ALMResearchBlog

2007 Cost of Doing Business Index

According to the 2007 Cost of Doing Business Index, Hawaii, New York and Alaska are the most expensive states for businesses, maintaining the top three spots for the second consecutive Milken Institute report. All three states increased their year-over-year overall costs. A major factor in the rankings is the cost of electricity. South Dakota, meanwhile, maintained its position as the least-expensive state for business, decreasing its costs to 30 percent below the national average. The Cost-of-Doing-Business Index measures wage costs, taxes, electricity costs and real estate costs for industrial and office space.

New Release: The Global 100

The American Lawyer has just published the 2007 Global 100 rankings and once again top three firms on the planet, based on annual gross revenue, are Clifford Chance, Linklaters, and Skadden Arps. But after that, there's been a bit of shuffling of the deck since last year's list. This year, Baker & McKenzie is in 4th place (last year, the firm was 6th), with a gross revenue that is different than what was presented in the annual Am Law 100. This is due to Baker & McKenzie's rather inconvenient fiscal year end, June 30th--two months after the publication of the Am Law 100 report. (Most American law firms' fiscal year coincides with the calendar year; most British, Canadian, and Australian firms' fiscal year ends at the end of the first quarter of the year.)

This year, the Global 100 chart was compiled in conjunction with our new sister publication, Legal Week this year. Note that there are actually three "Global 100" charts: the key chart ranks by gross revenue, and a second chart ranks by size (number of lawyers). A third chart ranks firms by their profits per equity partner; only firms on the first two charts are considered for these rankings. In all, there are 113 firms that made one or both of the first two charts.

The Global 100 in searchable spreadsheet format is now available through the ALM Research Store, and it includes all the data points covered in the three charts. The data from the Global 100 charts is now archived in the ALM Research Online database for subscriber searches.

2008 Corporate Equality Index

The 6th annual Corporate Equality Index shows an “unprecedented” 195 major U.S. businesses earned the top rating of 100%, up from 138 last companies last year—a 41% increase. The Human Rights Campaign Foundation’s Corporate Equality Index report, released each fall, provides an in-depth analysis and ratings of large U.S. employers and their policies and practices pertinent to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender employees, consumers and investors. Most importantly, we counted 29 Am Law 200 firms on the list that had perfect (100%) scores.

Vault’s Second Annual Ranking of U.K. Firms

Vault says they surveyed solicitors at 100 major law firms in the U.K. and nearly 1,500 lawyers from firms responded to. The results of the responses led to the Top 50 Most Presitigious, with Slaughter & May, Linklaters, Freshfields, Allen & Overy, and Clifford Chance in the top five positions. American firms Skadden Arps, Cleary Gottlieb, and Sullivan & Cromwell were ranked 7th, 8th, and 9th, respectively.

On the Best 20 Firms to Work For list, several smaller firms made the top of the list—much like in our own Midlevel Survey. At the top was Trowers & Hamlins, followed by two U.S. firms, Weil, Gotshal and Latham & Watkins. In 4th place, another relatively unknown firm (to the U.S. audience), Burges Salmon, and then LeBoeuf Lamb in 5th place.

The Billable Hour – and the Alternatives

First, we read on the Law Marketing Blog that $1,000 hourly fees “are not out of the question, if it is a ‘bet the company’ type matter,” which blog author Tom Kane then acknowledges is a rare situation. And then we read in The National Law Journal that firms are learning to cope with alternative billing plans, which “create their own sets of challenges in dealing with outside counsel.”  The article noted that “more than 85% of in-house counsel are testing out alternative billing arrangements, according to a recent survey sponsored by Chicago law firm Butler Rubin Saltarelli & Boyd. Sixty percent of the 162 in-house counsel who responded to the online survey on managing litigation expenses also reported success with fee arrangements other than the traditional hourly billing method.”

We follow such news with interest for two reasons. One of our most popular products in the ALM Research Store is the annual NLJ Billing Survey, which canvasses NLJ 250 firms for their high, low, and average hourly rates for partners and associates, as well as their alternative billing practices. Secondly, we’ve just concluded the first-ever ALM Research Billing Survey of billing rates and practices by lawyers at small and midsize firms and solo practices across the U.S. The full report will be available later this fall. (If you want to be notified when it is available for sale, send an email to [email protected].) There were over 5,000 respondents, and all that data is still being analyzed. But we can say that 88% of the responding lawyers said that they offer alternative billing methods. And only a few said that their highest hourly billing rate exceeded $1,000.

Three Recent Legal Technology Surveys

Editor in chief of Law Technology News Monica Bay has given our recently-published Legal Technology Market Assessment Study a great review on her blog, The Common Scold, though she chastised us for using a passé euphemism for legal technology (“solutions”). We promise not to do that again.

The “LTMAS” Survey was joint project of ALM Research and Cogent Research. Editor Bay terms the results showing that many lawyers are still without the technologies they need “breathtaking.” As the survey found, only 52% of responding attorneys have access to case management software; even fewer - 32% - have access to document management tools, a mere 12% have access to EDD products, and very few - 9% - have access to CRM software. She exhorts vendors to “wake up” and "do a better job of reaching and educating your potential customers.” For a look at the table of contents and information about how to purchase a copy of the “LTMAS” Survey, click here. For information about two more recent surveys about legal technology solutions tools, continue reading below the fold.

Outsourcing News

According to a recent post on Bloomberg News, Jones Day and Kirkland & Ellis are among the latest biglaw firms to outsource work to India. The only specific work mentioned in the article customizing a residential lease for all 50 U.S. states. Other work was referred to as simply “low end” or “routine” legal work. Also mentioned are a variety of companies whose in-house legal departments outsource some work to India, as well as the names of a half-dozen India-based outsourcing companies. According to the article, much of the outsourced work is done for roughly 10% of what it would cost in the U.S.

ALM Research has not yet conducted a survey to explore the outsourcing of legal services, but we have surveyed firms to explore the outsourcing of administrative services. That survey, the 2006 Law Firm Outsourcing Survey yielded interesting information about trends in outsourcing human resources, document production and management, IT support, and finances functions. That survey and others are available through ALM Research Publishing.

The Am Law 200 Blogosphere

It’s inevitable. A new trend comes along, and someone has to then quantify it and analyze it. We love that tendency. Blogging has definitely caught on among The Am Law 200, according to Kevin O’Keefe of Real Lawyers Have Blogs. And in a recent post, O’Keefe presented an analysis of the trend. In State of the AmLaw Blogosphere, August 2007, he writes that “of the firms on the 2006 AmLaw list (the number was a few below 200, as mergers have consolidated firms since the list first published), 39 firms were blogging. From those 39 firms, we found a total of 74 blogs. 56 of these blogs were firm branded (meaning they had the firm's logo prominently displayed on the page). 18 were not branded, indicating that the lawyer was operating their blog independently of or at a distance from their firm.” Blog topics include a huge range of practice areas. A list of firms with blogs, and links to those blogs, are provided in this post.

Just released: The 2007 Legal Technology Market Assessment Study

ALM Research has just released the 2007 Legal Technology Market Assessment Study (LTMAS). This landmark study, conducted by Cogent Research and ALM Research, is based on the survey responses of nearly 1,400 attorneys, and measures user satisfaction, market penetration and brand loyalty. Specific products are rated and reviewed in five key areas: Case Management; Document Management; Client Development; Electronic Discovery; Online Research.  See which brands earned the highest marks from their customers. Find out what is driving technology purchases and preferences, and defining trends in law firm technology budgets. Order your copy of the 2007 LTMAS Report from the ALM Research Store.

ALM Research Offer: Free Associate Salary Update

ALM Research is offering the 2007 Associate Salary Update free to subscribers, and free to non-subscribers with the purchase of one other product. The promotional code for non-subscribers to use is when requesting the Update is "ASU." Email [email protected] for the link to download the Update in searchable spreadsheet format.

The Associate Salary Update includes information tracked by ALM Research about raises in first-year associate salaries and bonuses since November 2006 for almost 300 firms. Data includes the firm name and headquarters city, the highest first-year salary reported, the high and low first-year salaries reported in the most recent NLJ 250 survey (November 2006), which offices receive the highest salary, and the sources for updated information.

This free product will be updated once a month until the publication of the 2007 NLJ 250 Survey in The National Law Journal in late November of this year.