LEVICK | November 30th, 2020
Beyond Black Swan: Positioning the law firm for the new normal

A few months ago, In-House Community, the magazine for Asia-MENA in-house counsel, asked me to write the forward for its latest White Paper, “Beyond Black Swan: Positioning the law firm for the new normal.” At the time, we did not know that this would also be the swan song for In-House Community, a company making most of its revenue from events for general counsel in Asia, as they become another victim of Covid-19. As epitaphs go, it’s a good one, providing a road map for law firms both far removed from, yet simultaneously on the cusp of disruption that will be far more challenging than anything law firms have experienced over the past 40 years. I do hope you will enjoy the read and download the White Paper.
When the American actress Sally Fields’ grandmother, Joy Bickeley, was dying in the hospital, Sally and her mother, Margaret, were at her bedside and asked as she faded between life and death, “Where are you, Joy? Tell us where you are?” Instead of mentioning her heroic mother or any close relative who might have preceded Joy to heaven, she instead said, “I’m with Bynum,” a dashing but irresponsible scallywag who had impregnated Joy’s mother, then an unwed teenager, and skipped town – or more likely was run out of town – as the story goes. We are all, it seems, chasing the love and acceptance that is just out of reach, even when we fade between one world and the next.
And so, it is with law firms, among the most challenged institutions when it comes to crisis and change. Always insecure, lawyers just want to be loved. Loved by our clients, by the market, by laterals with portable business, and our partners, at least once a year, during review. Law firms have never been more insecure than now; when partners are only an elevator ride away from leaving, when PPP and RPP are publicly graded like so many Premiership teams; evisceration only one complaint away; and deals ever more lucrative but increasingly competitive.
After having worked with and represented more than 300 law firms around the world over the last 30 years, my favorite refrain to hear is some version of, “We want to do something radical and transformative, we just don’t want to get noticed.” If stare decisis is the way to practice law, the unconscious thinking goes, it must be the best way to market and manage. The only challenge with this theory is that following has never been a very effective way of leading.
Since 1977 when the U.S. Supreme Court decided in Bates v. Arizona that state bars could not prohibit law firms from marketing, law firms have increasingly thought like businesses. After decades of merger mania, they are billion- and increasingly, multi-billion-dollar corporations. But they still act like lawyers. Imagine Jürgen Schrempp, the then-CEO of Daimler-Benz who guided the merger with Chrysler, being asked “Just how many hours did you work on the line this year?” Leadership in law firms, at least by many firms, is still considered a part-time job.
Just a year or two ago, among the greatest challenges on the horizon for law firms were nascent AI technology offering the early reward of increased profitability but now it threatens to consume its way up the food chain to, heaven forbid, lawyers! Already AI is participating in minor legal matters such as parking violations. Can the practices of “form lawyers” be far behind? How long after that, when the financial pressures from corporate clients resemble what happened in the medical community? Maybe lawyers aren’t all that different from doctors and most aren’t worth $1000 or more an hour?
The pressure of the AmLaw and other tables to be constantly more profitable cannot go on forever. Adding more lawyers to a call and raising rates each year is a financial strategy that isn’t missed by clients. It is a strategy with a limited future.
Our society is experiencing historic change. It is as if 1918, 1929 and 1968 have all occurred at once. A global pandemic, economic dislocation, civil unrest, and in the United States and increasingly globally, a new Civil Rights movement, born of the #BlackLivesMatter movement that is requiring corporations and law firms to actually be diverse, not just symbolically so.
For a decade or more, law firms have shown their diversity largely through their summer associates and first-year classes, but for most “Big Law” law firms, diversity after year four or five is more aspiration than accomplishment. True diversity is going to threaten the recruitment strategy of seeking out “exclusivity” through law school graduates of Harvard, Yale, Georgetown and the like, requiring law firms to think about recruitment strategies differently. This will require investments in state schools and Historically Black Colleges and Universities, and not only at the law school level but at the undergraduate level where many minority students need the pathway – mentoring and financial – to make law school even a possibility. As the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity points out, it is about “grit over grades.” “Exclusivity” will increasingly look like “exclusion.”
I know, I know, we have been talking about seismic changes at law firms since the first transatlantic law firm mergers and the DuPont and Tyco models. Well, here we are. The new mantra is “change, change, change” and nothing is sacred. What about when the client has a public crisis, as is all too frequent these days? As a long-time American expatriate lawyer in the Middle East likes to say, “Lawyers need to be on the bus, but they shouldn’t necessarily be driving the bus.” The first thing to do – with litigation or crisis communications counsel part of the discussion – is to evaluate the risk. If the investor relations, reputational, brand or social risks are higher than the litigation risk, then don’t drive the bus. Saving millions in court but losing billions in market share or reputation is not a win. The role of a lawyer, at the highest level, is to be a counselor, not an attorney.
Who better to lead the path to effective change management during this coming period of radical transformation than Paul Smith, an old friend who transformed Eversheds from a “Leeds based firm” to a global powerhouse; Patrick Dransfield, who has worked on all sides of the legal business equation in all parts of the world and works with 20,000 general counsels through In House Community; and Adam Roney, who trained at Eversheds Sutherland and is a leader in digital transformation. You don’t have to read this white paper to manage your law firm effectively through the coming turbulent challenges and certain crises, but why would you risk it? Happy reading.
Richard Levick
LEVICK | November 30th, 2020
Beyond Black Swan: Positioning the law firm for the new normal

A few months ago, In-House Community, the magazine for Asia-MENA in-house counsel, asked me to write the forward for its latest White Paper, “Beyond Black Swan: Positioning the law firm for the new normal.” At the time, we did not know that this would also be the swan song for In-House Community, a company making most of its revenue from events for general counsel in Asia, as they become another victim of Covid-19. As epitaphs go, it’s a good one, providing a road map for law firms both far removed from, yet simultaneously on the cusp of disruption that will be far more challenging than anything law firms have experienced over the past 40 years. I do hope you will enjoy the read and download the White Paper.
When the American actress Sally Fields’ grandmother, Joy Bickeley, was dying in the hospital, Sally and her mother, Margaret, were at her bedside and asked as she faded between life and death, “Where are you, Joy? Tell us where you are?” Instead of mentioning her heroic mother or any close relative who might have preceded Joy to heaven, she instead said, “I’m with Bynum,” a dashing but irresponsible scallywag who had impregnated Joy’s mother, then an unwed teenager, and skipped town – or more likely was run out of town – as the story goes. We are all, it seems, chasing the love and acceptance that is just out of reach, even when we fade between one world and the next.
And so, it is with law firms, among the most challenged institutions when it comes to crisis and change. Always insecure, lawyers just want to be loved. Loved by our clients, by the market, by laterals with portable business, and our partners, at least once a year, during review. Law firms have never been more insecure than now; when partners are only an elevator ride away from leaving, when PPP and RPP are publicly graded like so many Premiership teams; evisceration only one complaint away; and deals ever more lucrative but increasingly competitive.
After having worked with and represented more than 300 law firms around the world over the last 30 years, my favorite refrain to hear is some version of, “We want to do something radical and transformative, we just don’t want to get noticed.” If stare decisis is the way to practice law, the unconscious thinking goes, it must be the best way to market and manage. The only challenge with this theory is that following has never been a very effective way of leading.
Since 1977 when the U.S. Supreme Court decided in Bates v. Arizona that state bars could not prohibit law firms from marketing, law firms have increasingly thought like businesses. After decades of merger mania, they are billion- and increasingly, multi-billion-dollar corporations. But they still act like lawyers. Imagine Jürgen Schrempp, the then-CEO of Daimler-Benz who guided the merger with Chrysler, being asked “Just how many hours did you work on the line this year?” Leadership in law firms, at least by many firms, is still considered a part-time job.
Just a year or two ago, among the greatest challenges on the horizon for law firms were nascent AI technology offering the early reward of increased profitability but now it threatens to consume its way up the food chain to, heaven forbid, lawyers! Already AI is participating in minor legal matters such as parking violations. Can the practices of “form lawyers” be far behind? How long after that, when the financial pressures from corporate clients resemble what happened in the medical community? Maybe lawyers aren’t all that different from doctors and most aren’t worth $1000 or more an hour?
The pressure of the AmLaw and other tables to be constantly more profitable cannot go on forever. Adding more lawyers to a call and raising rates each year is a financial strategy that isn’t missed by clients. It is a strategy with a limited future.
Our society is experiencing historic change. It is as if 1918, 1929 and 1968 have all occurred at once. A global pandemic, economic dislocation, civil unrest, and in the United States and increasingly globally, a new Civil Rights movement, born of the #BlackLivesMatter movement that is requiring corporations and law firms to actually be diverse, not just symbolically so.
For a decade or more, law firms have shown their diversity largely through their summer associates and first-year classes, but for most “Big Law” law firms, diversity after year four or five is more aspiration than accomplishment. True diversity is going to threaten the recruitment strategy of seeking out “exclusivity” through law school graduates of Harvard, Yale, Georgetown and the like, requiring law firms to think about recruitment strategies differently. This will require investments in state schools and Historically Black Colleges and Universities, and not only at the law school level but at the undergraduate level where many minority students need the pathway – mentoring and financial – to make law school even a possibility. As the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity points out, it is about “grit over grades.” “Exclusivity” will increasingly look like “exclusion.”
I know, I know, we have been talking about seismic changes at law firms since the first transatlantic law firm mergers and the DuPont and Tyco models. Well, here we are. The new mantra is “change, change, change” and nothing is sacred. What about when the client has a public crisis, as is all too frequent these days? As a long-time American expatriate lawyer in the Middle East likes to say, “Lawyers need to be on the bus, but they shouldn’t necessarily be driving the bus.” The first thing to do – with litigation or crisis communications counsel part of the discussion – is to evaluate the risk. If the investor relations, reputational, brand or social risks are higher than the litigation risk, then don’t drive the bus. Saving millions in court but losing billions in market share or reputation is not a win. The role of a lawyer, at the highest level, is to be a counselor, not an attorney.
Who better to lead the path to effective change management during this coming period of radical transformation than Paul Smith, an old friend who transformed Eversheds from a “Leeds based firm” to a global powerhouse; Patrick Dransfield, who has worked on all sides of the legal business equation in all parts of the world and works with 20,000 general counsels through In House Community; and Adam Roney, who trained at Eversheds Sutherland and is a leader in digital transformation. You don’t have to read this white paper to manage your law firm effectively through the coming turbulent challenges and certain crises, but why would you risk it? Happy reading.
Richard Levick
- Brand
- Corporate Revolt Over Campaign Donations Shakes Political World
- What Happens Next?
- CSR & Sustainability
- Public Perception & the Biden Transition
- WATCH: Reputation Management with PRSA
- Over the River and Through The Woods
- Why Non-Profits are so Vulnerable to Crisis Risk
- The Threat to Free Markets
- What Happens When Nonprofits Get Caught In The Klieg Lights?
- You Took a PPP Loan. Now Get Ready to Talk About It.
- Avoid Future Shock: 10 Changes to Anticipate for 2021
- Guidance for Corporate Reputation Risk
- Communications
- What Happens Next?
- CSR & Sustainability
- A Conversation with Abbe Lowell
- A New Year’s Resolution
- Public Perception & the Biden Transition
- WATCH: Reputation Management with PRSA
- Leveraging Legal Expertise in Communications
- Over the River and Through The Woods
- Why Non-Profits are so Vulnerable to Crisis Risk
- The Threat to Free Markets
- Dropping the Mic
- Combatting Misinformation
- Company News
- Recent Awards & Recognition
- Won’t You Be My Neighbor?
- What’s a Director to Do?
- LEVICK Announces Partnership with BCG
- A New Look
- Albert Krieger, 1923-2020
- LEVICK Announces Partnership with Jipyong
- Speaking to In-House Counsel
- Childhood Lessons
- LEVICK Announces New Webinar Series with Turbine Labs
- LEVICK Launches New Website
- LEVICK to Launch Podcast
- Crisis
- How to Stop the Madness
- Corporate Revolt Over Campaign Donations Shakes Political World
- A Remembrance of Tommy Raskin
- No ‘justice’ in rep’s vote
- A Call for Orderly & Peaceful Transition of Power
- Recovering from the Greatest Sacrifice
- The Cost of Government Regulation and the Threat to Free Enterprise
- What Happens Next?
- A Conversation with Abbe Lowell
- Covid-19: The Pandemic that Never Should Have Happened
- Public Perception & the Biden Transition
- WATCH: Reputation Management with PRSA
- Finance
- The Threat to Free Markets
- Advisory & Insurance Services
- WATCH: Revolutionizing Litigation Finance
- Litigation Finance: Revolutionizing Litigation
- Consumer-Focused Solutions for Financial Health
- Event: Consumer-Focused Solutions for Financial Health
- Sports: Power and Money in a New Age of Social Justice
- The Balancing Act: The Role of Whistleblowers in American Commerce and Government
- The Evolving and More Powerful FARA
- FCPA & Compliance in a Time of Uncertainty
- Shareholders vs. Stakeholders: Is the Paradigm Shifting?
- CommPRO: Transparent Political Donations
- Guest Column
- Guest Blog: The Mainstream Media Gets an A for Intellectual Arrogance, an F for Journalism
- Buckle up Directors: Cybersecurity Risk and Bankruptcy Risk Are Not Mutually Exclusive
- Buckle up Directors: Cybersecurity Risk and Bankruptcy Risk Are Not Mutually Exclusive
- South Africa: The Slow Decline of the ANC
- Why CSR Fails and How to Fix It
- What to Expect Following the European Elections?
- Buhari Inaugurated. What Now for Nigeria?
- Marketing- It’s Up To You…
- Crisis Management lessons from the air-crash investigation model
- The Future of War
- Health
- Food Issues & the Biden Administration
- Covid-19: The Pandemic that Never Should Have Happened
- Pharma’s Post-Pandemic Policy Outlook
- Keeping Hope Alive
- Real Herd Immunity
- The Fiction of College Sports Amateurism
- Mac Summit: Crisis Communications in a Post-Covid, Post-Election World
- Travel Industry Communications in the Age of Covid-19
- Track of Time
- Is C-19 Taking Women Lawyers’ Careers Back to the 1950s?
- Post-Pandemic PR Strategy
- Bankruptcy: A Culture of Transparency
- In Memoriam
- Snider’s Super Foods: Locally World Famous
- Speak Truth With Love, Not Anger
- In Memoriam: Stephen Susman
- Letter to the Movement
- John Lewis’ Life Bridged the Best of America
- Albert Krieger, 1923-2020
- In Memoriam of Marcia Horowitz
- Jim Lehrer Passes Away
- Martin Luther King, Jr.
- Harold Burson Passes Away
- Interviews
- CommPRO: Ruth Bader Ginsberg’s Life & Legacy
- Richard Levick on “My Wakeup Call”
- Primerus Webinar: Into the Wind
- The Future of Baseball Post-Pandemic
- Webinar: The End of Brand Neutrality
- Thought Leadership & Organic Growth
- Man & Superman
- LEVICK Announces New Webinar Series with Turbine Labs
- Navigating Coronavirus Challenges in the Insurance Industry
- VIDEO: How to Anticipate & Avoid a Crisis
- What’s Next? with Julie Chase
- What’s Next?: California Electoral Behavior
- Law Firms
- You Took a PPP Loan. Now Get Ready to Talk About It.
- Beyond Black Swan: Positioning the law firm for the new normal
- A Salute to Personal Courage and the Rule of Law
- Cyber Risk Institute Expands Its Profile
- When a client becomes a law firm’s PR nightmare
- The General Counsel’s Dilemma
- A First Look at the Google Antitrust Suit
- The Latest Top Class Actions
- Trust on Trial: How Communicators Succeed in a World No Longer Trusted
- The Latest Settlements, Class actions, Investigations & More
- Managing Legal & Communication Advice in a Crisis
- Class Action Lawsuits 2020
- Litigation
- A Conversation with Abbe Lowell
- Leveraging Legal Expertise in Communications
- You Took a PPP Loan. Now Get Ready to Talk About It.
- Beyond Black Swan: Positioning the law firm for the new normal
- A Salute to Personal Courage and the Rule of Law
- Cyber Risk Institute Expands Its Profile
- When a client becomes a law firm’s PR nightmare
- The General Counsel’s Dilemma
- WATCH: Revolutionizing Litigation Finance
- Litigation Finance: Revolutionizing Litigation
- A First Look at the Google Antitrust Suit
- The Latest Top Class Actions
- Our Work
- Recent Awards & Recognition
- The Cyber Bad Guys Are Getting Worse
- Crisis Communications & The Age of Cancel Culture
- Standing on the Shoulders of Giants
- Video: Conversations with American Legends
- Staying Ahead of the Crisis
- A New Era of Insurance Marketing
- Infographic: Judgment Free Zone
- Infographic: Barriers to Entry
- Infographic: History Meter
- Assistance for Law Firms Engaged in Pro Bono
- Webinar: The End of Brand Neutrality
- Public Affairs
- How to Stop the Madness
- Corporate Revolt Over Campaign Donations Shakes Political World
- No ‘justice’ in rep’s vote
- A Call for Orderly & Peaceful Transition of Power
- Recovering from the Greatest Sacrifice
- Food Issues & the Biden Administration
- The Cost of Government Regulation and the Threat to Free Enterprise
- What Happens Next?
- CSR & Sustainability
- A Conversation with Abbe Lowell
- Public Perception & the Biden Transition
- You Took a PPP Loan. Now Get Ready to Talk About It.
- Risk
- Ingredients of Decency
- ESG Performance and Credit Markets
- The Coronavirus Saga is Just Beginning
- No. 1 Risk of the Decade
- The Risk Evolution of Corporate Risk
- Extend Risk Management Reach
- Collective Action
- Risk Identifying Software
- The New Risk of Doing Nothing
- Political Unrest In Hong Kong
- High-Profile Kidnaps in African National Parks
- Cyber Resilience
- Social
- How to Stop the Madness
- A Remembrance of Tommy Raskin
- No ‘justice’ in rep’s vote
- A Call for Orderly & Peaceful Transition of Power
- Recovering from the Greatest Sacrifice
- CSR & Sustainability
- A New Year’s Resolution
- Dropping the Mic
- Won’t You Be My Neighbor?
- Crisis, Covid, DEI & the Election
- MLK’s Memphis Address
- The Fiction of College Sports Amateurism
- Technology
- Constella Intelligence Announces Hunter for Improved Investigation Capability
- Cyber Risk Institute Expands Its Profile
- Digital Politics: The Future of Voting Technology
- Ethics in Electronics
- The Cyber Bad Guys Are Getting Worse
- A First Look at the Google Antitrust Suit
- The Pause
- Cybersecurity Incidents of the Summer
- The Changing Digital Economy and Cyber Risks
- The Future of U.S. Manufacturing
- Tech CEO Summer Superbowl hearing
- Technology & Privacy Alert
- This Week
- A Remembrance of Tommy Raskin
- A New Year’s Resolution
- Over the River and Through The Woods
- Dropping the Mic
- Won’t You Be My Neighbor?
- The Cyber Bad Guys Are Getting Worse
- What We Hear
- Track of Time
- Video: Conversations with American Legends
- Conversations with American Legends
- A New Era of Insurance Marketing
- American Legend