The Business of Law – Marketing and Business for Enterprising Attorneys

Larry Ribstein is with me!!  A few weeks ago, I laid out the case for outside ownership of law firms, arguing that it was good for firms, and good for access to justice.  Well according to the ABA Journal, University of Illinois law professor Larry Ribstein told the Philadelphia Inquirer that big law firms need a more creative approach to their current woes—one that might include selling shares to outside owners.

Quoting the ABA Journal:

He says changes in legal ethics rules to allow outsiders to own shares in law firms would give firms access to lower-cost financing and the freedom to expand in ways that can serve lower-paying clients. “Ribstein elaborates in a draft paper (PDF) posted on Ideoblog. Law firms are business entities, he argues, but ethics regulations regard them “as the worker cooperatives they once were.”

I was, as I often am…more blunt.  We run our law firms right as if they were country clubs, with the partners gathering around to decide weighty issues and determine what direction to take the business in.

That’s insane.  Let’s run our law firms like businesses they are.  Let’s have the lawyers do excellent client work, which is of course what they do best, and let’s have the investors and professional managers run the business, manage cost, allocate resources, and provide strategic direction…you know the stuff business people do well.