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November/December 2016

The ILN is proud to announce our latest firm of the month, Reinhart Marville Torre, France!
Established in 1990, Reinhart Marville Torre is a full-service business law firm whose 19 partners provide litigation and legal advisory services to companies and business leaders in order to assist and advise them on their legal affairs and litigation strategies.

Reinhart Marville Torre has been ranked as a leading firm by specialized press in France and abroad. These rankings reflect the success of the firm’s structure, its long-term client relationships and its core objective of providing consistently innovative and tailored legal solutions. Chambers Europe and Legal 500 recognize the firm’s excellence in ten distinct practice areas. Eight of the firm’s partners are peer-recommended in Best Lawyers International.

Continue Reading ILN Firm of the Month – Reinhart Marville Torre, France!

photo-1470093309323-be5043d91fa6 (1)Last week, we considered the idea that maybe the law firm of the future was going to have to start from scratch in order to really generate change that matters. On LinkedIn, one commenter saw this as an opportunity for smaller firms to grab marketshare from BigLaw, as they are able to be more nimble and agile in a changing market, while one of the ILN’s members wondered how mid-sized firms, particularly in emerging markets, are able to properly prioritize the changes that clients want and need.

I tend to agree that where some may see change as a challenge, it does present a huge opportunity, especially for some smaller and mid-sized firms, but it not only requires us to ask some tough questions and take a critical internal look, it also means that we need to work collaboratively. When we work together – not just within our firms and organizations, but within the industry – we’re able to better identify both the questions and challenges AND the answers and solutions to these issues. We’ve talked before about how the law firm of the future will embrace a more collaborative approach, but I see the industry overall as taking on a more collaborative tone – without giving away any trade secrets, we can all work together to make the industry stronger and more client-centric.  Continue Reading Law Firm of the Future: Deeper Discussions Sought Here

photo-1477414348463-c0eb7f1359b6Up until this point, as we’ve looked at the “law firm of the future,” we’ve mostly focused on the idea that we can take what we’ve been doing and adapt or tweak it in some way, so that we can continue on our paths and just improve ourselves. We’ve talked about embracing technology, making things better, using all of our people instead of just lawyers to be innovative and remain curious. And of course, none of these things are wrong. But are they too comfortable?

Are we just putting duct tape over a hole in our tire, instead of taking the tire off and putting on a new one?

What if truly being a law firm of the future means throwing out everything we know, and starting at the beginning?

  • Looking at the client’s point of view, and finding out what really works for them and never considering how we’ve always done things – in terms of processes, billing, staffing, etc.
  • Running our firms as businesses and not as partnerships.
  • Fully embracing technology as an integral part of our team, and how it can drive that business, instead of a necessary evil?

These are the challenges given to us by the two contributing authors that we’re examining from HighQ’s book on Smart Law and the future of the law firm today.

I’m as guilty as the next person of wanting to change the least amount possible to achieve the maximum gains – that way, I can stay pretty comfortable while still pleasing the people that matter.

But what if we didn’t do that? What if we were brave and effected real change?  Continue Reading Law Firm of the Future: Get Ready to Change

photo-1461532257246-777de18cd58bThe law firm of the future continues to be a hot topic of discussion, not just here on Zen, but among lawyers around the world. Both at our recent ILN European Regional Conference and the Association of International Law Firm Network’s (AILFN) Inaugural Summit, the questions of “what comes next?” and “how do we prepare for it?” were on the tips of everyone’s tongues.

So I want to check back in on our series looking at what some of the industry’s experts had to say when asked:

What do you believe lawyers and law firms need to do to prepare for the future of legal services?”

You’ll remember that their answers were pulled together in an eBook by HighQ on Smart Law, available here.

The two thought leaders we’re looking at today both consider people to be at the center of the law firm of the future – which will be a relief to those lawyers who might be concerned that robots are about to take over their jobs. But we can all agree that while technology is still going to play a huge role in the next phase of the legal industry (and does already), the people are – and will always be – at its core.  Continue Reading Law Firm of the Future: It’s About the People

A photo by Ben White. unsplash.com/photos/4K2lIP0zc_kLet’s try this one more time – I originally wrote this post last month – and let me tell you, it was great. Then, the internet gobbled it up, and as I hit “publish,” almost the entire post disappeared into the ether, never to be seen again. Since I was already limited on time that week while we were in the throes of last minute conference prep, you can imagine the angst that caused me – and that also meant that I haven’t been able to bring myself to attempt to resurrect the post until now. But let’s see if we can do some justice to the original and get you excited about using IG stories.

In August, Instagram rolled out their new “stories” feature, affectionately referred to as “Snapchat for grown-ups.” We’ve already talked about why you may want to care about this, and how you can use them, so today, I want to look at a couple of accounts who are using IG stories really well now that we’ve had a couple of months to figure them out and talk about what advice you can appropriate from their examples. Continue Reading How Lawyers Can Win at Instagram Stories

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October/November 2016

The ILN is proud to announce our latest firm of the month, Cleaver Fulton Rankin, Belfast, Northern Ireland!
Cleaver Fulton Rankin is one of Northern Ireland’s leading corporate law firms, combining over 100 years of heritage with an innovative approach.  They’re conveniently located in Belfast city centre and employ 17 directors, 12 associates, 14 solicitors and 13 trainees and paralegals with a total staff of approximately 100 people.

Continue Reading ILN Firm of the Month – Cleaver Fulton Rankin, Belfast, Northern Ireland!

photo-1467501556106-31d7a35cc25dNo one is more surprised than I am that one of my most popular posts here on Zen is “Instagram: How Lawyers Can Use it & Get Noticed.” I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again – I really doubt that using Instagram is going to bring you business as a lawyer. BUT, I do think it’s an important tool for you to know how to use for two reasons:

  1. It’s another tool to have in your arsenal, and one you should know how to use, especially with its staggering usage statistics (plus, it’s fun to use and engage with).
  2. It’s fairly likely that your clients are using it either as individuals or as companies, so even if you, yourself, don’t use it, you should understand how it works and the potential pitfalls, to be a good advocate for your clients (that’s true for all social media by the way).

Since Instagram is such a hugely popular topic with my audience, I wanted to take a break today from our law firm of the future series to look at a few more tips about how you can stand out from the competition on Instagram. Brands are using it, which means that it’s not just for individuals, and you can get some great advice for dos and don’ts from taking a look at their behavior on this platform.

Kara Burney shares a great piece from the Content Marketing Institute, taking a look at what some of the biggest brands are doing with Instagram, and what that might mean for you. You may be interested to know that in three short years, we’ve seen an increased from 24.6% of Fortune 500 companies using Instagram to 50% using it in 2016. Burney followed their activity for a year to get us some great insight.  Continue Reading How Lawyers Can Stand Out from the Competition on Instagram

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September/October 2016

The ILN is proud to announce our latest firm of the month, Jalsovszky Law Firm, Budapest, Hungary!

Jalsovszky Law Firm is a leading independent commercial law firm providing premium quality legal services to an international corporate clientele. The firm has unrivalled expertise in tax law and M&A practice and has a solid and strong banking & finance, property law and competition law practice.
The clients of the firm include multinational enterprises, leading local companies from different industries as well as fast-growing medium-sized entities. We are proud to provide advice to various private and venture capital funds as well as to high net worth individuals.
Jalsovszky is  a young, but experienced and innovative team of lawyers, combining international standards of ethics with practical local experience, with a clear focus on identifying potential issues and providing real-world solutions. The firm is run by three partners, all of them having extensive experience in their field of activity. In addition to their legal skills, each partner has a profound economic background and they are able to interpret legal complexities in a practical manner.

Continue Reading ILN Firm of the Month – Jalsovszky Law Firm, Budapest, Hungary!

photo-1448220140720-53ea5ddbd54a“What they really need is leadership willing to make decisions.” 

That’s what one reader feels is going to be required of the law firm of the future. And that’s true, isn’t it? Although it’s inherent in some of the responses we’ve seen from the authors included in HighQ’s book on Smart Law – in order to make changes and be ready for the future, you have to have curiosity and open-mindedness, a level of comfort with innovation. But really, you have to have guts.

It reminded me of the phrase clients have been using for years – “Change or die.” I’ve blogged about it before, so I searched Zen to see where it came up – and you might be surprised to see that we’ve been talking about this for six years already:

We keep talking about changing or dying, and sometimes, changing an industry like the legal industry is like turning an ocean liner – it takes time. Will we see the monolithic shifts in the industry that we hope to in the next five years? The next ten? That remains to be seen. But we do need bold, strategic thinkers with varied characteristics and guts to be leading the charge. As Will Rogers said “Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.” Continue Reading Law Firm of the Future: Move it or Lose It

photo-1444653614773-995cb1ef9efaThis guide continues to be a labor of love for us, so I’m excited to announce that our Corporate Specialty Group is releasing their Third Edition of “Establishing a Business Entity In: An International Guide.”

This collaborative electronic guide offers a summary of key corporate law principles in 22 countries across the globe, serving as a quick, practical reference for those establishing an entity in these jurisdictions.

The guide continues our previous efforts to highlight and promote the collaborative efforts and expertise of our corporate lawyers. The group continues to work diligently to update the guide with the latest figures and regulations for their jurisdictions, and we will pursue regular revision and growth of this comprehensive guide to ensure we are providing the most up-to-date information for our firms and their clients. Continue Reading ILN Corporate Specialty Group Launches Third ‘Establishing a Business Entity: An International Guide’