Mid-size firms

April 26, 2010| NYLJ.COM|

LAW SCHOOLS: A Special Report

director. Instead, until Ruskin Moscou created that role, it fell to long-time managing partner, Michael Faltischek. “It was clear that someone had to be here supervising them,” says Mr.

lingual public relations director.

In addition to sitting in
on executive committee
and partnership meetings,
work, but the firm’s needs
grew more complicated as
it expanded. “As the firm
got larger, the business
side of it got more com-
plex,” Mr. Tobin says.

the ability to reward and
punish, he or she is not
going to make a significant
difference and probably is
not going to last.”
one’s called “chief fi-
nancial officer” doesn’t
necessarily mean that
it’s General Motors,” Mr.

Consultant Bruce
Jones says. “I make all the
decisions.”
Still, consultants say
that mid-size firms like
Faltischek, who stepped
down as managing part-
ner in July. “It made no
economic sense for me to
be that person.”
Ms. Bey helps plan the
firm’s annual meeting by
assisting with putting to-
gether the agenda and hir-
ing consultants. The firm’s
other key personnel,
including Chief Financial
Kenyon & Kenyon, Ruskin
MacEwan adds that titles
only go so far. “There can
always be a disconnect
between title and respon-
sibility,” he says.

authority. One reason, says Altman Weil consultant Ward Bower, is that mid-size firms tend to represent smaller clients, which don’t themselves employ professional managers to the same extent as large corporations.

Ms. King at Kronish
Intellectual property
boutique Kenyon & Ke-
nyon also several years
ago took on a non-lawyer
chief administrative of-
ficer, Gwen Bey, and gave
her the mandate of build-
ing an administrative in-
frastructure for the firm.

Officer John Barry, also answer to her.

Mr. Barry himself is charged with gathering intelligence to help set billing rates, which he does by scrutinizing industry sources and surveys.

Moscou and Kronish Lieb are still very much the exception, as most mid-size firms still vest nearly all administrative power in a managing partner.

Tom Collins, founder
of business software
company Juris, Inc. and
head of consulting firm
He adds that large firms
took the idea of profes-
sional managers from
their clients—large com-
panies that themselves
employed highly skilled
and paid MBAs and other
administrators.

Since joining the firm, she
has advised on matters
including re-engineering
the marketing and IT de-
partments, and has also
helped develop a separate
public relations depart-
ment; that process alone
involved hiring a multi-
With three offices and
about 200 lawyers, Ke-
nyon & Kenyon is large
enough that it now re-
quires sophisticated man-
agement, says Managing
I-65 North, says that few
firms outside of the Am-
Lieb adds that even
though the firm techni-
cally had an “executive
director” position before
she arrived, it was only af-
ter Kronish Lieb hired her
that the job evolved into
something more akin to a
chief operating officer.

Consider also Jones Hirsch Connors & Bull, an insurance defense firm with about 60 lawyers.

Jones Hirsch’s
chief financial officer, an
accountant, manages the
company’s records, but
the job is “more of a book-
keeping role than a man-
agement role,” Mr. Jones
says. “I think, in a busi-
ness like ours, the owners
have to take responsibil-
ity for what’s going on,”
he says. “I have the assis-
tance of some very able
non-lawyers.”
Industry observers say
mid-size firms like Jones
Additionally, Mr. Bower
says, many lawyers have
an elitist attitude toward
anyone who isn’t an attor-
ney. “There’s a mind-set in
law firms where lawyers
think all lawyers outrank
all non-lawyers,” he says.

Career Prospects:

Partner Robert Tobin. In
the 1970s, Kenyon & Ke-
nyon relied on an office
administrator to handle
much of the non-legal
Law 100 have real C-level
executives. What’s more,
he says, in many firms a
person might have an im-
portant-sounding title, but
isn’t given enough author-
ity to really manage.

’Alternative’ Jobs:
The Educational Challenge:
Emotional Intelligence:

Things are looking up but the game has changed, so be proactive and remember that this is just one stage in a long career.

“Unless that person can take on the mantle of leadership, which includes

Procurement, compliance and other non-traditional work can hold meaningful opportunities—and maybe even a career.

Although the firm technically has a chief financial officer, its managing partner, Winfield Jones, holds the reins.

The schools must find ways to adapt and remain relevant to their specific markets.

“Just because some-
Hirsch are more the rule
than the exception in
terms of hiring non-law-
yer managers who do
not have a great deal of
Even the term “non-law-
yer,” he says, shows a
caste-type mentality. In
how many other profes-
sions, he asks, do people
define their co-work-