February 5, 2010
Legal Trends
With the New Year, we are changing the name of our monthly report from Recruiting Trends to Legal Trends. Increasingly, recruiting and human resource issues are intertwined with the overall business interests of the practice of law and this has expanded the breadth of our conversations. It's just a name change but we hope you enjoy the expanded scope. Associate Salaries -- Back to Business
Six months ago law firms were getting in line to announce salaries freezes and decreases in the associate compensation scale. Managing Partners were quoted as saying, "I could see $145,000 go to $100,000 in a nanosecond." Bloggers were quoting firm leaders about how the recession has stopped the insanity and it would be a long time before firms returned to the competitive mill that had been in place before the recession. Time flies and Latham & Watkins, one of the first firms to implement a salary freeze, recently announced that it is returning salaries to previous levels. Few firms have announced their intentions but it's a safe bet that most will follow suit and begin the cycle again. Oddball Interview Questions
Every employment interviewer has a cache of standard questions like, "Where do you see yourself in ten years?" Unfortunately, asking the same questions gets boring and candidates have developed canned answers to standard questions. An employment website asked users to submit the strangest question they were ever asked in an interview. More than 14,000 people responded and the site picked the 20 best -- remember, these are actual questions that candidates were asked:
1. What was your best MacGyver moment?
2. How many tennis balls can you fill this room with?
3. If you were a brick in a wall, which brick would you be and why?
4. How would you move Mount Fuji?
5. If two cars are traveling in a two-lap race on a track of any length, one going 60 mph and the other going 30 mph,
how fast will the slower car have to go to finish at the same time as the faster car?
6. Are your parents disappointed with your career aspirations?
7. Tell me how you would determine how many house painters there are in the United States.
8. What should it cost to rent Central Park for commercial purposes?
9. If I put you in a sealed room with a phone that had no dial tone, how would you fix it?
10. If you could be any animal, what would you be and why?
11. How many hair salons are there in Japan?
12. If both a taxi and a limo were priced exactly the same, which one would you choose?
13. How do you measure nine minutes using only a four-minute and one-minute hourglass?
14. What are five uncommon uses of a brick, not including building, layering or as a paperweight?
15. What is the probability of throwing 11 and over with 2 dice?
16. What is your favorite food?
17. Say you are dead. What do you think your eulogy would say about you?
18. Given a dictionary of words, how do you calculate the anagrams for a new word?
19. How many light bulbs are in this building?
20. If you saw someone steal a quarter, would you report it
Keeping Warm
Arguments about office temperature are an ongoing problem in many firms. The recent cold weather in some areas has caused some law firm staff members to complain that their firms are turning down thermostats to reduce costs. Now there is a confirmed productivity aspect to temperature complaints. A recent study found that 22 percent of office workers claim that too warm workplaces make it hard to concentrate. Eleven percent made the same claim about workplaces that are too cold. The University study found that workplace performance increases with temperatures up to 71.6 degrees which is the point of maximum performance. A month long Cornell University experiment found that chilly workers make more errors and are less productive. In fact, the number of typing errors fell by 44 percent and typing output increased 150 percent when the office temperature rose from 68 degrees to 77 degrees. Conventional wisdom has been that people are more alert and productive in cooler temperatures.
Business Travel Continues
After many corporations scaled back business travel as a cost control measure in response to the recession, recent security concerns were anticipated to further reduce law firm clients' expectations of travel for their lawyers. According to the National Business Travel Association, only two percent of clients are reducing approvals for international travel and virtually none are reducing domestic travel.
Law firms, however, are working with travel agents and frequently flying lawyers to respond to safety concerns. Some firms have eased restrictions on overnight stays to allow lawyers to travel at less crowded times and some are increasing the availability of travel insurance. One firm has worked with its travel agency to counsel flyers on flying more safely and comfortably. The advice includes:
· Route business travel through larger U.S. airport hubs where security screening devices are most sophisticated.
· Avoid traveling at peak times. Small groups are less attractive to terrorists.
· Register for airline email or text updates for alerts regarding delays and avoiding having to wait in crowds at the airport.
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THEWESEMANNREPORT
...a comprehensive analysis of the Legal Marketplace in the Great Lakes Region of the United States. Written by Ed Wesemann in partnership with Legal Resource Group, the analysis includes:
· The segmentation of law firms into definitive tiers within each legal market based on their size and reputation.
· A review of the competitive capabilities of specific firms within each tier.
· Specific information on the size of legal markets based on the amount spent annually on private practice legal services.
· A SWOT analysis of each marketplace.
· An economic analysis of the key drivers that affect the growth and prosperity of legal practices in each area.
· The demographics that attract business to cities and states.
Covering the Great Lakes Region including:
Chicago Minneapolis Milwaukee Columbus
Detroit Buffalo Indianapolis Cleveland
Cincinnati Pittsburgh
P 115 pages of detailed factual competitive intelligence
P 126 charts, graphs and illustrations
P 8 States and 10 Metropolitan Areas
P Information on 215 law offices
Like all services and products of Legal Resource Group, we are so confident in the value of this report that we offer you our
Unconditional Guarantee
If you are not satisfied with this report for any reason, you may, at your sole discretion,
elect to pay whatever amount you deem its value to be, even if that amount is zero.
Available immediately by download. Your firm will be invoiced $2,995
For further information please call Bob Lang at 1-800-688-4147 or email at Bob@LRGLLC.com Legal Resource Group LLC specializes in serving the executive and administrative recruiting needs of law firms. We maintain the largest data base of law firm executive and Administrative staff in the world. This allows us to immediately identify the very best candidates. We find the best people, complete searches faster and have extremely reasonable fees. For further information, visit our website at www.LRGLLC.com , contact us by e-mail at inquiries@LRGLLC.com or by phone at 1-800-688-4147.
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