By Lindsay Griffiths on We’ve saved the best for last – or potentially, I’ve just been avoiding this topic because time management is an area where I need to be taking my own advice. If you ask a lawyer what one of their biggest issues is, you’ll find that time management is top of the list. Especially when it … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on Regular Zen readers will know that I’m a runner. When you first start running, you tell yourself that it’s the cheapest sport – all you need is a pair of sneakers, and you can head outside and do it. While this is (essentially) true, we runners love our gadgets and our products, and sharing our … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on Has everyone got their “fa la la” on yet? While the holidays are often a mad rush for all of us, it seems that this year especially, everyone is behind with wrapping up their end of the year duties (and wrapping up their gifts), while we try to figure out shortcuts for how to manage … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on We’re so excited to officially welcome our newest member firm, Fenno Attorneys at Law, in Finland! A regional Finnish law firm, Fenno provides legal services for both corporate and private clients. For corporate clients, Fenno is called upon to assist with corporate law, mergers & acquisitions, company reorganization and/or insolvency, tax law, labor law, dispute … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on The International Lawyers Network’s Real Estate Specialty Group announces the third release of its publication, “Buying & Selling Real Estate: An International Guide.” This collaborative electronic guide offers a summary of key real estate law principles in 21 jurisdictions across the globe, serving as a quick, practical reference for those buying & selling real estate … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on We’ve discussed the idea of change extensively here on Zen, and although it’s a long time coming in the legal industry, there are pockets of exciting innovation. One such pocket is the Corporate Legal Operations Consortium, or CLOC, which has grown by leaps and bounds in recent years (as in 40 members to 1800 members … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on Successful communication comes in many forms, and we may be already convinced either by virtue of our training or personality that we’re naturally good communicators. Whether you’re confident in your communications skills, or looking for a refresher, there are four tasks you can undertake today to improve your business communication skills. Audit Your Communication How … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on A question I get ALL the time is whether using social media actually has any impact at all on referrals and business development. Actually, the way it typically goes is this: Come on, really. Tell me. Does anyone get matters or referrals because they post to LinkedIn?” The short answer is yes, sometimes, it does … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on As you’re reading this post, I want you to think about whether you’d consider yourself to be a fairly good networker and business developer. What does “networking” mean to you? Do you think of it as a complete waste of time? If the answer to that last question is yes, keep reading, and I hope … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on We’re continuing our series on soft skills that lawyers require in order to achieve success. We’ve looked at some suggestions for improving networking and presentation skills, and the next item in our series is raising the level of our business writing. You may feel that this is something that you’re already pretty adept at, since … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on As one of the largest networks of experienced attorneys in the world, the International Lawyers Network is pleased to announce that Martinez Berlanga Abogados in Mexico City, Mexico have joined the association. An independent, regional law firm, Martinez Berlanga Abogados provides clients with general corporate, restructuring, corporate finance, mergers and acquisitions, joint-venture, cross border transactions, … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on The ILN is delighted to announce the release of the fifth (and updated) edition of their corporate guide, “Establishing a Business Entity: An International Guide.” This collaborative electronic guide offers a summary of key corporate law principles in 40 countries across the globe (an increase of nine chapters over our 2017 guide), serving as a … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on We’ve been talking about the soft skills that young lawyers need to hone in order to become successful, and how these translate for more experienced lawyers. Another skill I reviewed for the ABA student law blog was that of presentations (and I think we can agree this is something that many of us can work … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on In addition to understanding the area of the law that you’ll specialize in, there are a variety of “soft skills” that will be essential to navigating the practice of law successfully. Your professional skills may need to be further expanded over the coming years as the industry itself changes and stretches, but for now, there … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on We’re already almost mid-way through September (can you believe it?) and this time of year can feel like a new beginning! Though January is typically the time for resolutions, September can also feel like a refresh as kids go back to school, and we jump back into the grind after our own summer holidays and … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on If you’re a regular reader of Zen, you know that I’m a big fan of the Corporate Legal Operations Consortium (CLOC). They’re working to revolutionize the legal industry, and engage all facets of it to do so. One of the ways that legal departments excel and law firms majorly lag behind is with tracking metrics. … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on In our most recent post, we broke down the art of persuasion, and looked at the styles for change that you may be seeing within your firm. I should also add that there’s really a fourth style too, and that’s the belief that no change is necessary – I didn’t cover this in any depth, … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on Change can be intimidating. Whether you find it exciting or not, even those of us who are the most adept at it can find it daunting and exhausting. In the legal industry, where change is historically slow, when it happens at all, it can be even more overwhelming. We’ve been talking an awful lot about … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on Continuing our discussion about SmartLaw and the future of the legal industry, which hopefully we can all say with some degree of comfort is here NOW, let’s consider another major theme of HighQ’s recent eBook – the intersection of technology and people. This idea is one that we touched on during our last series on … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on We’ve been discussing the NEED for change a lot lately, and while many of us may understand the urgency, and have even begun undertaking some steps to effectuate change within our firms and organizations, others may be asking what it actually means to be a leader of change. Fortunately, there are some great resources out … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on This is just a guess, but I suspect that most of us didn’t get into the legal industry because we love data, right? If we loved data, we’d be elsewhere. But…bad news. Data is one of those things that we have to start embracing as the industry changes in order to stay relevant. It sounds … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on Altman Weil recently released their “Law Firms in Transition” survey, which is now in its tenth year. The survey, which includes responses from half of US law firms with 50 or more lawyers, was initially developed as a response to the 2008 recession, to help firms understand how other firms were reacting to the marketplace … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on We’ve had a lot of discussion over the past several years about what the future of legal services will look like, and what critical characteristics and ideas will be necessary for lawyers and law firms to embrace in order to operate within it successfully. Last week, we opened the conversation again with the release of … Continue Reading
By Lindsay Griffiths on Long-time readers of Zen may remember when we first started talking about the future of the law firm and the idea of “SmartLaw” in 2016, when HighQ asked the question “What do you believe lawyers and law firms need to do to prepare for the future of legal services?” Over the course of several posts, … Continue Reading
