How your firm feels about bar associations

The results are a surprising 50/50 in our latest survey. 50% of our readers work for law firms that encourage partcipation in bar associations -- all of those work for firm that allow time for bar meetings and encourage leadership roles; the other 50% work for law firms that don't -- within that group 17% of those surveyed said their firm impliedly discourages participation. That's an unfortuate statistic.

Musings on the R word

This Autumn has been full of unfortunate falls. We have yet to see if professionalism in the law will expand or contract, and if lawyers will be viewed more positively or negatively during these times of the R word.

But even closer to home, we are all asking ourselves: Was the boom in financials directly related to the boom in law firms? (oh yes, those of you in denial, that was a boom) In New York and probably everywhere else in the country you have to say yes. How is the bust going to affect us lawyers, or me associate/counsel/junior partner/partner? I think we have already seen some of the effects.

Don't hold your collective breaths because there is inevitably more to come . . . .