ALMResearchBlog

Just released: Survey of Billing Rates at Small and Midsize Firms and Solo Practices

The ALM Research Survey Report on Billing Rates and Practices should not be confused with the recently published National Law Journal Billing Survey. While NLJ's survey focuses on the large firms (the NLJ 250), the ALM Research survey studied billing rates and trends in small and midsize firms and solo practices.

This is our first-ever syndicated survey of billing information for this segment of the legal industry; over 5,000 lawyers responded. The report includes analyses of billing rates and alternative billing practices based on firm size, geography, practice area, client industry, number of years in practice, and gender. Pricing information and further details are available for the full report (print and PDF file) or just the PDF file. Contact Chuck Lowry, director of client relations for questions about the survey.

Patent and Trademark Office Issues Performance and Accountability Report

According to this report on Docuticker, the USPTO has just issued its FY 2007 Performance and Accountability Report. Patent quality and productivity are at historic highs, according to the USPTO press release. In 2007, patent examiners examined the highest number of applications in history—362,227, and quality compliance was at 96.5%, equaling last year’s results. In addition, patent examiner decisions were upheld by the patent appeals board 69% of the time, up from 51% in 2005.

For the second year in a row, the USPTO exceeded all of its trademark-related performance goals: a record number of applications were examined—323,527. Quality was up 97.4%. And, the average time from filing an initial trademark application to a preliminary decision was below 3 months.

Just Released: Report of Practice Group Management Survey

Altman Weil and ALM Research have just released a report of their survey of Law Firm Practice Group Management, which surveyed law firm leaders across the U.S. about their practice group operations and management. Key findings include the fact that, despite the time and money invested in their practice groups, more that half of law firm managing partners and executive directors surveyed rated overall practice group performance as average or worse. When asked to rate their groups on the ability to market, develop new business and cross-sell other practices, fewer than 20 percent of firm leaders rated their groups as “excellent” or “very good” on any one of those measures.

The report includes data and information about practice group structure, performance, operations, leadership, administration, and marketing. It is the first formal benchmarking survey of law firm practice group management to be published in the U.S. In addition, the report leverages the extensive expertise of Altman Weil, to provide actionable recommendations for improving and increasing the overall effectiveness of Practice Groups. The report is available through ALM Research Publishing.

Questions About Research

FYI, or BTW - in our bi-monthly e-newsletter, NewsLine, I write a Q&A column to address FAQs, or frequently-asked questions. The question I addressed in the most recent issue was this one: What does the "syndicated survey" part of ALM Research do?  Where can we find these syndicated surveys?  Are they part of our subscription? To go right to the answer, click here.

To read the most recent issue, which is all about technology surveys, lists, rankings, and reports, click here. And to sign up for a free subscription to NewsLine, click here.

And to send me your questions, email me here ([email protected]) or call me at 212-592-4932.