Page 10 - Final QVM 27 PDF_Neat
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Private Draft QVM - Quality, Value, and Metrics
Enable business organizations and lawyers to generate a detailed written report of quality
service provisions that might be used to fulfill requirements of accrediting and regulatory
agencies;
Assist students and practicing professionals in understanding the components involved in
providing quality legal services; and
Educate business owners and corporate counsel about the indicators of quality legal services
and how they can be measured.
Summary
The legal profession has operated under ethical standards defined by more than 100 institutions.
The scope of the ethics rules vary from country to country.34 Though recent versions are more
aspirational, their common denominator is they are “Thou shalt nots.” While not uniform
worldwide, they are generally based upon the principle of protecting the unsophisticated client.
They generally do not address the expectations of the business or the institutional client that
assumes their attorney complies with ethics rules.
What do not exist are qualitative measurable standards related to businesses law. Measurable
quality standards are very different in that they presume fundamental adherence to ethical
principles. Until recently, measurable standard were particularly hard to quantify. Today, it is both
practical and possible to objectively quantify them. Effectiveness and efficiency can be measured
based upon standards. As the ethical standards are being harmonized, the measurable quality
standards also deserve to be harmonized or at least unified globally.
Today, the lack of any established measureable standards means that the four interested
constituencies – bar associations, lawyers and law firms, new LPS models and business/institutional
clients – have a truly unique opportunity to establish them almost on a tabula rasa.
34 The trend is to harmonize ethical rules. Andrew Boon, The Globalization of Professional Ethics? The Significance of Lawyers’ International
Codes of Conduct, ACADEMIA,
http://www.academia.edu/179509/The_Globalization_of_Professional_Ethics_The_Significance_of_Lawyers_International_Codes_of_Con
duct; see also USPTO, HARMONIZED ETHICAL STANDARDS, THE NEW USPTO RULES OF ETHICAL STANDARDS,
https://www.uspto.gov/ip/boards/oed/TM_OED_Slides_9July2013.pdf ; see also Laurence Etherington & Robert Lee, Ethical Codes and
Cultural Context: Ensuring Legal Ethics in the Global Law Firm, IND. J. OF GLOBAL LEGAL STUDIES (2007),
http://www.repository.law.indiana.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1346&context=ijgls; see also Susan Saab Fortney, Challenges and
Guidance for Lawyering in a Global Society, 38 ST. MARY’S L. J. 849, 850 (2007); see also Laurel Terry, Putting the Legal Profession’s
Monopoly on the Practice of Law in a Global Context, 82 FORDHAM L. REV. 6, http://fordhamlawreview.org/wp-
content/uploads/assets/pdfs/Vol_82/No_6/Terry_May.pdf.
9
Enable business organizations and lawyers to generate a detailed written report of quality
service provisions that might be used to fulfill requirements of accrediting and regulatory
agencies;
Assist students and practicing professionals in understanding the components involved in
providing quality legal services; and
Educate business owners and corporate counsel about the indicators of quality legal services
and how they can be measured.
Summary
The legal profession has operated under ethical standards defined by more than 100 institutions.
The scope of the ethics rules vary from country to country.34 Though recent versions are more
aspirational, their common denominator is they are “Thou shalt nots.” While not uniform
worldwide, they are generally based upon the principle of protecting the unsophisticated client.
They generally do not address the expectations of the business or the institutional client that
assumes their attorney complies with ethics rules.
What do not exist are qualitative measurable standards related to businesses law. Measurable
quality standards are very different in that they presume fundamental adherence to ethical
principles. Until recently, measurable standard were particularly hard to quantify. Today, it is both
practical and possible to objectively quantify them. Effectiveness and efficiency can be measured
based upon standards. As the ethical standards are being harmonized, the measurable quality
standards also deserve to be harmonized or at least unified globally.
Today, the lack of any established measureable standards means that the four interested
constituencies – bar associations, lawyers and law firms, new LPS models and business/institutional
clients – have a truly unique opportunity to establish them almost on a tabula rasa.
34 The trend is to harmonize ethical rules. Andrew Boon, The Globalization of Professional Ethics? The Significance of Lawyers’ International
Codes of Conduct, ACADEMIA,
http://www.academia.edu/179509/The_Globalization_of_Professional_Ethics_The_Significance_of_Lawyers_International_Codes_of_Con
duct; see also USPTO, HARMONIZED ETHICAL STANDARDS, THE NEW USPTO RULES OF ETHICAL STANDARDS,
https://www.uspto.gov/ip/boards/oed/TM_OED_Slides_9July2013.pdf ; see also Laurence Etherington & Robert Lee, Ethical Codes and
Cultural Context: Ensuring Legal Ethics in the Global Law Firm, IND. J. OF GLOBAL LEGAL STUDIES (2007),
http://www.repository.law.indiana.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1346&context=ijgls; see also Susan Saab Fortney, Challenges and
Guidance for Lawyering in a Global Society, 38 ST. MARY’S L. J. 849, 850 (2007); see also Laurel Terry, Putting the Legal Profession’s
Monopoly on the Practice of Law in a Global Context, 82 FORDHAM L. REV. 6, http://fordhamlawreview.org/wp-
content/uploads/assets/pdfs/Vol_82/No_6/Terry_May.pdf.
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