – 2021 editions of IAM Strategy 300 – The World’s Leading IP Strategists and has regularly been listed in Super Lawyers. Clients describe him as creative, energetic, and easy to work with and seek his insight into the business, technology, and legal facets of their IP issues.

Michael writes and speaks extensively. His articles have appeared in Intellectual Asset Management (IAM) Magazine, LEXIS, Thomson/Reuters, Practical Law Company, IP Law360, Bloomberg/BNA, Managing IP Magazine, The National Law Review, and elsewhere. Michael is the sole author of Practical Law Company’s Practice Note on Patent Law and the Lexis Practice Advisor on Patent Licensing and is a co-author of Practical Law Company’s Practice Notes on Global Patent Litigation and Licensing and on Tracking and Privacy.

A member of the firm’s Inclusion, Diversity and Equity Committee, Michael has been the keynote speaker at conferences addressing topics such as diversity and mentorship. He is also a passionate advocate for mental health and wellness in the legal profession and the world at large and serves on the Communications Committee of The Institute for Well-Being in Law.

Michael serves as on the Board and as Director of Communications and Development of the nonprofit MyChild’sCancer and on the Board of the SouthNextFestival. He was formerly Chairman of the Board of the nonprofit CityScience, which focuses on improving STEM education in cities. He is also the Director of Special Projects and Sr. Sports Editor for The Good Men Project.

Michael received his J.D. magna cum laude from New York University School of Law. He was a member of the NYU Law Review and the Order of the Coif, was Fish & Neave Fellow for the Engelberg Center on Innovation Law and Policy, and served as President of the Intellectual Property and Entertainment Law Society. After law school, he clerked for the Honorable Judge Roderick R. McKelvie in the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware. Michael received a B.S.E. in electrical engineering magna cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania, with a minor in mathematics. He was a member of Eta Kappa Nu, Tau Beta Pi, and the Penn Parliamentary Debate Team.

©2022 Major, Lindsey & Africa, an Allegis Group

June 2022 Legal Industry News and Highlights: Law Firm Hiring, Industry Recognition, and New Diversity and Inclusion Efforts

Happy Summertime from the National Law Review! We hope you are staying safe, healthy, and cool. Read on below for the latest news in the legal industry, including law firm hirings and expansion, legal industry awards and recognition, and diversity, equity, and justice efforts in the field.

Law Firm Hiring and Expansion

Michael Best & Friedrich LLP has added Brett R. Valentyn as Senior Counsel to the firm’s Corporate and Transactional Practice Group. Mr. Valentyn, a well-practiced mergers, acquisitions, and corporate attorney, has a wide array of experience in areas such as private equity, corporate governance, and transactional and contractual matters. He has advised clients across industries in buy-side and sell-side transactions for both small-cap and large-cap companies.

“Brett’s successful history in advising clients on transactional matters has him well-positioned to flourish,” said Jason Rogers, Chair of the Corporate & Transactional Practice Group. “Brett’s impressive background in transactional law will only strengthen our already deep bench of talented and business-minded private equity and M&A attorneys. I’m confident Brett will make a wonderful addition to our Corporate & Transactional Practice Group.”

Corporate attorney Eric D. Statman has joined the Toxic Torts practice group at Goldberg Segalla. A 20-year veteran of complex commercial litigation, Mr. Statman is poised to continue his environmental, product liability, and mass tort practice out of the firm’s Manhattan office.

Previously, Mr. Statman has aided clients across a variety of industries, resolving major disputes with minimum impact to corporations through mediation or litigation, as well as negotiating a large number of group settlements. Notably, he has represented asbestos defendants as local and national counsel, helping to develop strategies to minimize exposure.

Michael J. Ligorano has rejoined Norris McLaughlin’s Real Estate, Finance, and Land Use Group and Immigration Practice Group after nine years as the Diocese of Metuchen’s General Counsel. Ligorano is an established New Jersey land use and immigration practitioner with experience evaluating undeveloped land, as well as acquiring, developing, and financing municipal projects around the state. In addition to city planning, Ligorano has served as a legal resource for multinational businesses who wish to enter the United States, assisting in the navigation of the US immigration process. He is the former supervising attorney for the Diocese of Metuchen Catholic Charities Immigration Program, and a member of the American Immigration Lawyers Association.

“Michael has a deep understanding of our firm and of the local landscape. He is not only one of the state’s foremost land use and commercial real estate attorneys, but as an experienced immigration counsel will help make ours arguably the best immigration practice in the region,” said David C. Roberts, Chair of Norris McLaughlin. “We are pleased to have Michael at the firm and look forward to his leadership and cross-practice collaboration.”

Five partners and eight associates have joined the Chicago office of the MG+M The Law Firm. The Asbestos Litigation Practice welcomes Partners Timothy Krippner, Michael Cantieri, Christopher Triska, William Irwin, and Daniel Powell, as well as Associates Alex Blair, Elizabeth Grande, Aerial Henderson, Dragana Kovacevic, Cindy Medina-Cervantes, Emily Sample, and Andrea Walsh. The new members bring with them decades of combined high-stakes complex commercial and liability defense experience.

“MG+M enthusiastically welcomes this exceptional team of professionals to our firm,” commented MG+M Chairperson and Partner John B. Manning. “We have collaborated with this group of lawyers for years and look forward to their enhancement of our brand as a go-to firm for high-stakes litigation matters in Illinois, the Midwest and nationally.”

Legal Industry Awards and Recognition

The Environmental Practice Group at Greenberg Traurig, LLP has been recognized in the Legal 500 United States 2022 Guide. 31 attorneys across 12 offices in the US were included in the list, highlighting the firm’s expertise in areas such as environmental regulation, environmental litigation, energy regulation, mass torts, and Native American law.

Of particular note, shareholder David B. Weinstein was recognized in the U.S. Guide as a Leading Lawyer in the category of Dispute Resolution > Product Liability, Mass Tort, and Class Action – Defense: Toxic Tort. Likewise, shareholder Troy A. Eid was recognized as a Leading Lawyer for Industry Focus > Native American Law.

Canadian law firm Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP was recognized six times at the 2022 Benchmark Canada Awards, including three separate “Firm of the Year” Awards. Specifically, the firm was named the Competition Litigation Firm of the Year for the first time, the White Collar Crime/Enforcement Firm of the Year for the third consecutive year, and the Arbitration Firm of the Year for the fifth consecutive year.

In addition, Blakes was granted the Impact Case of the Year award for work on Sherman Estate v. Donovan, led by partner Iris Fischer. Partners Michael Barrack and Melanie Baird also received the Hall of Fame Award and the IP Litigator of the Year award, respectively.

Thomson Reuters has named six Stubbs Alderton & Markiles attorneys as “Rising Stars” on the Southern California Super Lawyers list. The members of the firm that have been selected are listed here:

Attorneys selected for the Super Lawyers list demonstrate a high degree of personal and professional achievement, as well as a significant level of peer recognition. The list selects only 2.5 percent of under-40 lawyers in the Southern California area for the “Rising Stars” designation, making decisions based on peer nomination, independent research, and peer evaluation.

Two Womble Bond Dickinson (US) attorneys have been ranked in the 2022 edition of Chambers USA. Cristin Cowles, Ph.D., an experienced patent prosecution and patent lifecycle management attorney, has been ranked in Intellectual Property. Jed Nosal, a practiced state regulatory oversight, enforcement, and compliance attorney, has been ranked in Energy & Natural Resources.

Additionally, the firm’s Massachusetts-based Energy & Natural Resources practice has been recognized by Chambers USA as an industry leader. In total, 60 Womble Bond Dickinson attorneys and 22 state-level practice areas have been recognized in the 2022 edition of Chambers USA.

Diversity, Equity, and Justice Efforts

Chris Slaughter, CEO of Steptoe & Johnson PLLC, affirmed the firm’s commitment to diversity and inclusion by taking the Leaders at the Front Initiative Pledge with the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity. Nationally recognized for its strengths in energy law, business, labor and employment, and litigation, Steptoe & Johnson has a longstanding commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion, with efforts such as the D Cubed Program, the Standing Diversity & Inclusion Committee, and ongoing diversity recruitment and retention efforts.

The Leaders at the Front Initiative is a movement intended to forefront the conversation about diversity and inclusion for major organizations and law firms. It requires an organization to act on their pledge by creating an action plan that turns their words into measurable actions, with the end goal of helping a new diverse generation of attorneys obtain positions of leadership and in return create a national legal industry that is diverse and inclusive.

Three Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP attorneys have been recognized by the Virginia Access to Justice Commission for their outstanding pro bono services. Lee-Ann C. Brown, an associate at the firm, has been named the 2020-2021 Pro Bono Service Champion, an honor reserved for top Virginia attorneys reporting the highest number of pro bono hours. Douglas L. Patin and Henry C. Su have likewise been named 2020-2021 Pro Bono Service Honor Roll members for contributing over 40 hours of pro bono service.

The Virginia Access to Justice Commission was established in 2013 by the state’s Supreme Court to promote equal access to justice, with a particular emphasis on the civil needs of Virginia residents. The bar’s participation in pro bono service has since become a priority for the Commission, connecting judges, lawyers, and legal aid and social services to assist in making the courts more accessible for all.

“These attorneys have made tremendous strides in providing pro bono service and working to promote access to justice in the Virginia community, and we are proud of their significant contributions,” said Bradley Pro Bono Counsel Tiffany M. Graves.

Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP has announced the establishment of the HuntonAK Pathfinders Scholarship Program, a 10-week, paid Summer Clerkship for outstanding first-generation 2L law students. Stemming from the winning submission at the firm’s annual “Hackathon,” a brain-storming competition for enhancing diversity and inclusion in the legal industry, the scholarship seeks to attract students to the private practice of law while providing valuable work and mentorship experiences at the firm.

“Hunton Andrews Kurth is committed to making our profession more accessible to talented law students who have already demonstrated great determination by climbing the first rung of the educational mobility ladder,” said managing partner Wally Martinez. “This scholarship, strictly for first-generation students, is one of the first of its kind and we are honored to help lead the way with this effort.”

Article By Chandler Ford and Crissonna Tennison of The National Law Review / The National Law Forum LLC

For more business of law legal news, click here to visit the National Law Review.

Copyright ©2022 National Law Forum, LLC

Six Tips for Selecting the Right CRM System

Before deciding on a new CRM, follow these steps to select the right CRM system that meets your requirements, enhances adoption, offers value to your users – and can provide a return on your investment.

Research estimates that up to 70% of CRM systems fail to meet expectations – and a failed CRM implementation can be extremely costly, not just in terms of the financial expense, but also because of the costs in lost time – and credibility. Even more impactful: you don’t often get a second chance at CRM success. This means that it’s critical to select the right CRM system the first time.

The good news is CRM success is more than possible. If you simply follow a few critical steps before and during the CRM selection process, you can ensure that the system you select will help you achieve your organization’s goals, enhance adoption and provide value to your users – and deliver a return on your technology investment.

Tip 1: Problems First, Then Products

When attempting to successfully select and implement CRM software, it’s essential to focus on people and processes first, products second. Too many people immediately rush out to find potential vendors, so they can set up demonstrations of the most popular CRM software.

While it’s easy to get caught up in the shiny bells and whistles of a good CRM demo, it’s important to resist the temptation to dive into features and functions too soon without first taking the time to gain a real understanding of your organizational and user needs.

Tip 2: Assess Your Needs

Organizations buy CRM software for a number of reasons – but each organization is unique. To provide real value and ROI, before making the purchase, you have to understand what you are trying to accomplish.

Start by putting together a list of the key reasons you think you need a CRM.

  • Are you trying to communicate more effectively with clients and prospects?
  • Manage and evaluate the ROI of events or sponsorships?
  • Track and enhance business development efforts?
  • Help the organization be more efficient?
  • Increase business and revenue?

After assessing your organization’s needs, you may discover that you have more goals than you first thought.

If this is the case, it will be important to prioritize the goals. Don’t try to boil the ocean. If you try to tackle too many things at once, especially during the initial rollout, you will be less likely to succeed. Instead, assign your goals to a timeline based on importance and value to users. For the initial implementation, set a few relevant goals, achieve those initial successes, communicate the successes – and repeat.

Making your users part of the process up front will also make them more likely to adopt the software later.

Once you understand your organization’s unique needs and requirements, it’s time to talk to your users. One of the biggest frustrations we hear from clients is a lack of CRM adoption. This isn’t surprising since, in many of these organizations, system users were not involved during the selection process. To get people to buy in and use software, it has to provide value not only to the organization, but to the users individually. The challenge is that different people define value differently, which means different groups or types of users will have their own unique needs and requirements. That’s why it’s so important to get them involved early. Making your users part of the process up front will also make them more likely to adopt the software later.

To gather user input, consider creating focus groups to provide feedback on product features and functions. You may even want to meet with some of the naysayers individually to start encouraging their participation and head off future roadblocks. Finally, be sure to involve key stakeholders in system demonstrations to help evaluate the software and solicit their feedback before proceeding with system selection. In fact, it’s beneficial to have users involved throughout the rollout to offer ideas on how to improve the CRM implementation for everyone.

Tip 3: Evaluate the Systems and Providers

After gathering all the relevant information, it’s important to fully document your requirements and make sure you are well-prepared before reaching out to providers. The best way to do this is with what I call a ‘demo roadmap.’ This is a comprehensive two- to three-page document that sets out all of the details for the demonstrations along with all the needs and requirements gathered during the needs assessment and the features and functionality that you want to see.

Your ‘roadmap’ will guide the CRM providers so that they show you the key system attributes that are critical to the success of your organization and users and also helps to prevent the demonstrations from becoming a ‘dog and pony show.’ Your roadmap should be shared with the CRM providers well in advance of the demonstrations to give them time to adequately prepare.

Some larger organizations may also find it beneficial to take an additional step and create a much more detailed, formal RFP document. This request for proposals would be sent to potential CRM providers to solicit answers to a number of questions before scheduling any demos. The formal responses allow you to evaluate and compare the vendors and their system features and pricing in advance of the demonstrations. Many organizations use the RFP to limit the demonstrations to only the potential providers who are able to meet the organization’s budget and other requirements.

Once you have identified a few CRM systems that meet your requirements, you can begin the vetting process to select the right CRM system for your organization.

Tip 4: Direct the Demonstrations

It’s essential that the CRM demonstrations allow you to make an informed decision and adequately and accurately compare systems, features and pricing. It’s also important at this phase to again involve your users. CRM systems have a reputation for being notoriously difficult to implement, and the last thing you want is to be responsible for unilaterally selecting a system that then doesn’t meet user expectations. This can also help to make them more invested in system success.

It’s also important to structure the participation and demonstrations so you maximize the benefits.

First, it can be helpful to thin the field of participating CRM providers to a manageable number.

Next, select a group of users to participate. It can be good to choose users from different groups such as professionals and administrative, so you get some different perspectives.

Participants selected must have the time and inclination to participate and must be willing to sit through all of the demonstrations so they can accurately compare all the systems.

Finally, you may want to prepare the users by sharing the requirements and/or roadmap with them and asking them to be prepared to ask any questions they may have.

You should also prepare the providers. First, let them know how much time they have. A typical CRM demonstration can take between one and two hours.

Also let them know who will be participating and what their needs and interests are. If you have professional or executive users who have limited time for demonstrations, it can be helpful to direct the providers to spend the first 30 minutes to an hour of the demo on the features that are most relevant to those users.

Then they can step out and the rest of the time can be spent showing you the more detailed back-end functionality. Finally, be sure to leave at least 15 minutes at the end of the demonstrations for questions.

Tip 5: Check References

CLIENTSFirst CRM References Checklist

Before making the final commitment to a CRM system, it’s important to make sure you go through a thorough vetting process. It’s important to make sure you get all the information you need before finalizing your purchase.

First, ask the CRM vendor for references you can speak with. But don’t stop there. Talk to other companies or organizations in your industry who have used the software. Be sure to ask open-ended questions that will help you learn not only about the software, but also about other important areas. A few good questions to ask include:

  • Would you recommend the software?
  • Has the system performed as expected?
  • What were the biggest challenges with the implementation?
  • Were there any unexpected costs or delays?
  • What do you wish you had done differently during the selection and implementation?
  • How was the service after the sale?

For a comprehensive list of good questions to ask before finalizing the sale, check out our CLIENTSFirst CRM Reference Checking Questions Document.

Tip 6: Final Selection Steps

Once you have selected the right CRM system for your organization, there are still a few additional important details that require attention. You will want to have a formal scoping call with the provider to be able to accurately gauge the actual cost. The final price can vary depending on a number of variables including:

  • The number and types of licenses
  • Additional modules or software needed
  • Professional services to implement
  • Ongoing annual subscription or maintenance costs
  • Any proposed integrations
  • The types of training and materials
  • Data conversion and/or quality

If the price is an issue with your system of choice, there are also options. First, there may be room for negotiation. Alternatively, you can do a phased rollout to spread the costs over time. Some organizations prefer to start the rollout with Marketing and power users and then roll out to a small pilot group. Then additional groups can be added in later phases over time.

Finally, remember that in any sale, you are not finished until the paperwork is done. After the price is agreed upon, you will need to review the contract or agreement. While these documents may look official and final, in fact they are often open to negotiation, so it can be beneficial to modify some of the contract terms.

For instance, if the software is new to the market, you may be able to get a discount or arrange a beta test at a reduced rate.

Additionally, instead of paying the entire invoice up front, you can often negotiate payment terms that are stepped over time based on the satisfactory completion of key deployment steps. This can enhance your chances of CRM success by aligning your CRM vendor’s success with yours.

One Last Tip: Don’t Do It Alone

Selecting the right CRM system can be a daunting process. Most firms have never been through the process before – and few want to repeat it.

Article By Christina R. Fritsch JD of CLIENTSFirst Consulting

For more business of law legal news, click here to visit the National Law Review.

© Copyright 2022 CLIENTSFirst Consulting

Episode 2: The Importance of Data in Legal Business and Legal Marketing with Laura Leopard of Leopard Solutions [PODCAST]

Rachel and Jessica speak with Laura Leopard, the Founder and CEO of Leopard Solutions: a service that provides law firms with data to improve hiring and marketing for the business of law.

Be sure to take the Women Leaving Law Survey HERE and sign-up for the Women Leaving Law webinar on June 2, 2022 to hear the results of their survey.

We’ve included a transcript of our conversation below, transcribed by artificial intelligence. The transcript has been lightly edited for style, clarity, and readability.

INTRO  00:00

Well, hello, and welcome to Legal News Reach the official podcast for the National Law Review. Stay tuned for a discussion on the latest trends, illegal marketing, SEO, law firm best practices, and more.

Rachel  00:15

My name is Rachel,

Jessica  00:16

And my name is Jessica.

Rachel  00:18

And we’re the co-hosts for the podcast. Today we’re speaking with Laura Leopard Founder and CEO of Leopard Solutions. Laura, would you like to tell our listeners a little bit about yourself and your organization?

Laura Leopard  00:28

Of course, of course, we are a legal intelligence company that monitors law firms and attorneys. And we have been doing it for nearly 20 years. And we have grown from a simple attorney list to a detailed current and historical account of attorneys and their movements. And of course, we now offer competitive and business intelligence for law firms and the market in general. And I have been at the helm for nearly 20 years.

Rachel  01:02

We’re excited to get your insight into some of those more data-driven trends here in the industry. So the first thing that we want to focus on is the importance of data and legal marketing and legal business. One of the things that I hear pretty often is that law firms are data-rich and information poor. So can you explain a little bit about why that is and how law firms can solve for that problem?

Laura Leopard  01:26

Well, I think that was more generally true in the past. But today, many law firms are correcting that issue, because they’re hiring intelligence professionals to come in and help them mind and understand their own data. The other side of the coin is gathering external data on their competitors so that they can benchmark their own shortcomings and successes properly. And that’s where we come in. We measure law firms across the board, and we deliver those benchmarks that they need. Well, several years ago now, we had prepared a detailed report on a law firm and the top 200, about their ROI on lateral hiring and entry-level hiring. And we showed it to you know, prospective law firm. And we offered to write one for their firm, and then also a list of their competitors, you know, of their choice. And their response was, “this is very interesting, but I’m not sure what we could do with it.” And it just proved to me at that time that firms and leopard both needed to do a better job of explaining the value of the data, and how it could be used. So we developed firm scape, which is our competitive intelligence platform. And it’s filled with great data. And people were very excited to see it. But then again, only people who could readily understand what it offered, really benefited from it in really meaningful ways. So when we wrote our Business Intelligence platform, we wanted to just carefully lay out what everything meant, in clear, concise terms, so that meaningful measurement would be readily understood. You know, everyone gets very excited about data. You know, “big data, big data, data-data-data.” But not everybody understands the application of that data, what that data could mean. And that’s where we have hoped to sort of democratize data in a sense of laying it out in a way that anybody can understand it, not just data people.

Rachel  03:36

Yeah, I think just being empowered to look at it is also really great. Because I think some people can get a little intimidated by data like, “Oh, it’s just a lot of numbers,” like what the numbers mean. So one of the trends that we’ve seen, and that we’ve talked about recently is women leaving the legal industry and what that means for the profession. We published a Q&A that you did with Stefanie Marrone, about this topic. We’ve had her on the podcast before; I was curious if you could dive into this trend and talk about why this is happening and how law firms can respond to it?

Laura Leopard  04:07

So we did a survey, and it’s still in progress. We’ve had about 170 responses so far. And I have to tell you, it was incredibly depressing to read the comments and the answers that they had about why they left their top 200 law firm. And a lot of it was much of what you might suspect, you know, lack of opportunity, lack of mentorship, a feeling of not being included, you know, in the group and just really lack of opportunity stood out, you know, a great deal. So we decided, well, we can’t just we can’t just, you know, do a report. We’re gonna do a presentation in May about this at the Art conference. We really wanted to dig in deeper. So we’ve been doing interviews with women who have succeeded in the top 200 Who are partners at their firm, and they’re leading women’s initiatives, and they’re doing some really great things. And we’re learning a lot in the whole process, I didn’t want to just say, here’s a big problem, you should fix it. It’s like, Here are ideas about how you can fix it. And here are examples of where those ideas are actually succeeding in top 200 law firms. But I think the really important thing that we took away after reading a lot of this was these same problems exist for attorneys who are also underrepresented, and from who are ethnically diverse. And there are also, you know, white men at the firms that have issues because they have a family members who is ill, and they have to step away. And there’s lots of there’s, there’s lots of problems here. But there are ways to fix them. And that’s what we’re working on. Right now. We are doing some great interviews, we’re coming away with some really positive ideas. And we have some firms that are really doing some great work. And we want to share that with everyone. This is not a problem that cannot be fixed. This is a problem that can be fixed, if one wishes to fix it, and everyone is determined to see it through. And for us, it’s really important to talk about this topic, we are a woman-owned business. I’m a woman entrepreneur, we have all experienced, you know, sexism, we have all experienced some lack of opportunity in our lives. And this is really important for us to start this conversation again, or remind people this conversation needs to be ongoing and continuing. So after our presentation, we’re going to we’re going to do a webinar at leopard, we’re going to invite some great folks to speak at that webinar, we’re also going to do a full white paper. But this is one of one of something that’s really, really important to us. And I really hope it can open a lot of eyes and help move the needle to helping women succeed in those top 200 firms and in law in general.

Rachel  07:13

We talked on the show before about how COVID has sort of given people the opportunity to make change that their law firm their ongoing, I think, you know, we did speak in the past year about how COVID did push women out of the workplace. But like, I think moving forward past that and not using that as like an excuse to go back to the way things were and to make long-lasting change, I think is really important. So I was curious if you could share maybe some of the solutions that you know, law firms could implement to help remedy this problem, or if that’s something that will come later with with your white paper and after your presentation?

Laura Leopard  07:48

You know, having a strong mentorship program is really important. And you can have assigned mentors, but you also have those sort of like those volunteer mentors on the side. And not just not just women mentoring women, but men also being mentors to women. The same problem exists for those who are ethnically diverse, if you have a program in place, or everyone is assigned a mentor, then you’re you’re going to help them overcome that hurdle, flex time paternity and maternity leave and not just saying we offer maternity leave, but by saying we encourage you to take maternity leave, right? If as many men took maternity leave, as women take maternity leave, it sort of removes that stigma from a woman having to take that time off, there are some really concrete things that can be done that can make a huge difference. And, you know, the women did not just leave these firms due to COVID. They left because it became untenable to stay for many different reasons. And a lot of it had to do with flexibility on the job, right? Yes, they were. Some of them were home with children. But a lot of people that answered this survey didn’t have children at home. But this entire pandemic caused people to think differently about their lives and their situations. Women are not alone in feeling this way. Right. So there are lots of young people now that are coming, you know, coming into law firms that are saying, I don’t I don’t want to work 80 hours a week. I like being home. I like having time to myself, that’s important to me. And the pandemic showed a lot of people how important that other part of your life is, right? It’s it’s a big bargain to make when you say I’m gonna work this hard for this long and I’m gonna make partner but some of the people that responded to our survey says, here’s here’s a here’s a newsflash when you make partner, that doesn’t get any better. If anything, it gets worse. worse, there are more responsibilities on top of you, you have to continue to work those crazy hours. And you have to do business development and you have administrative duties. And and and so if you are questioning, you know if this is the lifestyle for you. And I actually did have someone say that. So if you really care about having a lifestyle with your family and friends that may be this, this choice isn’t for you, I’m gonna flip it back on its head and say, Do you really want well rounded, happy, well adjusted people working for you, somebody that’s working 80 hours a week is not going to fit that bill, right? Because that’s all they do. That’s their single focus. And they’re going to burn out, and they’re going to leave you just when you need them. So taking a more holistic view, and saying, you know, and this was this was a quote, I had a partner say, I was told when I, you know asked for flex time, my partner said, I would rather have you at 50% of your normal time than many of the people that work for me at 100%. Because you do the job that I need you to do. It’s it’s time that law firms start thinking about the future, things never stay exactly the same, right? The whole hierarchy of law firms that we know now was created, what 100 years ago, when men were the only people that were lawyers, and they had wives and housekeepers and stuff at all. Right? That’s not the world we live in anymore. And we’re also beginning to question, you know, all the young people coming up are questioning everything. They’re questioning authority, they’re questioning why they have to do this and why they have to do that. And when they say, this isn’t a life, that’s for me, I don’t want to be partner. What does it do to that old model? You know, you’re there, there’s going to have to be an inflection point where they start to think about what is going to happen at their firm five years from now 10 years from now, when this generational divide, you know, really takes place. And here’s another newsflash. According to our data for the last three years ago, I think entry level hiring coming out of law school was about 5050 men and women, then the women edged out the minute, then the women rose again, there are far more women in college and far more women in law school than there are men, and they are outnumbering men being hired on that entry level position. But if those women don’t stay, and if those women leave, because you are asking, you’re creating an untenable situation for them, what’s going to happen to your partner track, then what is going to happen to that wealth of knowledge that that person brought to your firm, and she’s gonna walk away with, there’s, there’s going to be a reckoning in the industry, because times have changed, and people have changed. And it’s going to be interesting to see how it plays out. But we can see by looking in the data that they’re, they’re going to be, there’s going to be some shockwaves. And as we start, at the Women’s seminar, we’re going to be, you know, measuring all kinds of exit data and comparing it, you know, one against the other. But it’s time that firms really start to have more of a forward view about what kind of law firm they’re going to be 10 years from now, because that’s really going to impact one thing they care about most. And that’s their bottom line.

Rachel  13:46

What has been the impact that you’ve seen, like this, this lack of information?

Laura Leopard  13:54

I think we all can say, you know, pretty clearly, if you are not using data to make decisions, you’re gonna pay a price for it. You know, data improves decision making, and it can help you predict, you know, competition stresses, and then by tracking industry trends, you can begin to predict future moves a little more successfully. Of course, you have to be, you have to have really, really good data, right? If you’re using bad or incomplete data to make decisions, you might as well not use it at all. So, data quality has been very central to our business. Our data is checked and rechecked and continually updated in order to offer the best possible dataset. But I think data itself should be demystified you know, to a certain extent, by making it clear why a particular dataset matters, right? firms should care about employee turnover because it costs their bottom line and I’m not just talking about a few dollars here and there. I’m talking about Millions of dollars. And firms should care about where their competitors are opening new offices because it shows possible opportunity that they didn’t see, firms should care about who their competitors hire, to see where their next focus will be. And perhaps they should look there as well. Are, is there a competitor building up a practice that competes directly with them in their city? Are they looking at your people to possibly, you know, recruit out of them? Lack of data and insight just leaves a firm operating blindly, just by their instincts and granted, instincts are great, but they can go horribly wrong. If you look in our growth decline report now, which kind of shows that winners and losers by you know, headcount, you will see firms in the bottom of that tear that you never would have guessed would be there just a few years ago, those other firms saw an opportunity that the others didn’t, and they seized it. So data can really make or break, you know, your company, relying on your gut and anecdotal data that people bring you. It’s just not effective. I, you know, law firms love to call around and ask a recruiter. So what’s hot right now? Or what’s what’s going on right now, this was one of my favorite stories. They they talked to a recruiter, the recruiter said, Oh, the Chicago market is so hot right now. It is so hot. It’s just on fire. And I look back and I looked at our data and and like, it’s, no, it’s not, there isn’t more movement, there isn’t more job openings, that one recruiter happened to be a lot busier in Chicago than anybody else. So all of that anecdotal data like that is meaningless when you can compare that against really hard, true facts. And that’s what they really need to start doing.

Jessica  17:00

Without giving away the “secret sauce” if you will, the metrics that these firms are using for hiring specifically is that, you know, the number of job openings, like you said. I mean, what are what would you say are maybe 1-2-3 of the big numbers they’re paying attention to with hiring specifically?

Laura Leopard  17:16

Well, you know, on our platform, one of one of everyone’s favorite, you know, reports is, is that growth decline report so they can see who is who is growing quickly, and adding a lot of people to their firm. You also can see firms who who are in churn, right, they lost 100 people, they hired 100, people, and firms will use that report to find firms that it might be easier to pry people away from, right. So if you have a firm, that’s negative 15, in headcount, and people are exiting that firm like crazy, well, you have an opportunity to go pick up those people there. You also can look at our lateral reports. And you can see where the hot markets are, you can slice and dice it by practice area by specialty, you know, by far by all different kinds of metrics. You even can look at, you know, gender movement, and those who are ethnically diverse, there’s lots of different ways to look at it, but it gives you a good market view. And of course, we do have, we have a job program where we are looking at over 1000 law firms every day in real time. And I’ll tell you, you know, when the pandemic happened, we normally had like six to 7000 jobs and our job program. During the pandemic, I think in like July of 2020, that number went down to about 3000. And most of them, I don’t think were really real openings. Anyway, there were openings, they just sort of left on their website. And now we have over 12,000, approaching 13,000 openings in a program. So that will just tell you the velocity, they also can. And our job program is great for CIA too, because you can go in and see how what your competitors are looking for how they’re framing that position, like right now, we know everyone’s looking for corporate m&a people, right? How are they framing that job? How can you make yours look more attractive? What can you do to you know, sort of get an edge in that market. And there’s lots of other reports that we have that can help them gain advantage. But those are probably, you know, the top the top three, just seeing what’s going on in the market.

Jessica  19:31

With all the changes in the legal industry, I think there’s a huge focus right now, not only in just data and the services you guys offer, but also diversity in the workplace. So I would love to know–I know you mentioned a little bit of it, but being able to see you said gender maybe changes are hiring, how to make it attractive to certain diverse populations of people so that you know, the law firms represent their communities, if you will. Could you explain a little bit more of that? I would love to definitely learn more.

Laura Leopard  20:00

For years, we had been asked to have diversity information in our database. But we just thought it would be incredibly hard, we weren’t sure how we wanted to do it, it was it’s it, you know, having that kind of information in the database is a little risky. To a certain extent, you have to be really careful and really think things through. Then the summer of George Floyd happened, we were in the middle of a pandemic, things were kind of crazy. But when that happened, we all you know, on our, our, you know, our little community of folks at leopard said, we have to do something, we have to do something. So we put all of our heads together. And we said, well, here’s how we might do it. And we knew about the Mansfield rule and, you know, diversity lab who are great folks. And we knew how they handled their data. And they really, were asking for data, they really wanted law firms to be able to go in and find people that were diverse in order to bring them into the hiring game. So we took a page out of their playbook, and we said, Okay, if we put diversity in our database, we’re only going to show it to people who we think are going to use it correctly. So if a law firm is a member of the Mansfield rule, they get the diversity data, we don’t charge an extra penny for any of this, we spent months doing research on every single person in the US in our database, to see if they might be ethnically diverse. And what we did was we, we went on a probability score. So if we look at where they’re from languages, they speak committees that they belong to, like we sort of look at all of their data points, then we can come back and say, Okay, we think there was a high probability, this person could be ethnically diverse. If you are a member of the Mansfield rule, you can access and you can view those attorneys. If you’re not, then you can sign the leper diversity pledge. And with that, you are promising to use that data in the correct way, which is to include not exclude, and to really look at these people, you know, in order to bring them in front of the hiring committee of a law firm, in order to move that needle. We also put safeguards in the database in place, so that those people could never be excluded from a search, they could only be included, you can only see them when you want to find them. And we did the same thing for gender. So we moved because there were other gender issues that we wanted to recognize and acknowledge. So you have a high probability of being gender diverse or low probability of being gender diverse. So now, because because we took those steps, we are also able to report on diversity, and every single law firm in our system. And that means if you are a diverse candidate, you’re going to you’re going to be able to know, you know, or a recruiter can show you or the law firm can show you what their diversity score is, in comparison to the other law firms that they may be considering. Everyone. Everyone gets a score, everyone sees you know, how well they’re doing or how poor they’re doing. And law firms can use this in their conversations with people that they want to bring in. And let them know that they are growing diversity within their firm, you can see it in the growth decline report, you can see who’s growing in ethnic diversity numbers, who’s growing in women numbers, it’s all right there for the world to see. And we use the same scoring across the board for every firm. So it’s so it’s all equal. But that was an incredibly important thing for us to do. We spent months with, you know, all hands on deck, getting this data in, and it’s something that we continue to work on all the time. You know, there are people that we have as, as we consider sort of, we don’t have enough information to go either way. Well, we continually go back to see if there’s more information that’s available about that attorney, so we can label them properly, high or low. But being able to do that also led us fold in diversity into our leopard law firm index. So we decided that the normal way that firms are assigned, you know, a grade of excellence, where those scores coming from a once a year list, you know, are really not helpful in today’s fast paced world. We have always seen firms go out of business in the top 200 of emerging they, you know, they go away, they go under, and we wanted something that was real time that would go up as the firm was improving and if the firm Um, you know, hit a bad patch than their score would also show that we have firms in the leopard top 250 that are not in the top 200. We have, we also have firms that are in the top 200 that are not in the leopard top 250 Because our scoring scoring methods are very different. And they’re really database and one of those data points is a diversity number, how well are they doing with diversity. So it is become a part of everything that we do in almost every single report. And in our last leopard law firm index, how well a firm is doing on ethnic diversity is incredibly important. And we wanted to show that by using it as many as many different ways as possible.

Jessica  25:49

I think it’s great to have so many different options of metrics, because I think casting that wide net, as far as what you’re able to keep track of for your firm, allows you to pick up any alarm bells of things that maybe aren’t going as well, like you said of, you know, growth, maybe it’s going down in this area or what have you. So I’m curious to know what some of those alarm bells would be or like red flags in the data that maybe law firms should pay attention to or could affect their business model and moving forward for their growth?

Laura Leopard  26:22

Well, I think all those items that are in that, you know, law firm index, and the score that we give because of it. So we look at metrics that really don’t change over time in the in the sense that we do look at only one little tiny piece of the financial puzzle, which is the revenue per lawyer, but it’s scored over a five year period, because that is really there just to show Oh, it’s going up, oh, it’s going down. So that is available there, and part of that index, but we also use items, the growth decline and attorney headcount, we use the average attorney tenure increases or decreases in that RPL, as I just mentioned, and the ROI, the success and lateral recruitment, and the success and entry-level recruitment. And for the index, we only look at it in the prior 12 months. Because if you are having problems retaining people, the first year they join that firm, we see that we think that is a red flag of something going on at the firm, which is why it’s in the index, we also look at promotions to partner and we look at ethnic diversity within the firm. And one reason that we do that is that companies have said over and over again, they care about ethnic diversity, and they want to work with firms that have a good ethnic diversity number, if that’s true, and if they hold their feet to the fire, then that really must be in the index. And there are other items that we’re looking to fold into that index. But those are the ones that help give that score. There are so many other things, that ROI that I talked about, like in the index, we look at the past 12 months, but you can go back and look, look three years ago, how well did you do in your hiring three years ago? How well did you do that the year before that, because we’re talking about millions of dollars that these firms are losing because they only have a 70% retention of people that they just hired two years ago. And and that is a huge red flag that they really must pay attention to. So then the question is, you know, where’s my problem? Right? So we wrote a report in the in the BI Suite, that really helps you break it down? Is it a practice area issue? Is it a particular office that has an issue, and you can benchmark your firm against your competing firms? I think sometimes when people say, Oh, we have a 80 80% retention rate, that’s pretty good. Well, it’s good until you compare it against some of your competitors who have a much higher number. And it’s also good until you realize exactly how much that attrition is costing your firm, millions and millions of dollars. You know, I’ve also I once had a recruiter and a law firm say, they really didn’t mind the attrition because it was sort of job security for them. Because they kept busy. But really, job security for them is not just it’s making sure you have a successful hire. It’s making sure that those people are happy and they’re getting what they need, is looking to see, you know who might be on the cusp of leaving. We have something in our attorney database called the probability The move, right? So we’re looking at people that have moved in the past and similar circumstances and JD, your range, practice area and all that good stuff. So you can run it on your own firm. And you can see who has a very high probability at your firm that allows you to play defense with those people and help to see if they’re getting what they need, are they happy? Do they need to look at some new kind of schedule? Are they unhappy in their practice area, and they’re not getting an opportunity to change it, there’s a lot, a lot of things that firms can do, if they start to use that data to help see where they might have a problem. And we’ve written many reports that could help them do that, again, again, even with the law firm index, it’s not about calling out oh, this is the big winner, this is the big loser, it’s like, you might have a problem. And we’re gonna help you find where your problem is, because this report will show you where you are, you know, far beneath your competitors, this is an area that you have to look at. And that’s what it’s there for is to really help them do better. And we can show them the metrics that say, this is where you should begin looking.

Rachel  31:15

We’d spoke a little bit about at the beginning of our conversation, how law firms are starting to really start to adopt this technology to integrate more data and things like that into their business. I was curious to get your thoughts on how the legal industry has changed over the course of your career in terms of how this technology has been adopted? Have you seen like a paradigm shift in the past couple of years? Or how has that been?

Laura Leopard  31:37

They certainly have changed, but it hasn’t been a change overnight, you know, law firms, both now. And then they use several different kinds of technology for several different purposes. And, you know, data was housed in silos, you know, with multiple programs used by multiple people. And today, you see firms hiring technology teams, to better integrate and manage that data. So that’s a step in the right direction. You know, I have seen firms that have very little data about their own firm, and about, you know, their own alumni. And they’re beginning to recognize that, that puts them at a disadvantage, right. So that recognition is a huge step, and getting the task of just getting all the data in a proper form, and then the right system, that’s a really big undertaking, and only the largest firms can really, you know, kind of take those steps and hiring that technology department, you know, lucky for others, we can kind of step in and provide that market data that CEI intelligence for them. And even for the firms that have, you know, their own CI department, they still need data on their competing firms to use to create that proper analysis and benchmarking. And that’s where we step in to fill that bill. But technology has been getting much, much better in in many law firms, but not all law firms, there will always be some that are sort of lagging behind.

Rachel  33:11

I wonder, you know, when is going to be the point where these people who are lagging behind will start to realize that, you know, if if you don’t change, then you die, essentially, you know, it’s because eventually just not going to be able to keep up with everyone else around you. So I think one of the technologies that in addition to data that we’ve been hearing about is the use of artificial intelligence in you know, recruiting and and other operations. I was wondering if you could speak a little bit about like your experience in using artificial intelligence and recruiting and things like that, and how it can improve those processes.

Laura Leopard  33:46

We have a product that uses AI, that sort of analyzes a possible merger, right, so it can produce possible candidates. And then when you select one, we use all of the data from all the past mergers that we’ve seen in our database, to really say, Well, this is how we think this merger would go based on attrition rates. And then we highlight all the risks points, you know, of that particular acquisition or merger. And that’s, that’s in the BI Suite. An AI for hiring is kind of tricky. So while it sounds like you know, oh, we’re going to use AI and it’s going to eliminate bias. The problem is there will be inherent bias baked in, depending upon the data set that AI is based on. And the legal industry has historically been predominantly white and male for decades. So an AI hiring system based on that data set is going to have bias unless you work to overcome it. If you’re parsing resumes and cover letters is going to need to be trained on you know, being neutral on titles and verbiage. And you know, was key words. Now we like to look at data patterns, which can prove to be, you know, maybe even more helpful than that kind of AI. You know, there’s different processes that firms do almost without thinking, you know, firms do a lot of institutional hiring. And we can show that in data and tell that story. And these are the types of data patterns that you know, I would like to see kind of shake up that hiring model, the one that, you know, may not be serving the firm as well as they thought. But an AI for hiring has always been tricky. And we’ve, we’ve explored some of this ourselves. And then at the same time, we said, Well, wait a minute, it could very well be that the best person at the firm, the one that succeeds the most is always going to be that white male partner that came on 30 years ago. So this is something that we’re working on. And we’re working to see how we could eliminate bias in that kind of report. But it’s, it’s a tricky thing. And it’s I know, a lot of companies outside of law firms have used it. And there have been a lot of issues with using AI in that process. So it’s something you have to watch very closely.

Rachel  36:17

Yeah, I think there’s this misconception that AI is just like, you know, it’s not a person. So how can it you know, make these questionable decisions. But the problem is that, like a person has to build the AI. And it has to be based off of, you know, it has to learn these things from something else. So I can see how that would be a slippery slope. So with that in mind, like do you see…Or I guess, like what technologies do you see changing these processes moving forward? What do you expect the role of technology will be like, in the future?

Laura Leopard  36:49

There are many, there are many hiring issues. And we are working now on a really cool piece of technology. To help with one of those, you know, I talked to I talked to a lot of law firm people who have to do a lot of work, before the hiring partner sits down with the candidate. Because so often that hire can be blown if that hiring partner doesn’t know what to say that I care. So much about lateral hiring is about convincing that person to join your firm. And competition right now is at an all-time high. So what sets your firm apart? You know, why would this top-notch corporate m&a attorney, choose your firm over the five others that he’s looking at, you really have to tell them and you can’t just say, Oh, we’re a great firm with great people and a great culture, you really have to say, how your firm has, you know, grown over your competitors. Let’s say you’re interviewing a woman who’s an IP associate and wants to make partner, well let her know how many women IP partners you have in your firm in relation to her current firm. And if that number isn’t as great, maybe the percentage of growth is great, right? Just convince them that your firm is the best choice by using data to confirm that back. There are always good stories that can be told with data. And we are trying to help firms uncover those and help that hiring partner convey those really positive things. And right now, you can do that. But you’d have to run several reports. And then you’d have to write the analysis and then hand it to the to the hiring partner. So we are developing a tool called the Coach’s Corner, that’s going to do just that. And it’s going to analyze the firm that seeking to hire against the firm with the attorney currently works. And it’s going to map out all the positives that we have in the data for your firm. And that is a really important part of the conversation. Right now the competition is so tight, and it’s so everything is moving so quickly, that they all need, you know, as as much help as they can to paint their firm in the right light if they’re gonna get that higher. So there’s a lot of power on the job seeker right now, especially in certain practice areas and in certain areas of the country. And they want to make sure that they’re making the right choice. All that there’s a lot of strange decisions going on out there. There’s, there’s a race for, you know, who’s getting paid the most. But if you’re all paying the most, how do you decide between one and the other, you have to look at all of that other data to say overall, our firm would be the better choice for you because of a B, C, D, and E. And that’s what we’re trying to do is give them the data for all of those points. So you may see people making decisions based on all of those metrics, and all of those things that that firm offers, as opposed to just monetary decisions, right? Am I going to be happy where I go? Am I going to be able to live the kind of life that I want to leave, all of that’s going to happen and that those firms that are doing that are going to change the dynamic of the rest. So it’s not all about starting salary, and it’s not all about the PPP. There’s a lot more in the mix now. And there may be a reshuffling of firms, as some firms begin to realize they need to change how they do business in order to have, you know, people that stay with them and people who want to join them.

Rachel  40:48

There will be an interesting thing to watch here in the coming years, especially as your company continues to roll out these new tools.

Laura Leopard  40:54

As a group as a women working in law firms, as men working in law firms, we have to look and demand and ask for that change to happen.

Rachel  41:04

Excellent. Well, that’s why we’re so excited to have you on as a guest today to get these ideas and these topics out there! So special. Thanks to you, Laura, for joining us today. We really appreciate it.

OUTRO  41:19

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February 2022 Legal News Roundup: Women in Law, Promotions & More

Happy belated Valentine’s Day from the National Law Review team. Please read on for new legal industry hires, promotions and awards.

Firm Recognition & Awards

Much is included on the 2022 Top Workplaces USA list, which recognizes organizations with a people-centered culture.

“At Much, our culture centers on people: our employees, our clients, and our community partners,” said Managing Partner Mitchell Roth. “We work each day to support a collaborative, kind, and service-oriented environment, so to be recognized for our culture on a national level is a tremendous honor.”

The rankings are based on employee feedback from a survey administered by Energage, an employee engagement technology partner. The survey gauged various aspects of workplace culture, including  alignment, execution, connection, and more.

Womble Bond Dickinson is one of the Best Places to Work for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ+) workplace equality, earning a perfect score of 100 percent on the 2022 Corporate Equality Index (CEI).

The survey is administered by the Human Rights Campaign, and acts as a benchmarking tool to track how businesses are adopting equitable workplace policies, practices and benefits for LGBTQ+ employees. Womble Bond Dickinson earned perfect scores every year since 2015.

“We are honored to be named one of the HRC’s Best Places to Work for LGBTQ+ Employees once again,” said Betty Temple, Chair & CEO of Womble Bond Dickinson (US) LLP. “We at Womble Bond Dickinson have worked hard to promote diversity and inclusion. These efforts include earning Mansfield Rule 4.0 Certification. The goal of the Mansfield Rule is to boost the representation of historically underrepresented lawyers—including LGBTQ+ attorneys—in law firm leadership, partner promotions and lateral hires by broadening the pool of candidates considered for these opportunities. We have much more work to do, but we are proud to be recognized for the progress we have made.”

Lawdragon recognized Foley & Lardner partners Daniel Kaplan, John (Jack) Lord, Jr., and Rachel Powitzky Steely on its 2022 edition of 500 Leading U.S. Corporate Employment Lawyers, an annual recognition of the nation’s top advisors on workforce issues. Lawdragon selected the honorees based on submissions, editorial vetting and journalistic research.

Lawdragon said that this year’s honorees “specialize in defending corporations in everything from wage and overtime claims to trade secret disputes, while helping companies maintain global workforces throughout a pandemic.”

Law firm Hiring & Additions

Varnum LLP expanded its intellectual property practice with the addition of Timothy D. Kroninger. Joining the firm’s Detroit office as an associate, Mr. Kroninger focuses his practice on copyright law, trade secret law, patent and trademark prosecution and more. He also has experience in drafting design patent applications, as well as participating in United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) trademark opposition proceedings.

Beyond his practice at Varnum, Mr. Kroninger works as a supervising attorney in the Trademark and Entrepreneur Clinic at University of Detroit Mercy College of Law. There, he instructs law students on copyright registration, drafting corporate documents, and protection of trademarks.

Beveridge & Diamond PC elected four new principals: Eric Christensen, located in Seattle; Allyn Stern, located in Seattle; Michael Vitris, located in Austin; and Gus Winkes, located in Seattle. Mr. Christensen practices in energy law, assisting companies and consumers in navigating the legal and regulatory landscape. Ms. Stern, former U.S. EPA regional counsel, helps clients develop environmental compliance strategies. Mr. Winkles practices in a variety of fields, providing solutions-oriented legal representation in the areas of enforcement defense, regulatory compliance, and contaminated site cleanup. Mr. Vitris, former litigation attorney with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, defends companies in class actions and environmental mass torts.

“Each of these Principals’ talents, skills, and expertise deepen and enhance B&D’s dynamic regulatory compliance and litigation practice as environmental and energy law continue to evolve,” said firmwide managing principal Kathy Szmuszkovicz. “They’ve proven their ability to deliver top-notch service to clients and to serve as thought-leaders at a particularly exciting time in our practice. We look forward to their continued success and contributions in their new roles.”

Barnes & Thornburg LLP added five new attorneys and legal professionals across various offices. Associate William Choi  joined the firm’s Los Angeles office, and associate Albert D. Farr joined the New York office. Mr. Choi focuses his practice on product liability and complex civil litigation, and he is well-versed in all aspects of pretrial case management. Likewise, Mr. Farr practices in transactional tax law, counseling multinational strategic and private equity clients on transaction tax structuring, tax diligence and more.

Furthermore, legal professionals Amit Datta, Al Maloof, and Soyoung Yang joined Barnes & Thornburg’s Chicago, Indianapolis, and Washington D.C. offices, respectively. Dr. Datta, a business transaction advisor, provides targeted legal advice and strategic insight for European clients conducting business in the U.S. Mr. Maloof, a client relationship specialist, provides strategic consultation among the firm’s government services, compliance and regulatory attorneys. Ms. Yang, a legal fellow, aids attorneys and clients on matters related to international trade, customs and the supply chain.

William L. Nimick  joined the Construction Litigation and Counsel practice group at Goldberg Segalla LLP. An experienced litigator, Mr. Nimick is located in the firm’s Raleigh office, where he counsels insurers, contractors, subcontractors and corporate entities in liability claims including but not limited to property damage, personal injury and construction defects.

Previously, Mr. Nimick worked as a civil litigator across North Carolina, representing clients in areas such as wrongful death, workers’ compensation, and subrogation. Specifically he  handled subrogation claims such as motor vehicle accidents, product liability lawsuits and large fire losses.

Women in the Legal Industry

Angela Bowlin of Frilot LLC law firm has accepted a position serving on the International Association of Defense Council (IADC), an organization for attorneys who represent corporate and insurance matters. Ms. Bowlin focuses her practice on mass torts and class actions, with experience in asbestos and other toxic tort cases.

“I am honored to have been selected as a member of IADC and look forward to working on the many important committees related to the law and its many facets,” said Ms. Bowlin.

Nicole Archibald joined Foley Hoag LLP as their Director of Legal Recruiting. Ms. Archibald will work alongside the Foley Hoag team to attract and promote a diverse group of attorneys to help the firm achieve its diversity and inclusion goals.

“We’re very pleased to welcome Nicole to Foley Hoag, and are confident that she will be a great asset to the firm and its culture. Her considerable prior experience as a director of recruiting, legal search consultant and practicing litigator will prove a valuable asset as we look to 2022 and beyond. Our executive committee, practice leaders, hiring committee and I are excited to begin working with Nicole to attract new talent and strengthen our market-leading practices,” said Foley Hoag Co-Managing Partner Kenneth Leonetti.

“I look forward to collaborating with Foley Hoag’s management, department chairs and practice leaders, and hiring committee to develop, implement and execute proactive recruiting initiatives to further the firm’s hiring goals and strategic growth plan,” said Ms. Archibald.

Norton Rose Fulbright appointed New York partner Robin Adelstein as the Co-Head of Commercial Litigation, joining Houston partner Andrew Price. Ms. Adelstein brings extensive experience in litigating complex commercial disputes and advises companies with respect to antitrust issues regarding mergers, joint ventures and more.

“Robin has long been respected as a leader within the firm as our Global and US Head of Antitrust and Competition, and she is a highly-recognized practitioner in her field. I look forward to seeing the great work that our commercial litigation group will do under Robin’s and Andrew’s leadership,” said Jeff Cody, Norton Rose Fulbright’s US Managing Partner.

“Our firm has a longstanding reputation for advising clients on their most complex and significant matters. It is an honor to head Norton Rose Fulbright’s commercial litigation group along with Andrew; I am proud to be leading such a talented group of lawyers,” said Ms. Adelstein.

Article By Rachel Popa, Hanna Taylor, and Chandler Ford of The National Law Review / The National Law Forum LLC

For more on the business of law and legal news, click here to visit the National Law Review.

Copyright ©2022 National Law Forum, LLC

Top Legal Industry News for August 2021: Law Firm Pro Bono, Hiring & Innovation

Welcome back to another edition of the National Law Review’s legal industry news column. Read on for the latest news on law firm pro bono, innovation and hiring as selected by the NLR’s editorial team.

Law Firm Hiring and Moves

Elizabeth Hermann Smith joined Mayer Brown’s Chicago office as a partner in their Banking & Finance practice group. She represents clients in all areas of the financial industry, including investors, borrowers, administrative agents, lenders and more. Ms. Smith’s specialty is in the field of leveraged finance, where she has focused on buyouts, dividend recapitalizations, and other financial transactions.

“Continuing to expand our leveraged finance capabilities, particularly with private credit funds, is a primary goal of the firm’s Banking & Finance practice. Elizabeth’s addition reflects our commitment to growth and strengthens our global finance offerings,” said Frederick Fisher, a co-leader of Mayer Brown’s global Lending group.

Mayer Brown also added Brett E. Moskowitz as Counsel to the Banking & Finance practice group. Located in the firm’s Charlotte office, Mr. Moskowitz focuses on bilateral and syndicated loan transactions, specializing in acquisition financing, real estate financings, and cash flow and asset-based lending.

Campos Mello Advogados added Antonio Tovo as a partner in the firm’s Corporate Criminal Law, Compliance and Cybersecurity practice group through an agreement with DLA Piper. Mr. Tovo works  in industries such as agriculture, real estate, healthcare, and hospitality.

Mr. Tovo works in Campos Mello Advogados’ São Paulo office. Ricardo Caiado Lima, a partner at Campos Mello Advogados: “We’re delighted to announce that Antonio […]  has joined our team. We’re seeing significant growth in our corporate criminal law and cybersecurity practices, and it is key for us to have highly qualified professionals with extensive experience, like Antonio […] .”

Robinson+Cole  added partner Danielle H. Tangorre to the firm’s Health Law group. At the firm’s Albany office, she will focus on guiding clients through state and federal health law regulations, in particular abuse and fraud laws such as Stark Law and the Anti-Kickback Statutes. Further, Ms. Tangorre has experience in  healthcare transactional matters,  litigation and  HIPAA compliance.

“Danielle has impressive experience and I’m delighted to welcome her to our team,” says Rhonda J. Tobin, Managing Partner at Robinson+Cole. “Continuing to expand the depth and geographical diversity of our health law practice is another step in the execution of our strategic plan to expand some of our strongest practices in our most strategic locations.”

Steptoe & Johnson PLLC opened three new offices in Texas located in Dallas, San Antonio, and Collin County.  Steptoe & Johnson’s new Texas operation includes –eleven new attorneys specializing in an array of fields including  commercial real estate, corporate transactions, energy, and tax law. The Dallas, San Antonio, and Collin County offices will be managed by Elizabeth Cromwell, Katherine David, and Brad Fletcher, respectively.

Steptoe & Johnson CEO, Christopher L. Slaughter said “These locations represent a strategic investment for the firm to better serve our existing clients in Texas and widen our scope of services to new clients. Our new lawyers bring substantial experience and knowledge to the firm’s practices. They are valued additions to the Steptoe & Johnson team.”

Legal Industry Recognition

Reginald Turner of Clark Hill PLLC is the new President of the American Bar Association (ABA).  Mr. Turner specializes in government policy and labor and employment matters and served as President of the National Bar Association and the State Bar of Michigan in the past. Mr. Turner will serve his role as President of the ABA through August 2022.

“Serving as ABA president and representing the legal profession is an honor. The ABA is committed to advancing the rule of law and increasing access to justice. As president, I will work tirelessly towards achieving those goals,” said Mr. Turner.

Ankura is one of 83 firms to contribute intelligence to the 2021 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report (DBIR), which provides an analysis of data breaches and security incidents and provides ways to proactively mitigate future risks. The Verizon Data Breach Investigations report is important for law firms because of the technical information and metrics that are associated with cyber-attacks. Ankura’s team provided intelligence related to almost one hundred cyber matters including ransomware, espionage and other financially motivated actions.

“Leaders at every level need to understand technology and the benefits and risks it poses to their organizations.  The 2021 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report does an extraordinary job capturing many of these risks, and Ankura’s inclusion on the DBIR team is testament to the quality of work and collaboration our team brings to every engagement, every day,” says Hon. Patrick J. Murphy of Ankura’s Cybersecurity practice.

The International Association of Defense Counsel (IADC) announced Adam M. Sheinvold of Eckert Seamans Cherin & Mellott, LLC  their team. The IADC is a legal organization for attorneys who represent corporate and insurance interests designed to help members develop skills, promote professionalism and facilitate camaraderie among clients.

Mr. Sheinvold brings the expertise of commercial and business litigation, regulatory and administrative litigation and product liability defense to the IADC team. “I am honored to be invited as a new member of the prestigious International Association of Defense Counsel and to join my distinguished colleagues of the corporate defense bar who rely on the IADC to provide valuable, high-level education and professional support and development opportunities,” said Mr. Sheinvold.

Legal Innovation & Pro Bono Programs

In July, Ropes & Gray hosted a “Legal Bootcamp” in partnership with BUILD (Broader Urban Involvement & Leadership Development), a Chicago youth development organization that focuses on gang intervention and violence prevention.

“A hallmark of Ropes & Gray Chicago has always been our commitment to the Chicago community,” said office managing partner Paulita Pike. “This dedication is evident by the extensive efforts from our Chicago office family in launching the Legal Bootcamp. We’re thrilled at the positive responses we’ve received from the students and BUILD, and I’m proud of my colleagues.”

Ropes & Gray worked with five high school and college age students to participate in a three week pilot program, which highlighted professions in the legal industry, including judges, attorneys and commercial support professionals. The curriculum included a corporate legal clinic, a speaker series and a preliminary injunction hearing workshop.

“Launching our inaugural Legal Bootcamp, together with BUILD, has been a highlight for our Chicago office over this summer,” said Ropes & Gray litigation and enforcement partner Tim Farrell. “We hope that by giving students who otherwise would not have access to or a background in the legal industry a front row seat at a corporate law firm, we’re advancing our mission of inclusion while hopefully the students are getting a broader perspective of the world of possibilities that lie ahead for them.”

Barnes & Thornburg selected five undergraduate students as members of the first class of its Pre Law Scholars Program, which aims to assist students’ pursuing a law degree. Through the program, Barnes & Thornburg will cover the cost of the students’ Law School Admission Test (LSAT) and LSAT prep coursework, as well as helping with the cost of law school applications. Additionally, attorney mentors from Barnes & Thornburg will work with the students to help guide them through law school.

“We are very excited to welcome the inaugural class of Prelaw Scholars to the Barnes & Thornburg family. They are all amazingly accomplished individuals and we are thrilled to be a part of their journey to law school,” said Sarah Evenson, Barnes & Thornburg’s director of law school programs. “Our hope is this program not only lessens the financial burden and administrative obstacles of applying to law school, but also provides key mentoring connections helping to prepare them for law school and ultimately rocket them to the legal career they desire.”

The Pre-Law Scholar program is presented in conjunction with Barnes & Thornburg’s Racial Justice Committee, which strives to support diverse candidates interested in pursuing law as a career.

“Our core belief as a firm and as a committee was to identify ways to build relationships with a pipeline of diverse legal talent and to mentor these aspiring legal professionals as they prepare to enter law school. The Prelaw Scholars Program does just that and I’m proud to be a part of it,” said William A. Nolan, member of the firm’s management committee and Racial Justice Committee.

The first class includes:

  • Phillip Arrington IV, Loyola University Chicago, B.A. in Political Science

  • Natalie Frazier, Emory University, B.A. in Women’s Gender and Sexualities Studies

  • Esther Oluwapelumi Durosinmi, Loyola University Chicago, B.A. in Political Science

  • Alexa M. Carpenter, Central State University, B.S. Criminal Justice

  • Jasleen Gill, University of California Berkeley, B.A. Philosophy and Legal Studies

Benchmark Litigation included Bradley Arant Boult Cummings partners Leigh Anne Hodge, Lela M. Hollabaugh and Kimberly B. Martin on its 2021 Benchmark Top 250 Women in Litigation list, developed through client feedback and research.

“Leigh Anne, Lela and Kim continue to demonstrate superior skill and client success in their litigation practices, and we are proud to see them recognized once again in this prestigious list,” said Bradley Chairman of the Board and Managing Partner Jonathan M. Skeeters.

Ms. Hodge is leader of the Litigation Practice Group and a member of the firm’s Healthcare Practice Group and is based in the Birmingham office. She represents clients in the healthcare industry in cases involving product liability litigation, medical malpractice litigation, peer review and staff privileges matters, administrative hearings before licensure boards, ERISA litigation, Medicare Advantage plan litigation, managed care litigation, insurance disputes and insurance fraud cases.

Ms. Hollabaugh works in the firm’s Nashville office, and advises leading natural gas pipeline companies and other infrastructure clients on issues involving location, land acquisition, construction and operations. She recently co-authored an amicus curiae brief to the U.S. Supreme Court supporting the industry’s position on the scope of the Natural Gas Act and the state’s 11th Amendment immunity.

Ms. Martin focuses on general litigation with an emphasis on medical device and pharmaceutical products liability litigation. She is based in the firm’s Huntsville office, and recently served as trial counsel defending a nationwide hospice provider in a three-month False Claims Act trial brought by the Department of Defense, which resulted in a dismissal.

Copyright ©2021 National Law Forum, LLC

Article By Hanna Taylor, Chandler Ford and Rachel Popa of The National Law Review / The National Law Forum LLC

For more articles on the legal industry, visit the NLRLaw Office Management section.

Legal Industry News from the National Law Review: Law Firm Hires, Attorney Accolades and Recognition and Innovation

As we move into fall, the National Law Review’s editorial team takes a look at the constantly evolving legal industry landscape—paying special attention to law firm hires, attorney awards and law firm innovation.

Law Firm Moves & Hires

Securities  attorney Paul McCurdy joined Katten’s Financial Markets and Funds group as a Partner in New York. Before joining Katten, McCurdy led the broker-dealer regulatory practice for over 20 years at his previous firm, and  he also previously served as an executive committee member and as the firm’s chairman.

In his practice, McCurdy represents investment banking, retail, clearing and direct broker-dealers and advisory firms in regulatory and enforcement matters. He has defended witnesses in over 200 interviews before the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority and the Department of Justice.

“Katten is a solid leader in the financial services industry, well-known as a one-stop resource with a deep bench of talent and some of the most experienced litigation and regulatory enforcement attorneys there are,” McCurdy said.

Arent Fox law firm added Partner John Zaimes and Counsel Roxanne Wilson to its Labor and Employmentpractice in Los Angeles. The pair worked together at Mayer Brown before joining Arent Fox.

“John and Roxanne join our national team at an extremely opportune time,” said Michael L. Stevens, labor & employment practice leader. “Since the start of the year, our clients have increasingly sought our counsel as the COVID-19 pandemic has forced them to shift their business and employment strategies and operations. Now, we’re starting to see a growing number of disputes with employees on a variety of fronts and adding John and Roxanne will strengthen our support for clients in California and across the country.”

Wilson focuses her practice on advising clients on employment-related class actionsregarding drug and alcohol policies, sick leave, employment application and wage and hour issues.

Zaimes advises clients on non-compete agreements, employee non-solicitation agreements, and the protection of trade secrets, and defends clients in actions under the Fair Labor Standards Act and Telephone Consumer Protection Act.

Grant Schneider joined the Washington, D.C. office of Venable as the senior director of cybersecurity services. Previously, Schneider was the federal chief information security officer for the White House Office of Management and Budget. He also served as the senior director for cybersecurity policy on the White House National Security Council.

During his time working for the federal government, Scheider oversaw the review of the government’s cybersecurity enterprise and worked with Congress on the SECURE Technology Act which established the Federal Acquisition Security Council.

“Grant joins us from a distinguished career in the federal government, where he led numerous initiatives that were pivotal to managing risk and enhancing our national cybersecurity, not least of which was his recent work on supply chain security, encryption, and identity management. We look forward to welcoming him to our team and leveraging this experience in service to our clients,” said Ari Schwartz, managing director of cybersecurity services at the firm.

Schneider also worked as the senior director for cybersecurity policy for the National Security Council, helping gain presidential approval for the first National Cyber Strategy in more than 15 years.

“Venable presented the rare opportunity to work with some of the nation’s leading minds in shaping the future of cybersecurity from within the private sector. I have spent my nearly 28 years of government service implementing innovative programs and policies on a national scale and am eager to stretch these muscles in new ways to advance the cybersecurity goals of the firm’s clients,” Schneider said.

Marc Boiron and Rebecca Rettig joined Manatt law firm as partners in the firm’s financial services group and fintech practice. Boiron will be based out of the firm’s Los Angeles office and Rettig is joining the firm’s New York office.

Boiron, a leading corporate lawyer and blockchain and virtual currency advisor, has experience guiding clients through issues such as token distributions, regulatory compliance and financings. Boiron is admitted in California and Delaware and advises companies on governance and corporate issues.

Rettig was recognized as one of the top 100 women lawyers in New York City by Crain’s New York Business, and represents blockchain and virtual currency companies in litigation and private arbitrations. She works with Fortune 100 companies on securities, shareholder derivative and contract disputes.

“We were really drawn to Manatt due to its groundbreaking approach to client services, which blends legal and business advisory services, as well as its bench of nationally recognized lawyers, consultants and technologists,” said Boiron. “We believe that the firm’s hybridized platform and collaborative culture will resonate with and be an invaluable resource for our clients as they prepare to tackle any challenge they may face in today’s new, and unprecedented, economy,” Rettig added.

 

Maja Zerjal Fink of Arnold & Porter

Maja Zerjal Fink joined Arnold & Porter’s Bankruptcy and Restructuring practice as a partner in New York City.

Zerjal Fink represents clients in corporate reorganizations and insolvency proceedings, and has been involved in some of the largest reorganization cases in the U.S., including the $74 billion restructuring of Puerto Rico’s outstanding debt load, as well as the $18 billion debt of Caesars Entertainment.

“I am very pleased to welcome Maja to the team. She is a talented lawyer with significant experience in some of the most complex bankruptcy cases and restructuring matters,” said Michael Messersmith, chair of the Bankruptcy and Restructuring group at Arnold & Porter. “Maja’s expertise, energy and business-focused mindset will complement our existing strengths and help our clients navigate the challenging restructuring landscape during this unprecedented time.”

Zerjal Fink was named a Pro Bono Star by Human Rights First and is a 2020 member of the International Insolvency Institute’s NextGen Class IX.

“I am thrilled to be joining Arnold & Porter’s world-class Bankruptcy and Restructuring practice,” Zerjal Fink said. “I look forward to expanding my practice and helping clients achieve their goals with a sophisticated and collegial team of lawyers.”

Jeffrey K. Cassin and Ross J. Switkes joined Norris McLaughlin as Members of the firm.

Cassin will serve as the lead corporate attorney in the firm’s Business Law Practice Group, and Switkes joined the Bankruptcy & Creditors’ Rights Practice Group in the firm’s New Jersey office.

Norris McLaughlin Chairman John N. Vanarthos said the additions of Cassin and Switkes are critical components of the firm’s pandemic strategy.

“To be able to provide services our clients need, in a time of need, is so crucial to us. We are excited to have Jeff bring our already-well-established business group to New York, and to have Ross as an essential member of our bankruptcy group is truly a testament to our firm’s commitment to client service,” Vanarthos said.

Cassin’s expertise includes representing companies at every stage of the corporate lifecycle, and has led successful acquisitions and divestitures and has closed transactions in restaurant management, media, technology and human capital.

“Norris McLaughlin’s approach throughout the pandemic has been to help clients work through it so they come out stronger on the other end, which is a value that I share. I’m excited to be joining the team,” Cassin said.

Switkes’ practice includes corporate restructuring, and commercial litigation, debtor/creditor rights and corporate restructuring. He currently serves as the Vice-Chair of the Lawyers Advisory Committee for the U.S. Bankruptcy Court, District of New Jersey, and is a Trustee of the Mercer County Bar Association.

“I am excited to join Norris McLaughlin and its Bankruptcy Group. It is a privilege to join such a well-respected team. Not only am I benefitting from having access to the kind of business platform and infrastructure that I need to grow my practice, but my clients will benefit from the opportunity to take advantage of the broader range of high-quality legal services that Norris McLaughlin offers, and they can do so without an interruption in value,” Switkes said.

Attorney Awards and Recognitions

The Utah State Bar Labor & Employment Law Section named Elizabeth “Terry” Dunningof Holland & Hart law firm as a recipient of its 2020 Lifetime Achievement Award.

Dunning graduated from Harvard Law School in 1977 and went on to achieve equity partnerships at two Am Law 200 firms in a career spanning four decades. Dunning is recognized as a top employment law attorney in Utah and nationwide, and she has dedicated her time to educating others in the profession, serving as a mentor to junior women attorneys.

“Terry truly is the whole package—she is smart, hard-working, and devoted to her clients, her colleagues, her community, and to the rule of law,” said Brit Merril, one of the newer members of Holland & Hart’s Employment team and Denning’s mentee. “Terry is an exceptional mentor, a skilled advocate, and the embodiment of civility and professionalism.”

In addition to her legal career, Denning has served in leadership roles on the Board of Trustees for the Presbyterian Church Foundation and the Committee on Mission Responsibility Through Investment for the Presbyterian Church.

The St. Louis Business Journal named Armstrong Teasdale Partner Sarah Sise as one of its Most Influential Business Women for 2020, selecting Sise as one of 24 recipients out of 225 nominations.

Sise is the co-leader of Armstrong Teasdale’s Employee Benefits and Executive Compensation practice and has over 20 years of experience in the field. Sise also serves as co-chair of Armstrong Teasdale’s Inclusion Committee and is involved in the firm’s Women’s Inclusion Network.

Paul Klimos of DLA Piper

DLA Piper announced Paul Klimos, an associate in DLA Piper’s Corporate Practice, was appointed to the Global Future Council on Agile Governance of the World Economic Forum (WEF). Klimos will begin his one-year period of membership on October 1, 2020.  The WEF Global Future Council’s is invitation only, and is comprised of thought leaders from across academia, business, civil society and government, dedicated to innovation and sustainability with an eye to the future.  Klimos’ experience working with emerging technologies and entrepreneurs will inform his time on the WEF Global Future Council.  In his practice, he represents emerging growth companies at all levels, as well as investors.

Nancy S. Shilepsky, partner in Sherin and Lodgen’s Employment Department, has been appointed to a three-year term as Employee Co-chair of the American Bar Association (ABA) Section of Labor and Employment Law’s International Labor and Employment Law Committee. Her term began on September 1, 2020 and will run through the end of August 2023.  In this role, Shilepsky will study and report on foreign labor relations law and employment practices, with an emphasis on US executives and foreign executives working in the US. Shilepsky, along with her role at Sherin & Lodgen, has an internationally recognized reputation in executive employment compensation.  On her role with the ABA, Shilepsky says:

The International Labor and Employment Law Committee has the unique responsibility of staying apprised of legal developments across the world. I’m honored to receive this appointment and look forward to working with members of the Committee to offer the most up-to-date analysis of international employment law.

Nancy is a leading influence in the world of executive advocacy and employment law and litigation and is a Fellow of the College of Labor and Employment Lawyers. She is a champion of the interests of individuals and a trusted counselor to executives, professionals, and partners across a wide range of industries. Nancy has established an internationally recognized reputation representing such clients in complex matters involving executive employment and compensation. She is known for her pioneering efforts in wrongful termination and discrimination cases. Her work includes a high-profile sexual harassment case involving the impact of the First Amendment on workplace speech restrictions and a landmark case dealing with the eradication of race-based discrimination in compensation.

The ABA’s Labor and Employment Law Section is comprised of more than 20,000 members who represent all perspectives of labor and employment law: management, union, plaintiff, neutral, and public. The Section is committed to a balanced discussion of employment issues throughout the world.

Sonny Haynes of Womble Bond Dickinson

Womble Bond Dickinson announced that Sonny Haynes, a partner in the Winston-Salem office, has been named one of the Minority Corporate Counsel Association (MCCA)’s Rising Stars for 2020. Attorneys who are given this honor must have at least eight years of experience in the legal profession, have leadership and achievements that are outstanding and have demonstrated a commitment to community service, pro bono work, and diversity, inclusion and equality.

Haynes fulfills these requirements through her practice focused on insurance defense, product liability and mass tort litigation.  She has been a member of the City of Winston-Salem’s Human Relations Commission since 2013, and she served on the Minorities in the Profession Committee of the North Carolina Bar association.  In her community, Haynes has recently focused on improving communication between community leaders and law enforcement on racial inequalities in the criminal justice system, among other community service efforts.

Law Firm Innovation and Development

“Necessity is the mother of invention,” and the stress and constraints of COVID-19 has inspired many ideas to facilitate the adaptation required by the virus. The Pandemic Technology Resource Center, operated at  PandemicIp.org is a non-profit website with a searchable database of COVID-19 adaption ideas and technology, contributed to the public domain.  The goal of this initiative is to ensure useful adaption ideas are spread quickly, to reduce the spread of COVID-19.  PandemiciP.org is led by Jim Sulciner, a technology entrepreneur for over 30 years and former CEO of RTD Company and the website PandemicIP.org was organized by the intellectual property law firm Schwegman Lundberg & Woessner, P.A. (Schwegman).

PandemicIP.org’s board members Janal Kalis, a partner at Schwegman, and Russell Slifer, a former Deputy Director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, infuse the endeavor with their expertise in patent licensing and commercialization.  This innovative website is a great place for users to search ideas and solutions, so others may benefit from the adaptations and discoveries made necessary by the virus. By sharing work, innovators can stand on each other’s shoulders and make the innovation’s required by these interesting times.

M&T Bank recently announced Nota, a Fintech tool designed to assist attorneys manage their trust accounts from their bank accounts.  The ABA recommends attorneys complete a three-way reconciliation process and balance their books against client ledgers and their bank statement.  Mistakes in this process can be time-consuming and expensive errors can lead to being out of compliance with state requirements and could mean inquiries, audits and possible disbarment. Nota was designed to simplify the trust account management process, creating a seamless and efficient tool for lawyers to adhere to their accounting requirements.  The tool was designed for small law firms and solo attorneys, which may not have extensive staff for accounting procedures.  Paul Garbian, president of Nota, says, “Nota is transforming the way lawyers manage their trust accounts.  We’ve reimagined the process by connecting it directly to the bank accounts and making it more intuitive, so attorneys spend less time managing their trust accounts and more time practicing law.”

We’ll be back with more legal industry news in two weeks.  Thanks for reading!

Copyright ©2020 National Law Forum, LLC

ARTICLE BY Eilene Spear and Rachel Popa of the The National Law Review / The National Law Forum LLC

 

For more articles on the legal industry, visit the National Law Review Law Office Management section.

Three Messages Next-Generation Recruits Need to Hear from Law Firms

By sheer numbers, millennials make up the largest generational group at midsize and large law firms today. Within the past few years, the oldest members of that generation began reaching partnership, and soon they will take over leadership positions as well. But the transition hasn’t been easy. Law firms know they must adapt in big ways to recruit, motivate and retain these lawyers, while at the same time working to stay relevant to firm clients. After all, the majority of legal services buyers will soon be millennials too.

Firms understand what matters to these younger lawyers; meaningful work, equity and inclusion, and work-life balance are all factors that determine where they choose to build their careers.

Most firms are at least beginning to reimagine some of the ways they do business in order to accommodate the needs of this new generation of lawyers. But not all law leaders grasp the important role communication strategy should play in their efforts to modernize. You might be taking the right steps, but how are you talking about that work with your target audience?

Here are three messages your firm must express:

 “We have a plan to make our firm more diverse and inclusive.”

Millennial lawyers know that most firms have been talking about diversity and inclusion for years without making much progress on advancing women, people of color, LGBT lawyers and lawyers with disabilities. They want to work for a firm that goes beyond lip service to articulate a plan of action and ambitious benchmarks that will hold leadership accountable for leaving the country club culture behind. What does that look like?

  • Provide PR support for diverse attorneys to help them build their profiles and develop business. Deploy your communications resources strategically to shine a light on your firm’s future superstars.
  • Address pay equity and the need for change. Millennials value authenticity, and they interpret silence on issues like this as complicity with unfair practices.
  • Demystify networking. Business development training and participation in professional associations can help these lawyers build their business in ways that feel natural and effective.
  • Equalize access and opportunity. How do cases and matters get staffed at your firm? Do you have a method for fairly distributing work and making sure a wide swath of your attorneys get to take a crack at high-profile work?

“We want you to have a life outside work — really.”

Millennials are more skeptical of institutions than past generations, and that means they are pretty good at spotting empty promises. So in order to appeal to these lawyers, your firm will have to get beyond platitudes and commit to specific policies and initiatives that encourage and protect work-life balance. How can you convince them you mean it?

  • Embrace flexible scheduling. Firms that will not budge on schedules virtually guarantee that parents — and women more often than men — will be forced to make impossible choices between their children and their career.
  • Destigmatize parental leave. Men and women both risk being viewed as “out of the loop” or not sufficiently committed to the firm if they choose to take time off after their babies are born, and that can have real negative consequences for their careers. Hold up and celebrate cases of men in leadership who take parental leave. Make it the new norm.
  • Address mental health issues head on. By now we’re all familiar with the alarmingly high incidence of depression, substance abuse and suicide among attorneys. Millennial lawyers want to know firms are not sticking their heads in the sand when it comes to mental health.

“We want you to succeed.”

Enduring and succeeding in the survival-of-the-fittest law firm culture may have been a badge of honor for generations past, but not for millennial lawyers. This cohort values collaboration and fairness more than gaining a competitive edge on their peers, and forward-thinking firms will adopt new policies and practices that assure millennial lawyers the game is not rigged. How can you communicate your support to these associates and younger partners?

  • Make your billable hour expectations transparent. According to the Young Lawyer Editorial Board of the American Lawyer, associates just want their new firms to be straight with them about how many hours they are expected to bill. And they don’t mean the published hours requirement.
  • Take mentorship seriously and prepare young lawyers to take advantage of it. Mentorship programs succeed when firms devote time and resources to them, and when they make thoughtful decisions about which partners should participate. (Not everyone is cut out to be a mentor, and that’s okay.)
  • Consider a sponsorship model. Sponsors move beyond the traditional mentoring engagement to advocate for their protégé. This may mean expanding the perception of the kind of work the lawyer can take on, brokering connections with other partners or with clients, or advocating when it comes time to staff cases. A sponsor uses his or her power and access to ease the younger lawyer’s advancement, particularly if that younger lawyer is a woman or other minority in the firm.

Firms who get their messaging right — and implement policies and processes that back those messages up — will be well-positioned to recruit the best and brightest next-generation lawyers.

© 2020 Page2 Communications. All rights reserved.

For more on the law firm workforce, see the National Law Review Law Office Management page.

Law Firms and Millennial Attorneys: Strategies to Develop Leadership Pipelines for Smooth Firm Transitions

Next year millennials will make up one-third of the workforce.  A recent study released by ManpowerGroup provides some compelling insight about millennials in the workplace.   The study asked 19,000 Millenials and 1,500 managers across 25 countries how they viewed their careers and what were their career priorities, with the goal of offering practical advice for millennials and their employers in the quickly evolving work environment.  The results offer some statistics and finding for employers generally, and law firms, specifically, have some lessons to take to heart.

According to the survey, 23% of the millennial respondents said making a lot of money is their main goal, 21% want to make a positive contribution and 20% want to work with great people.  But only 22% of the millennials surveyed indicated an interest in growing into leadership roles and only 4% of millennial respondents valued “managing others.”

These factors, when combined with the boomer exodus out of the workforce is pointing to a leadership vacuum across industries, with 84% of organizations anticipating a shortfall of leaders over the next five years.  In fact, leadership transitions are becoming more frequent and complex, and developing a leadership pipeline in law firms needs to become a top priority.  Law firms, when working with millennial attorneys, would be well-served to find ways to incentivize leadership, increase transparency surrounding firm decisions, especially the partnership process in order to create a leadership pipeline to ensure successful succession planning and relationship management.  To examine this issue, we spoke to several law firm consultants on the state of leadership in law firms,  how firms can engage and cultivate their millennial talent to take on leadership roles, and how marketing and business development teams fit into this process.

Importance of Developing Millennial Leadership and Talent at the Associate Level

Jonathan Kirschner, CEO of AIIR Consulting, points to conditions in law firms, that may make developing leadership habits in millennial attorneys more challenging.  In a traditional law firm structure, leadership at the associate level is not incentivized. Associates are valued for their ability to work hard and long, creating a situation where young lawyers are not encouraged to reach out and develop leadership skills, but rather rewarded for keeping their nose to the grindstone.  Kirschner says, “If a newly minted lawyer has to choose between a single billable hour and coaching a colleague or peer, the former is a much more useful currency in today’s traditional firm.”  Alycia Sutor of GrowthPlay points out that many of the characteristics that comprise good leaders are important to millennials–just divorced from the authoritarian and hierarchical packaging associated with a traditional law firm. Kirschner says, “firms need to do a much better job defining what leadership is and why it is important.  If leadership isn’t treated as a significant factor in promotability, then there is a strong chance it won’t be cultivated.”

The Role of Transparency and Feedback in the Law Firm Leadership Pipeline

Sutor points out that firm looking to secure their leadership pipeline would do well to “exemplify the kind of behaviors that millennials value–being more transparent . . . and being relationship-focused and investing in the success of the people at the firm.”  In doing so, firms can cultivate their high-potential talent and help ensure the firm’s leadership for years to come.  By providing young lawyers with feedback and offering mentorship and advice, Kirschner says, “associates become more self-aware of their strengths to leverage, develop key leadership skills, and cultivate client management skills, and firms will, in turn, build up bench-strength.”  Finding ways to offer feedback and evaluation–in a positive, affirming way can show young attorneys that they are an important part of the firm’s future.  John Remsen, Jr of the Remsen Group points out that providing positive feedback in a public setting can be an easy, inexpensive way to cultivate the kind of behavior law firm leadership wants to see, and help younger attorneys feel invested in turn with the firm.

As part of embracing transparency,  Kirschner suggests that eliminating some of the mystery around the Partnership approval process can help. Young attorneys are often likely confused and frustrated–they have the ambition and desire to reach that level, but don’t know what else is required beyond hard work.  Kirkschner says, “firms with great succession planning practices favor transparency over keeping a black-box around both the process as well as the necessary skills and competencies.”   By clarifying advancement criteria law firms can develop a system where important metrics are met, and this can open the door to non-billable activities the firm may want to encourage–such as pro-bono work or legal marketing activities.  Remsen  agrees, saying, “Everyone will give you what you want, if you indicate that it matters, set the expectations, apply metrics and ultimately reward the desired behaviors.”

Creating a Law Firm Culture to Develop Leadership Talent

According to Remsen: “There are things law firms can do beyond dollars to build a culture where young lawyers want to go and thrive.”  Law firms find extreme value in taking steps to craft a leadership pipeline, such as shifting the hierarchical structure to create a space for younger attorneys to flex their leadership abilities and shape the firm into a place where they want to be.

There are plenty of ways to do that, and Sutor says, “firm leaders can give millennials opportunities to practice leading on a small scale.”  Remsen agrees, suggesting law firms create “deputy” positions with the firm to encourage younger attorney engagement.  By getting more creative about leadership development, firms can reconfigure talent pipelines to create new leadership levels, Kirschner says, “this can increase career optionality and make mobility less of a zero-sum experience.”

Firms should also consider asking younger attorneys for input on firm culture issues–especially in relation to changes to make the firm more attractive to attract and retain talent.  Sutor suggests: “create opportunities for millennials to reverse mentor or teach others . . . charge them with connecting to others across the firm for the purpose of feedback and perspective on an issue up for discussion.”  Keep in mind this may open the door to some dramatically different suggestions about how the firm does things–especially surrounding work-life balance issues.  However, the changing dynamics of the job market coupled with millennials’ willingness to change jobs or even careers, large changes in workplace culture at law firms may well be worth considering.

Pro bono projects are excellent opportunities for young attorneys to take a leadership role, manage a matter, and contribute to their own development in a way that can make a difference both to the pro bono client and within the firm.  This can be a win-win for the firm and the attorney involved, as he or she can use their legal education to make a positive contribution (something a fifth of millennials surveyed want to do) while elevating the firm’s reputation in the community.

The Role of Business Development in Law Firm Leadership Development

Client relationship management is very important for a firm’s bottom line, and the voice of the client–a voice that is increasingly demanding diversity from outside counsel can be instrumental in advocating for the kind of change many firms need to enact.  Sutor says, “Marketing and Business Development folks can champion millennial participation by encouraging senior partners and law firm leaders to consider who may not be represented at the table in key activities like client pitches or network building activities.”  Sutor explains that the demand for diversity coming from clients also includes a generational perspective.  Including associate attorneys in business development activities with clients–including networking or other events, not just at pitch meetings, the relationship between firm and client can be strengthened across generational lines.  Increasingly millennials are also making key decisions in retaining law firms.  By using the voice of the client, marketing and business development teams can make a compelling argument for law firm leadership to examine the gaps in their age, gender and cultural representation and encourage the participation and development of younger attorneys.

Law firms that are able to find ways to engage and develop their millennial attorneys through firm initiatives are building a competitive advantage in the increasingly competitive legal marketplace.  By harnessing the voice of the client, crafting pathways and pipelines for young attorneys to contribute meaningfully to the culture of the firm as well as providing newer attorneys with feedback and training opportunities to develop their own skills and abilities, law firms can smooth out some of the succession bumps and ensure the next generation of leaders will be ready to take the reins.    Kirschner says, “The best way law firms can gain leadership capacity is by growing it organically.”

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