It helped to know that I am not alone and that there are other like-minded women leaders out there.
Capital Partner | Linebarger Goggan Blair & Sampson
New York, NY
New York, NY
It helped to know that I am not alone and that there are other like-minded women leaders out there.
The Managing Partner Forum is a go-to resource for not only what’s currently important to law firm leaders, but how law firm leaders are dealing with the issue of the moment and preparing for those of the future.
We have enjoyed working with John Remsen and his talented team. The Managing Partner Forum provides excellent content that truly assists in operating a successful business in today’s challenging environment.
The MPF programs always provide relevant, timely educational content. They are high energy and interactive which makes them fun to attend, too.
Great conference, thank you for the invitation.
The information sharing at the MPIEs is especially valuable.
My partner and I really enjoyed the conference and we look forward to attending again next year.
Connecting with other firm leaders, as it felt more like a ‘retreat’ than a ‘conference.’ Fantastic format allowed for great information and advice sharing.
I go to a lot of conferences, and your event is the one I look forward to and gain the most from each year. The power of this group is incredible. So privileged to be a part of it. Thank you for what you do for our industry.
Connecting with other firm leaders, as it felt more like a ‘retreat’ than a ‘conference.’ Fantastic format allowed for great information and advice sharing.
ATL was a great time, and I really enjoyed the conference, as always.
That was my first experience at the conference, and it was tremendously valuable.
Great job! Keep it going. Thank you for the excellent work you do for the profession.
The collegiality and brainstorming opportunities can’t be beat.
The MPF Conference is always a great event. The MPIEs and Workshops were really good this year.
The program topics are timely and well presented. Every time I attend, I learn something new.
MPF is on top of the issues facing firm leaders, often before we even see them coming in our own firms, and provides timely advice from industry experts to see us through them.
I highly recommend the MPF Leadership Conference. I’ve participated many times, as have several of my partners. We leave with new ideas and fresh perspectives every time.
Hands down the best leadership conference for managing partners I’ve ever attended.
This is my 12th or 13th time attending, and it’s always the best conference I attend every year.
The MPIEs are interesting, informative and very useful!
I look forward to this Conference every year. It really helps me to be a more effective firm leader.
MPF provides tremendous value and excellent resources. Great information. Great speakers. Great networking opportunities.
The full 140-page report – called the “Stay Study” – details the key factors driving associates’ decisions to remain at their law firms. It reflects data collected from 3,367 associates from 57 participating US and Canadian law firms. The “Stay Study” identifies the key reasons that associates elect to remain at their firms, collecting data on 15 factors important to associates (including firm policies, benefits, mentoring, firm culture, DEI support, and work/life balance) and segmenting the findings by seniority, firm size and location, and demographic cohorts. Not surprisingly, here are the top five reasons associates stay at their firms:
Click here to learn more about the complete Stay Study.
NALP (National Association of Law Placement) has more than 3,000 members, including legal career professionals advising law students, lawyers, law offices, and law schools in North America and beyond. The NALP Foundation was formed in 1996 and is dedicated to advancing excellence in leadership, management, professional development, and professionalism.
Our MPF Featured White Paper is the recently published report called 2023 Lateral Partners Satisfaction Survey published by Major, Lindsey & Africa. This report has been published annually since 1996, and here are some the highlights this year:
The report is long but, if nothing else, we encourage you to read the Executive Summary within the first few pages of the report…especially if your firm is on the prowl for lateral partners.
Published by our friends at Thomson Reuters. This 30-page report writes about differences observed between “dynamic” and “static” law firms over the past decade, and it is worth a read by leaders of smaller and midsize law firms. Although directed mostly at AmLaw 200 firms, here are some of the lessons to be learned:
Make sure to take in the last section of this report – “Lessons Learned and Conclusions.”
Everybody seems to be on the prowl for laterals these days, but how much to compensate them? Dan is a Washington, DC-based headhunter and was on the faculty of our most recent Fall Symposium. He is the former President of the National Association of Legal Search Consultants, and is one of the best in the business. In this article, Dan outlines key metrics, how compensation gets paid, transparency and other important factors to consider.
Many smaller and mid-size law firms say that “strategic growth” is among their top short-term and longer-term priorities. Often their leaders talk about going after “laterals with books of business.” Yet, the failure rate for lateral hiring at the partner level is quite astonishing. Frequently, there is a lack of adequate due diligence in vetting potential laterals and, once the deal is made, successful integration falls short. In many cases, the “book of business” never materializes.
The cost and distraction of mistakes in this area can be devastating, especially for smaller firms. Read this White Paper to learn the keys to successful lateral hiring.
In this two-page article, Sharon sets forth practical and effective initiatives that your firm can implement today to retain young lawyers and support staff. By communicating with your talent, providing the proper tools and giving opportunities to grow along the way, you are more likely to retain your attorneys so they will become the next generation of partners and leaders at your firm.
Back in the day, a young lawyer made partner after working hard for seven to eight years. More often than not, that young lawyer remained at the same firm for a life-time, and the largest law firms at the time had 150 lawyers. What a difference we’ve seen in the last generation! Today, 29 US law firms have more than 1,000 lawyers with hourly rates soaring past $1,000, and top earners taking home well north of $10 million a year. This article looks at developments at several firms AmLaw 100 firm in recent years.
According to recent MPF surveys, two of three mid-size US law firms have moved some or all of their IT systems to the Cloud. And one of our most-read articles in many months discussed the ethical considerations of cloud computing for lawyers and law firms. Among the myths Morris addresses in the article:
Morris is the founder of Tabush Group, and was on the faculty at our MPF Leadership Conference in May.
MidLaw enjoyed solid growth in 2018, and client-driven trends may hold even more opportunities for well-run mid-size US law firms.
For many years, our colleagues at Altman Weil have been tracking merger and acquisition activity among US law firms. In 2017, they track 102 such combinations. The average size of the acquired firm is 27 lawyers with the Southern US identified as the most active region. Here are a few other highlights in this year’s MergerLine report.
Consolation is a clear and ongoing trend in the US legal market, and Altman Weil has been tracking law firm merger activity since 2006. After a post-recession dip in the number of law firm combinations, 2016 was the fourth consecutive year with more than 80 mergers and acquisitions. Here are some of the more interesting highlights in this report:
In addition to the report itself, there are four good articles, including one entitled “Is this Merger a Good Idea?”
Forum Faculty member John Smock and his partners recently wrote this assessment of how law firms are performing in the midst of the current economic downturn. And it’s not as bad as you might think for the well-managed law firm.
Founded in 1971, the Association of Legal Administrators (ALA) has grown to more than 10,000 members in 30 countries. If your firm is looking for a new administrator, its Career Center has a number of articles and resources that will be helpful to you, including:
– Evaluating Your Firm’s Needs
– The Candidate Search Process
– Defining the Role of the Firm Administrator
– How to Succeed When Hiring for the First Time
Even today, 60% of mid-size commercial law firms do not have a written strategic plan. Among those that do, 90% report that it has led to improved firm profitability and performance. Why, then, do most firms still not have a firm-wide plan? The reasons vary…but it’s not really that hard if you go about it in a thoughtful, systematic way.
MPF CEO John Remsen, Jr. led a Web seminar presented by the ABA’s Law Practice Management Section in September 2011. Panelists included MPF Advisory Board member, Vince Valenza, Managing Principal McNamee Lochner in Albany, New York, and Bob Young, Managing Partner of English Lucas in Bowling Green, Kentucky. Allison Shields was the moderator.
This is a timely and helpful program if your firm is thinking about embarking on a strategic planning initiative. Click here for more information and to download the session.
Generations at Work ($27, AMACOM) is an invaluable resource to help firm leaders understand and appreciate the differences of these four generations within the firm, and provides workable solutions to bridge the gaps among them. It comes highly recommended by our friends at the Association of Legal Administrators (ALA).
If we could only recommend one book to a lawyer in private practice, it would be True Professionalism ($26, Simon & Schuster)! Maister’s lesson is clear: believe passionately in what you do and never compromise your standards and values. Act like a true professional, aim for excellence and the money will follow. The challenge for leaders is to find the strength and courage to do what we know is right. A must read.
The Complete Guide to Understanding, Controlling and Stopping Bullies and Bullying at Work ($21.95, Atlantic Publishing) offers guidance in identifying and defining workplace bullying, including how to identify characteristics of a bullied employee, pathological characteristics of workplace bullies and indicators of a toxic workplace. Written in a clear, concise style and peppered with case studies throughout, this 285-page book provides valuable information on work.
Despite BigLaw’s obsession with growth and firm size over the past ten years, many of the largest US firms are taking more measured and strategic approaches to growth, according to the 2016 NLJ 500 Survey of the Nation’s Largest Law Firms. Others are intentionally down-sizing to improve their competitive positions.
In Katelyn’s short article, she observes some interesting trends in today’s evolving legal market. Here are a few findings:
According to research by Cushman & Wakefield and published in its annual report called Bright Insight, these are the top six factors today’s young lawyers look for in a law firm:
Yet, according to MPF surveys, many firms are doing little, if anything, to adapt to the next generation of lawyers. For example, less than a third of mid-size firms provide leadership and/or business development training for their associate attorneys.
As the administrator of a mid-size firm, Jennifer finds herself in the trenches and offers solid advice if your firm wants to attract and retain young talent.
Millennials have now surpassed GenXers as the largest generation in the US workforce and will soon constitute the highest percentage of lawyers in private practice. Yet, many law firm leaders and their firms remain vexed by the challenges associated with attracting and retaining tomorrow’s legal talent.
This great article was brought to our attention by Dr. Sharon Meit Abrahams, and it says that Millennials seek the following attributes in their work environments:
According to Cushman & Wakefield’s 2015 National Legal Sector Benchmark Survey Results, mentoring, collaboration, diversity of work and partnership opportunities are key factors in keeping young lawyers from leaving your firm.
What’s your firm doing to build and maintain an environment that attracts and retains your top young lawyers?
Be very strategic and deliberate if your firm plans to grow through lateral hiring at the partner level, because you can’t afford to make mistakes! Consider these findings:
Our advice? Conduct thorough due diligence on the front end to make sure you’re bringing in the right people and, as you do, make sure they’re fully integrated into your firm and its culture. This article dispenses some great guidance.
While the vast majority of managing partners of smaller and mid-size firms say their firms want to maintain independent, it’s interesting to note that merger activity among US law firms is at all-time high according to The American Lawyer. Citing Altman Weil’s latest merger report, Houston and Chicago are the hottest markets for law firm expansion, and most mergers involve larger firms acquiring smaller boutique firms to establish a new area of expertise.
We met Bob Denney almost 30 years ago at a conference in Minneapolis, and we've been good friends ever since. He is a pioneer in law firm management and marketing. In his July 2015 Legal Communiqué, Bob lists 15 "red flags" that often arise as law firms consider a combination. Among them:
We've worked with numerous firms over the past several years on this question, and our advice is often the same:
In far too many law firms, the path to partnership is unclear and unspoken. For many, it’s a matter of time served, coupled with the fact that the would-be partner has done a reasonably good job meeting minimum billable hour and/or collections requirements (most of the time anyway) and hasn’t pissed off too many partners along the way.
We think there’s much more to it than that. We also think that the path to partnership and the criteria to achieve (and maintain) status as an equity partner should be clear and in writing.
Owners of law firms should act and contribute like owners, not loyal employees. And that means, among other things, mentoring younger lawyers, active participation in governance, and a book of business.
These articles discuss the issue.
No doubt, the legal profession has experienced tumultuous change over the past 20 years. Accelerated by the Great Recession, many of these developments are permanent and will forever change the business of law, the experts seem to agree.
In her well-researched article, Susan discusses ten trends to which successful law firms must adapt. They include:
At the end of the article she sets forth numerous questions that you, as managing partner, should be asking other leaders of your firm.
In July 2012, Sterling Strategies conducted some interesting research attempting to identify the characteristics of the “model partner” in a law firm. According to John’s research, the characteristics, in order of importance, are:
As we’ve written many times, owners of law firms should act and contribute like owners, not long-time employees. And that means, among other things, good citizenship, sharing, teamwork, and a book of business!
We like two-tiered partnership structures and, for most law firms, they make a lot of sense for a lot of reasons.
Simply stated, owners of law firms should act and contribute like owners, not employees. And that means, among other things, mentoring younger lawyers, active participation in governance, and a book of business. There’s more to it than time served.
The two-tiered structure enables the firm to keep competent legal technicians who’ve been around awhile and have much to contribute – but don’t bring what it takes to be an owner – on the payroll.
This article contends that companies that are good at growing leaders do so in the trenches at the “line manager” level, not through their HR departments. That would equate to a department head and practice group leader in the context of a law firm. It includes a “Leadership Development Checklist” on how to grow great leaders.
This thought-provoking article was featured in Law Practice Today, the ABA’s monthly online magazine. In it, William Blackburn reports on a growing number of law firms that have adopted new models of governance to help them survive, even thrive, in both good times and bad. He profiles numerous firms that have implemented broad-based sustainability initiatives — cultural, social, economic, environmental, and financial — to ensure their long-term prosperity and well-being.
This article from ALA’s Legal Management magazine provides numerous practical, common-sense ways a law firm can improve its profitability. Among its suggestions: Stay current on collections and invest in technology to improve efficiency.
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The law firm merger market is starting to reawaken according to separate reports published by Hildebrandt International and Altman Weil. Although both reports show that firms aren’t ready to resume the highly aggressive growth strategies contemplated just 18 months ago, the market has started to heat up again. However, "it has turned from a seller’s market to a buyer’s market when it comes to acquiring small firms,” says Altman Weil consultant Bill Brennan.
Research firm Catalyst conducted a survey of minority female lawyers and offers these insights into why most of these women are leaving law firms within the first five years.
This article starts off by asking "Are you going to follow the lemmings or set your own course?" The lemmings that Cobb refers to are firms that make merger and acquisition decisions based on practice trends or in order to keep up with the firm down the street. Learn the three key models that will help you determine whether merger is in your future and set your own course.
This is a quick read. Peruse these perspectives on social networking from the different generations in the workplace.
How do you communicate with the younger professionals in your firm without sounding like an adult in a PEANUTS cartoon? “Wa-wah, wa-wah.” Haserot specializes in helping firms get things done by understanding the different communications styles, work ethics and career goals across the generations. Take these tips into your next team meeting.
Diversity is on the minds of most managing partners and it’s definitely important to your clients and prospective recruits. This article touches on the economics associated with creating a "family-friendly" workplace.
At no other time in our nation’s history have we had this many different generations – Baby Boomers, Gen Xers and Millenials – working side-by-side. See if you can identify with any of the characteristics for your generation and learn how to mentor the people from other age ranges inside your firm.
Attracting and retaining young lawyers is a vexing issue for leaders of smaller and mid-size law firms. Let’s face it. Today’s young lawyers are quite different than their counterparts from 30 and 40 years ago. We hear it all the time. They want work/life balance, lots of attention and feedback, and state-of-the-art technology. Many will bounce around from job to job, and only half say they want to be an equity partner of a law firm.
Larry suggests that law firms implement several institutional and individual practices to engage your young legal talent. Engagement leads to longer tenure, improved productivity and increased job satisfaction. These practices center around the concepts of:
This is a solid (and short) article with great ideas that your firm should take seriously.
We’ve all read about the disappointing results many firms have had with lateral hiring, with failure rates as high as 60-70% according to some reports. The cost and distraction associated with a bad deal can be devastating, especially for smaller and mid-size law firms. This article looks at what BigLaw is doing to improve its batting average in this area:
Our advice to leaders of smaller and mid-size firms? Conduct adequate due diligence on prospective lateral hires. In addition, develop an agreed upon written integration plan and check-in monthly to make sure it is being implemented.
BigLaw, with their highly paid recruiting and professional development staffs, is doing a pretty fair job articulating and enforcing the criteria to become an equity partner. Unfortunately, this is not the case for many smaller and mid-sized firms. In this brief article, David does a nice job outlining some of the best practices in this critically important area. Here are four of them:
How is your firm doing at grooming its future owners?
This short article (about 1,200 words) sets out what I’ve learned over the years about what law firms must do to attract and retain younger lawyers. Like it or not, today’s younger lawyers tend to want different things from their legal careers than their senior counterparts. Here are four of the things we recommend that law firms do:
Check out the article to read all 13 of them.
On occasion, we kick off the MPF Leadership Conference with a keynote presentation to set the stage for the Conference. In 2018, we invited Patrick Fuller to present an overview of the legal industry based on data collected by ALM Intelligence. It’s a tough market place out there, full of change and volatility. Here are a few highlights:
At MPF, we believe that these and other long-term trends present exciting opportunities for well-run smaller and mid-size firms with focused plans and effective leadership.
After months of meetings and due diligence, your firm has just landed a five-star recruit – a young hot-shot lateral hire with an oh-so-attracive book of business. Now what? Too often, we find that firms don’t do a particularly good job of fully integrating their new super-stars into the firm. With proper planning, you can make sure your firm’s laterals hit the ground running and get off to a great start.
In this four-page article Mary Kate provides some terrific ideas from a young lawyer’s perspective. Here are five of her suggestions:
These ideas may seem like common sense (and they are), but it’s surprising how many law firms do not have an effective and consistent onboarding process in place.
