TechnoLawyer: Technology Industry/Legal Profession

Originally published on February 17, 2012 in our free SmallLaw newsletter. Instead of reading SmallLaw here after the fact, sign up now to receive future issues in realtime.

Rumor has it that Apple has 1,000 engineers working on chip design, and a similarly large number working on Siri. On top of these impressive numbers, Apple announced it would ship new versions of both iOS and OS X every year beginning with Mountain Lion this summer, and that it would open iCloud to third-party developers. In the midst of all this news, TechnoLawyer publisher Neil Squillante started hearing about embedded iPad systems, and engaged in a discussion about next-generation payment systems. So his mind began to wander about how large Apple could grow, and its impact on small law firms. The result is today's issue of SmallLaw about two lawyers named Jack and Diane. Also, don't miss the SmallLaw Pick of the Week (email newsletter only) for a contrarian take on Apple's announcements.

A Litty Ditty About Lawyers Jack and Diane: Law Practice in an Apple-Dominated Future

Jack wakes up to his iPhone 6 playing Bowie's Changes. He glances at the display. February 16, 2015. Better than that Mellencamp song from yesterday that reminded him of work. Bowie's stuttering chorus makes him think for a moment. "Was it really just three years ago that Apple announced OS X Mountain Lion? Since Apple audaciously announced it would ship major new versions of OS X and iOS every year? Since Apple's stock price reached $500 (now $1,000) and we all realized the iPad was taking over the world?"

Jack grabs his iPhone, opens the Lavazza app, and chooses an arabica ristretto shot. By the time he reaches the kitchen, his perfectly brewed cup of espresso awaits him. No sugar needed. After knocking it back, he holds down his iPhone's home button to summon Siri. "What happened since last night?"

Speaking through his Apple TV rather than through his iPhone, Siri tells Jack he has one voicemail message from his wife who is traveling and 10 email messages, including a new issue of SmallLaw (some things never change). "Shall I play your voicemail message and read your email messages?" "Just the voicemail," says Jack. "Queue up the email to play in the car. Load some Bowie songs too — just songs that charted and nothing after his Let's Dance album."

En route to his law firm, Jack stops at Target to pick up some items his wife told him to buy. At the self-checkout, the now ubiquitous embedded iPad point of sale system asks him whether he wants to pay by credit card, debit card, or Apple's iPay. Jack taps iPay and opens his iPay app on his iPhone. He enters his password, sees the virtual receipt appear in iPay, grabs the shopping bag, and heads to work.

Jack arrives at the office park. He swipes his ID card to open the turnstile in the lobby. "I wish they'd get an iOS-compatible security system like everyone else," he grumbles. Now outside his office door, he opens his ADT app on his iPhone and enters his password. The door unlocks. "First one here as usual."

Lying down on his office's chaise lounge, Jack grabs his iPad 4. After a few taps, the same brief he was reviewing nine hours ago on his iPad 3 at home appears. He flips to the next page and sees a new paragraph that makes him sigh. He switches off the iPad, gets up, and sits at his desk. He opens Microsoft Word on his Mac and opens the same document. It's on the same page. "Gotta love iCloud." He begins editing the problematic paragraph.

Still unhappy, Jack undoes his changes, summons the Messages app first introduced three years ago on that fateful February day, and sends a text message to his client's general counsel, Diane, who responds a few seconds later and transforms the text chat into a Facetime conference. "You're up early," she says. "Well, your brief is due tomorrow. Can you open it now?"

Thanks to his firm's iCloud-aware document management system, Diane opens the same document on her iPad. Having put down her iPhone, Jack sees the ceiling of her living room for a split second until her iPad automatically takes over and he sees her face again.

"You have a way with words, but this judge is old school," he says. "I think we should tone down this paragraph you added last night." Diane makes a few changes that Jack sees on his own screen in realtime. He likes Diane's changes, and cracks a smile thinking again about that Bowie song. "Just three years since law practice changed."

Neil J. Squillante is the publisher of TechnoLawyer.

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Small firm, big dreams. Written by practicing lawyers who manage successful small firms and legal technology and practice management experts who have achieved rock star status, this newsletter provides practical advice on management, marketing, and technology issues in small law firms, as well as comprehensive legal product reviews with accompanying TechnoScore ratings. The SmallLaw newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Today's issue of Fat Friday contains these articles:

Mazyar Hedayat, Is Legal Technology Doomed?

Jason Pink, Reviews of LastPass, Roboform, 1Password

Mark Mitchell, Review: Ergotron Workfit Station for Multiple Monitors

Nathan Schindler, Private Versus Public Clouds and How They Differ From iCloud

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Our most serendipitous offering, Fat Friday consists of unsolicited contributions by TechnoLawyer members. You'll no doubt enjoy it because of its mix of interesting topics and genuinely useful knowledge, including brutally honest product reviews and informative how-tos. The Fat Friday newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Coming today to BlawgWorld: Our editorial team has selected and linked to 101 articles from the past week worthy of your attention. Below you'll find a sample article from each section of today's issue, including our BlawgWorld Pick of the Week.

Is Worldox GX3 a Document Management Game Changer?

Review of AirStash: WiFi Flash Drive

Pepper Hamilton Names Non-Lawyer as CEO

Lawyers Debate the Usefulness of Social Media

Congratulations to Martha Sperry of Advocate's Studio on winning our BlawgWorld Pick of the Week award: Look Out PC, the iPad Now Handles Document Markups

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Coming today to BlawgWorld: Our editorial team has selected and linked to 98 articles from the past week worthy of your attention, including our Pick of the Week. Here's a sample:

A Review of Lexis Practice Advisor

Scanning on the Go, Wirelessly

Law Firm Headcount Up, but Demand Down (PDF)

A Lawyer's Claims Online Gets Him in Hot Ethical Water

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Today's issue of Fat Friday contains these articles:

Eamon Wall, Let's Not Forget Android's Advantage In The GPS Navigation World

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Question Of The Week: Please Share Your Top Technology Tip

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Legal Forms for the Price of a Song on iTunes?

The Most Tech-Friendly Airports and Airlines

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Law Firm SEO Is Not An Advertising Strategy

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Coming today to BlawgWorld: Our editorial team has selected and linked to 107 articles from the past week worthy of your attention, including our Post of the Week. Here's a sample:

CES 2012 Recap: Everything You Need to Know (Probably)

Xerox Unveils Mobile Scanner (That's It's Name)

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The Problem With Ambulance Chasing

This issue also contains links to every article in the January 2012 issue of Law Practice Today. Don't miss this issue or future issues.

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Originally published on September 6, 2011 in our free SmallLaw newsletter. Instead of reading SmallLaw here after the fact, sign up now to receive future issues in realtime.

I have a confession to make. Since covering the 2011 ABA TechShow for TechnoFeature, I've been wrestling with a vexing question …

Who the hell is Jay Shepherd and how will he earn a living?

Let me explain. On the eve of TechShow, a veritable Who's Who of legal pundits took the stage at Ignite Law 2011: Tom Mighell, Dennis Kennedy, Kevin O'Keefe, Carolyn Elefant, Marc Lauritsen, Jim Calloway, and of course Jay Shepherd. Wait a minute! Jay who?

Well whoever he was, he considered it appropriate to announce during his six minutes on stage that he would close his employment law practice to start Prefix, a consulting firm to help law firms abandon the billable hour.

My first thought was: Who cares? My next were: Too much imbibing at the cash bar? An attempt at free advertising? A cry for help? Still, I let go of the issue and chalked it up to a lawyer's ego (plenty of that to go around). So imagine my surprise when none other than the ABA Journal covered Jay's announcement.

Whoa. This guy's career move was national news? The whole episode got me wondering — why would anyone abandon a successful law practice to become a consultant? Not that it's unheard of. After all, a few years ago I did just that, only to be drawn back to the law once and for all.

While this SmallLaw column might arrive too late for Jay, let me explain to those of you still managing small law firms what will likely happen to Jay since I have traveled this path.

Commanding Attention Versus Begging for It …

Not long after I slipped the surly bonds of law practice in 2006 to live the jet-setting life of a legal practice consultant, I found out that lawyers don't think they need advice, and certainly won't pay for it.

Even free advice was of no interest to most lawyers. After all, if they had to change anything to make the advice work then it really wasn't "free" was it? Change is hard, new hardware and software costs money, and clients hire people, not technology. To the vast majority of lawyers, one good afternoon on the links and a vintage IBM PC (circa 1999) was more important than all the consulting in the world.

Of course, sometimes I would get a prospect to agree to a meeting. Inevitably however, I found myself talking to someone from IT with no grasp of the legal process, or explaining things to a partner who had already decided to cut out the middle man and have his teenage kids throw together a Facebook page. Ultimately, the process was more like selling encyclopedias than delivering professional services. And at no time did I feel as if I were selling "knowledge," a recurring theme in Jay Shepherd's promotional materials. On the contrary, I frequently had to beg for attention instead of command it, as I had when I was a lawyer.

Even if Jay manages to avoid such obstacles and get hired, how will his new business compare to his old business? We lawyers adhere to a simple principal — clients pay to cure pain, ward off fear, or have us deal with unpleasantness. Of course, it doesn't hurt that the law is utterly opaque, attorneys and courts have little patience for lay people, and the legislature and courts throttle competition from out-of-jurisdiction lawyers while keeping the barriers to entry high for recent law school graduates. All in all, you might say that clients have to hire us to get anything done.

By comparison, being a consultant is like playing Vegas. The field is clogged because any mope can call himself a consultant. Even when consultants get hired payment is still at the customer's mercy. Worst of all, consultants must span the credibility gap with prospects by selling themselves around the clock. That doesn't leave much time in which to sell knowledge — or help lawyers sell knowledge instead of hours.

Room for One More?

So, is there room for one more practice consultant in an unregulated field crowded with tireless self-promoters? After my experience a few years ago, I recommend that Jay keep one toe in the legal practice tide pool for now. And for all we know, that might be his game plan. When Jay also used his Above the Law column to announce his plans, one commenter sarcastically quipped that: "he said he was closing his law business, not necessarily quitting law practice. I expect that he will work out of his (mom's?) basement … as a solo practitioner doing legal work for several of his existing clients, but without having to carry the risks and costs of employees."

But practice consultants who try to wear both hats are often lousy lawyers. What's more, skills become dull surprisingly quickly, learning new tricks is never easy, and having the confidence of courts, colleagues, and clients is as important as making a good argument. Being a lawyer is as much about relationships as anything else, and those relationships rely on seeing and being seen by the right people every day.

What's a would-be consultant to do when he's too busy selling himself to be at the closing table, in the office, or in court? Does Jay understand what he's getting himself into?

Here's a lawyer about my age and experience level, with an established practice in a major metropolitan area, strong academic and peer credentials, several blogs and a popular column who experienced his share of wins and notoriety, and who by all accounts could have continued to practice.

Why the sudden zeal to fix our industry's broken billing model? Is it because he's a fellow at the Verasage Institute, an organization so inscrutable its name isn't even a real word? Or is it because the Institute taught him to "bury the billable hour and timesheets" as it boasts on its web site? Or is it because, as Jay writes in his biography on the Verasage web site, he is on a "mission to save the world from lawyers, and to save lawyers (and other professionals) from themselves"?

Or Has Jay Simply Painted Himself Into a Corner?

I guess what I'm saying is that Jay Shepherd might want to take a lesson from my experience, and not throw the baby out with the bathwater. He might also want to refrain from predicting the future at national events just in case things don't work out. And in the unlikely event that he's forced to take up law practice again, he might want to keep certain skills honed so he doesn't have to re-learn how to maintain credibility with his peers, acquire clients, try cases, hire good employees, and most importantly, fire bad ones.

I mean, look at me. As critical as I am of our profession and its broken systems, I still practice law and keep track of hours, expenses, and other business minutiae. Why? Because to paraphrase Churchill (and channel Tocqueville), the legal business is terrible … but consulting is far worse.

Written by Will County bankruptcy lawyer Mazyar M. Hedayat of M. Hedayat & Associates, P.C.

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Originally published on October 18, 2011 in our free BigLaw newsletter. Instead of reading BigLaw here after the fact, sign up now to receive future issues in realtime.

Law firms, lawyers, and recruiters all expect the best in any lateral move. The firms expect a superstar with a massive portable book. The lawyers expect a better platform — broader footprint (better technology, stronger cross-selling, etc.) on which to display their talent. Recruiters expect fat commissions, usually in the neighborhood of 25% of the moving lawyer's projected total annual compensation.

But sometimes lateral moves don't work according to plan. This month, we thought we'd catch up on recent lateral moves gone awry. And to make this task more challenging, we've avoided the low-hanging fruit. Suits over placement commissions are a dime a dozen. The stories below address some of the more-novel aspects of lateral moves gone wrong.

Look Before You Leap

Chris Gilbert's career was going swimmingly at K&L Gates, but he was happy to field a cold call from recruiter Diane Caldwell who told him he needed to escape from K&L Gates' lockstep compensation structure and move to a firm where his skills would truly be appreciated. According to Gilbert, she spun a tale of becoming a practice leader and making more money. According to Caldwell, he was a big boy — a partner no less — capable of making his own decisions.

Starry eyed, he left K&L Gates for Patton Boggs, but it didn't work out. Gilbert doesn't provide too much detail in his complaint of what went wrong, but the relationship didn't last long. He's now at Bryan Cave and has sued Caldwell for fraud, negligence, breach of contract, etc. She denies any responsibility.

Runaway Bride

Sometimes taking that extra day to think about a move causes a sea change in expectations. Much like a runaway bride, Stephen Kon just couldn't make that walk down the aisle. The SJ Berwin EU and competition boss was all set to move to Milbank Tweed, but at the last minute, he and partner Cameron Firth called the whole thing off. Kon and Firth were pretty well down the path, having tendered their resignations and been voted into the Milbank Tweed partnership.

SJ Berwin has a pretty good reputation, and is well within the top 20 UK firms, but Milbank Tweed is a global behemoth, which would have been quite the culture shock. Kon, as one of the founding partners of SJ Berwin, probably had more of an emotional attachment to the firm — although he was also one of the leads in the aborted merger discussions with Proskauer Rose. Kon is now likely one of the strongest contenders to take over as senior managing partner in the spring elections.

You Can't (Usually) Take It With You

Lawyers, perhaps because we write the rules, enjoy some unique benefits in our mobility. Unlike other professions where non-competes of various strictness may be enforced, lawyers have largely unfettered rights to take their files with them, all under the guise that the client's right to counsel of her choice shouldn't be restricted.

Some limits exist though, so departing lawyers have to make sure they're playing by the rules. Not surprisingly, spurned firms already feel insecure, which can cause them to react angrily when the files, and fees, walk out the door. Just ask Hunter Shkolnik who was sued by his former firm, Rheingold, Valet, Rheingold & McCartney.

Even more rare than seeking a TRO for the return of files as Rheingold Valet sought is an injunction against a lawyer's practicing for a period of time. Philadelphia personal-injury firm Kline & Specter recently sought one against an associate, claiming he had failed to give the required notice. An associate's departure might be one of the few cases in which a court could convince itself that the client still had access to the partners, although this case certainly seemed like a close call.

Making Them Pay

While we can't restrict our clients' access to the counsel of choice (notwithstanding the cases above), firms have figured out one way to keep wanderlusting lawyers around — cutting their retirement benefits. That's what Stroock & Stroock & Lavan did to Michael Perlis, a 20-year partner. Just weeks after taking his securities litigation team to Locke Lord, he sued for the retirement benefits the partnership agreement purported to cause him to forfeit.

Conclusion

Other than personal bonds and loyalty, both of which are apparently in short supply at many law firms these days, very few tools exist to keep a partnership together. It's no surprise that firms like Stroock have created contractual attempts to prevent departures.

Partner departures individually tend to have very little effect on large firms, but they are often early indicators of firms in trouble, and can become self-fulfilling prophecies. Looking back, early departures from firms like Brobeck and Howrey signaled something wrong beneath the surface. Then, people started connecting the dots and speculating. Partners started looking at their own options, worried they'd be left holding the bag, which kicked off the vicious cycle that led to the demise of these firms. One of the benefits of this BigLaw column and the Lateral Tracker is that they enable you to spot these trends early.

Written by Law Shucks, which curates and analyzes data on large law firm lateral hiring.

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Many large firms have good reputations for their work and bad reputations as places to work. Why? Answering this question requires digging up some dirt, but we do with the best of intentions. Published first via email newsletter and later here on our blog, BigLaw analyzes the business practices, marketing strategies, and technologies used by the country's biggest law firms in an effort to unearth best and worst practices. The BigLaw newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.

Originally published on September 20, 2011 in our free BigLaw newsletter. Instead of reading BigLaw here after the fact, sign up now to receive future issues in realtime.

August is usually a quiet month for large firm laterals, but this year it was hot, hot, hot. We'll highlight two trends — law firms entering new markets overseas and beefing up their talent in hot practice areas.

Kirkland's Hong Kong Coup and More International Expansions

The four big UK Magic Circle firms (e.g., Slaughter & May) and American firms like Baker & McKenzie and White & Case have long believed in having local presences around the world. We may be seeing a renaissance in that mindset as firms look at opportunities. And they're not necessarily playing nice about it.

The headline move for August was certainly Kirkland's grand entry into Hong Kong. In one fell swoop, Kirkland rounded up three corporate partners from Skadden (leaving eight), three from Latham, and one from Allen & Overy (along with a senior associate who is joining as a partner). Kirkland's bold move instantly gives the firm a significant presence in the market.

Kirkland immediately caused ripples as Skadden turned around and lured banking lawyer Clive Rough out of his recent retirement from Freshfields and moved in M&A partner John Adebiyi from London. Skadden has stated that it remains committed to the Hong Kong market, so additional moves should not surprise anyone. But as we noted last month, associates who aren't taken along with their departing partners need to be on layoff alert.

Other firms targeting international expansion include:

• Locke Lord and Troutman Sanders in London.

• Dewey & LeBoeuf in Kuwait (the firm already has four offices in the Middle East).

• Sheppard Mullin in Beijing by hiring a Squire Sanders partner.

Bird & Bird may or may not have been actively looking to expand in Germany, but the opportunity to pick up the Hogan Lovells Hamburg media team couldn't be passed up. That firm has been hemorrhaging lawyers in certain markets since last year's merger.

Another firm that saw an opportunity it couldn't resist was Linklaters, which made its first Paris lateral hire in four years, picking up a capital markets partner from Gide Loyrette Nouel. As we saw last month with Cravath's hire of Christine Varney, even the firms that have traditionally avoided lateral hires have reconsidered that strategy.

Serendipitously, LegalWeek just published a retrospective on Proskauer's foray into the London market, which highlights just how difficult it can be to break into a developed market (subscription required).

The Patent War Results in a Talent War

The HogLove merger was more opportunistic than anything, but Google's $12.5 billion acquisition of Motorola Mobility in August demonstrates why firms constantly seek partners in big-ticket practice areas.

Only Google knows all the reasons for its acquisition, but patents certainly played a role. As Bloomberg noted, when companies spend that much money on patents, smart law firms spend big bucks on patent lawyers.

Unfortunately, these firms must also compete with the technology giants' inhouse legal departments, which can offer options, better working conditions, and the opportunity to boss around former colleagues. Apple recently created a position for a head of IP litigation, which it filled with a former Sun lawyer. Apple also hired a new chief patent counsel from HP.

The Ghost of Ma Bell

Getting closed out of deals has always been a compelling reason to change firms — or, as David Boies most notably did, start your own. Rather than share fat telecom-deal fees, Carl Northrop decided to hang his own shingle, along with some of his former Paul Hastings partners, creating Telecommunications Law Professionals.

Much like Boies' frustration with Time Warner keeping him out of doing a deal for the Yankees, Northrop and company were none too happy about not being able to go up against the $39 billion AT&T/T-Mobile merger, which is spewing off tons of antitrust work now that it's been opposed (the FCC hired Renata Hesse from Wilson Sonsini in May to oversee the matter).

Low Margin Practice Areas and the Super-Boutique

On the flip side, once in a while a firm decides that it has a practice area it no longer wants to support. Not surprisingly, it's never M&A, IP, regulatory, or the like. It's always something far more plebeian and lower margin. CMS Cameron McKenna is exiting the immigration business, jettisoning 15 lawyers to Fragomen "an international firm specializing in immigration law." If you missed the link in BlawgWorld, read Jordan Furlong's take on this move, which he dubs the "rise of the super-boutique."

We've always felt that large firms only maintained immigration and similar practices as favors for high-net-worth individuals and major international corporate clients. These folks have finally realized that the help they need shouldn't be at the rates they're forced to pay.

Conclusion

Large firm moves aren't always about interpersonal relationships. They're often about the same economic drivers that motivate the business world — seeking out untapped markets, be it geographic or new services. This profit-driven model of law firms is also driving similar attitudes in partners, as they're constantly on the prowl for the BBD (Bigger, Better, Deal). This business first mindset results in a lot of churn as firms and partners try to maximize their profits with little long-term commitment.

Written by Law Shucks, which curates and analyzes data on large law firm lateral hiring.

How to Receive BigLaw
Many large firms have good reputations for their work and bad reputations as places to work. Why? Answering this question requires digging up some dirt, but we do with the best of intentions. Published first via email newsletter and later here on our blog, BigLaw analyzes the business practices, marketing strategies, and technologies used by the country's biggest law firms in an effort to unearth best and worst practices. The BigLaw newsletter is free so don't miss the next issue. Please subscribe now.