Law firms are often shocked and surprised when a partner or a group of attorneys announces their departure. We preach advance planning for law firms to avoid this element of surprise where possible. Well-managed firms try to anticipate situations that
Continue Reading 5 Law Firm Events That Can Trigger Partner Departures
We frequently address how law firms can use partnership agreements to disincentivize partners from departing the firm. Protecting the firm through the partnership agreement is an important way for law firms to manage the risks of partner departures. The partnership
Continue Reading Which Law Firm Partners Should Stay and Which Should Go?
Partner departures typically are very disruptive to law firms. In the near term, partner and group departures can create short term revenue shocks, create holes in the firm’s expertise, foster uncertainty for those who remain, and damage morale, to name
Continue Reading How Savvy Law Firms Protect their Firm from Partner Departures
In today’s rapidly changing legal marketplace, law firms must prepare for potential partner departures before they happen, with detailed plans for reacting if a partner or group of attorneys leaves the firm for another firm. But partners or groups leaving
Continue Reading Succession Planning for (Dearly) Departed Partners
Here it comes again, that dreaded thing: New Year’s resolutions. Yes, just when all of us were ready to turn the page on 2020 and embrace a new year with new possibilities, so far, the turmoil does not seem to
Continue Reading Law Firm Risk Management Goals for 2021
It has been almost two years since the California Supreme Court issued its decision in Heller Ehrman v. Davis Wright (2018) 4 Cal.5th 467, holding that a dissolved law firm has no property interest in fees generated after dissolution
Continue Reading Looking at Your Firm’s Balance Sheet: Law Firm Clients, and Lawyers, are Not Property
While it is a good practice for any law firm to periodically assess its exposure to potential partner departures, the pandemic’s impact on law firms has made this task more important than ever. Doing so involves taking a candid look
Continue Reading Is Your Law Firm Prepared for the Next Partner or Group Departure?
Does your firm have Non-Equity Partners? Of Counsel, Consulting, or Contract Attorneys? All of the above? What is the nature of their relationship with the firm, and how are they compensated? Are these attorneys paid as employees (W-2), independent contractors
Continue Reading What’s in a Title? How Law Firms Define the Lawyers that work at the Firm Matters
As the legal industry continues to adjust to life during a pandemic, things are still changing every day as law firms make economic and other adjustments to their traditional ways of doing business. And all this change is likely to
Continue Reading Law Firm Formations and Transformations
As the legal industry continues to adjust to life during a pandemic, some law firm transitions and transformations inevitably will lead to law firm closures and dissolutions. We have seen numerous headlines of law firms, big and small, actively tightening
Continue Reading Managing Law Firm Dissolutions in Uncertain Times
