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Leaders in Legal Business
all but the small handful of cross-border law firms. When you don’t have an international presence and you need
access to reliable foreign expertise for referral purposes, a law firm network fits your bill very nicely.
Post-globalization, however, and especially now that countless large and even some midsize firms have
planted their own flags in foreign soil, these networks must reexamine their purpose and value. Some have already
scaled themselves down to service smaller and midsize firms inherently limited to local footprints, while others
have sought to institute best-practice standards in order to become more appealing to clients. Law firm network
members are naturally inclined toward independence; building and enforcing a pattern of inter-dependence among
those firms will be a major challenge. Nonetheless, it also looks like the inevitable next step in these networks’
evolution.
Professional Developers
Few aspects of the legal support ecosystem have seen their roles internalized within law firms as
thoroughly as professional development has. Along with legal publishing, professional developers, or “PDs,” are
one of the oldest services provided to lawyers, traditionally through continuing legal education (CLE) courses
conducted in local lecture halls and hotel ballrooms nationwide. Today, however, many solo practitioners and
small-firm lawyers choose and organize their own CLE schedules from among an array of low-cost, free, and
online CLE providers, while large firms have hired PD directors and established their own internal training
systems, practice update services, and even “academies” and “universities.”
Tomorrow’s “CLE” will bear little resemblance to yesterday’s one-to-many, in-person, knowledge-update
gatherings of unpaid lecturers and expert panels of talking heads. Both private sector and in-house providers of
professional development will shift their focus away from “what’s new in the law” toward skill-building sessions,
client-relationship role-playing, hands-on legal technology engineering, and other practical applications of legal
expertise. Lifelong, multi-dimensional learning will come to be seen as a natural part of basic lawyer competence,
and likely will be regulated, administered, and enforced as such. The professionalization of PD will only accelerate
and add new dimensions in the coming years.
Marketers
It wasn’t easy to be a legal marketer when lawyer advertising was a de facto ethical violation. It wasn’t
easy when the typical lawyer’s view on the subject was that “the good work I do is all the marketing I need.” It’s
still not easy today, when many in-house marketers are consumed by RFP responses and many outside marketing
consultants still need to explain to lawyers why blogs are a good idea. By any measure, legal marketing has
matured and flourished within the legal profession incredibly rapidly. Very few lawyers today believe that
marketing has no value or that they can handle all their marketing activities themselves. Now the game is shifting,
and the challenges are becoming greater.
The inevitable evolution of legal marketing is toward legal sales. Sales consulting already takes place
now, although it operates under the pseudonym “business development,” because lawyers can’t bear to use such
a lowbrow and unsophisticated word as “sales.” The whole point of marketing is to open the door to which
business can walk, and business is not even going to approach the door without some direct sales efforts to bring
it there. Few other businesses artificially partition “sales and marketing” the way law does, and reunification of
these two related elements inevitably will take place in the coming years. Legal marketing and legal business
development are going to merge, bringing together two separate yet intimately linked skill sets to the ultimate
benefit of the practice of law.
Technologists
The typewriter was technology, as were the photocopier, the fax machine, and dial-up modems accessing
the “information superhighway.” Since the first lawyer dipped a quill pen into an inkwell, technology has been an
integral part of law practice. It’s a mistake to believe legal technology started with email or Amicus Attorney or
4
all but the small handful of cross-border law firms. When you don’t have an international presence and you need
access to reliable foreign expertise for referral purposes, a law firm network fits your bill very nicely.
Post-globalization, however, and especially now that countless large and even some midsize firms have
planted their own flags in foreign soil, these networks must reexamine their purpose and value. Some have already
scaled themselves down to service smaller and midsize firms inherently limited to local footprints, while others
have sought to institute best-practice standards in order to become more appealing to clients. Law firm network
members are naturally inclined toward independence; building and enforcing a pattern of inter-dependence among
those firms will be a major challenge. Nonetheless, it also looks like the inevitable next step in these networks’
evolution.
Professional Developers
Few aspects of the legal support ecosystem have seen their roles internalized within law firms as
thoroughly as professional development has. Along with legal publishing, professional developers, or “PDs,” are
one of the oldest services provided to lawyers, traditionally through continuing legal education (CLE) courses
conducted in local lecture halls and hotel ballrooms nationwide. Today, however, many solo practitioners and
small-firm lawyers choose and organize their own CLE schedules from among an array of low-cost, free, and
online CLE providers, while large firms have hired PD directors and established their own internal training
systems, practice update services, and even “academies” and “universities.”
Tomorrow’s “CLE” will bear little resemblance to yesterday’s one-to-many, in-person, knowledge-update
gatherings of unpaid lecturers and expert panels of talking heads. Both private sector and in-house providers of
professional development will shift their focus away from “what’s new in the law” toward skill-building sessions,
client-relationship role-playing, hands-on legal technology engineering, and other practical applications of legal
expertise. Lifelong, multi-dimensional learning will come to be seen as a natural part of basic lawyer competence,
and likely will be regulated, administered, and enforced as such. The professionalization of PD will only accelerate
and add new dimensions in the coming years.
Marketers
It wasn’t easy to be a legal marketer when lawyer advertising was a de facto ethical violation. It wasn’t
easy when the typical lawyer’s view on the subject was that “the good work I do is all the marketing I need.” It’s
still not easy today, when many in-house marketers are consumed by RFP responses and many outside marketing
consultants still need to explain to lawyers why blogs are a good idea. By any measure, legal marketing has
matured and flourished within the legal profession incredibly rapidly. Very few lawyers today believe that
marketing has no value or that they can handle all their marketing activities themselves. Now the game is shifting,
and the challenges are becoming greater.
The inevitable evolution of legal marketing is toward legal sales. Sales consulting already takes place
now, although it operates under the pseudonym “business development,” because lawyers can’t bear to use such
a lowbrow and unsophisticated word as “sales.” The whole point of marketing is to open the door to which
business can walk, and business is not even going to approach the door without some direct sales efforts to bring
it there. Few other businesses artificially partition “sales and marketing” the way law does, and reunification of
these two related elements inevitably will take place in the coming years. Legal marketing and legal business
development are going to merge, bringing together two separate yet intimately linked skill sets to the ultimate
benefit of the practice of law.
Technologists
The typewriter was technology, as were the photocopier, the fax machine, and dial-up modems accessing
the “information superhighway.” Since the first lawyer dipped a quill pen into an inkwell, technology has been an
integral part of law practice. It’s a mistake to believe legal technology started with email or Amicus Attorney or
4
