ABA Tag Archives — Marketing Attorney Blog

Published on: November 17, 2022

ABA Law Practice Today — Point-Counterpoint: The Likelihood of Revising RPC 5.5

SNL’s Point-Counterpoint

Perhaps, I’ve never (co) authored an article with a smaller potential audience than the great give-and-take on the bandied-about subject of Model Rule 5.5 under the Rules of Professional Conduct. In the November 2022 edition of the American Bar Association’s online webzine, Law Practice Today (LPT), together with Charity Anastasio of the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA), we debate the viability of a revision.

In Point-Counterpoint: The Likelihood of Revising RPC 5.5, we ask and answer the question – Is the Association of Professional Lawyers’ Proposal for a Revised Model Rule 5.5 on its way, or DOA?

Published on: October 1, 2015

Buchdahl appointed chair of American Bar Association Standing Committee on Continuing Legal Education

by Micah Buchdahl

Micah U. Buchdahl of Moorestown, New Jersey has been appointed chair of the American Bar Association’s Standing Committee on Continuing Legal Education (SCOCLE), the entity that oversees CLE for the largest professional organization of lawyers in the world. Buchdahl, president of the law marketing consultancy HTMLawyers, was appointed by ABA president Paulette Brown.

READ PRESS RELEASE HERE

“There are numerous critical issues surrounding the continuing legal education of attorneys,” said Buchdahl. “They include diversity of faculty, consistency of educational requirements from state to state, how lawyers should best be positioned to meet CLE requirements and how bar associations are best positioned to deliver them.”

Published on: March 18, 2015

LPT — Law Firm Management Struggles with Multigenerational Issues

by Micah Buchdahl

The March 2015 issue of Law Practice Today (LPT) focuses on the theme of multigenerational and multicultural issues at law firms. As Editor in Chief of LPT, I wanted to also serve as the issue editor for this particular topic. It is an interesting one that seems to creep into conversations at my law firms and in bar activities on a daily basis. It is a struggle, and it simply can’t be ignored.

Depending on the size and makeup of your firm, you might have traditionalists, baby boomers, generation X and Millennials in the mix. Many articles provide the definitions and traits tied to each. They often have little to do with the lawyer business and more to do with employers and employees in general. I’ve changed the “generations” around a bit to better identify with the real struggles that law firm management encounters–what I call the originals, “junior” senior partners, next-generation partners and the largest…”others” (entitled “not an equity partner and who cares?).

What this topic really addresses are underlying and overlying issues tied to attorneys of different ages and generations–work-life balance, dual-income households, retirement, telecommuting, technology, social media, the billable hour, nannies and au pairs, quality time with the kids, and materialism. Besides age, factors and issues related to race and gender become part of a firm’s cultural makeup. It is one thing to fund a women’s initiative and another to have female partners. It is great to have a diversity officer on staff, if the end result is actually diversity. Yet a complaint of many departing attorneys of varying diverse backgrounds is that the culture was simply not comfortable.

Published on: April 16, 2014

Marketing for Law Firms: Priorities, Purpose, and Pay Grades

by Micah Buchdahl

In today’s The Legal Intelligencer, reporter Gina Passarella writes about the trend toward sticking “business development” into the titles of many Philadelphia law firm lead marketers. She could have changed the title to “Philly Law Marketers should not let the revolving door hit them on the way out.”

The latest step (or misstep) for many of these firms is to add or change the CMO title to lead or include “business development” in it. Somehow, law firm management thinks this will make it all better. The irony is that most of the hires and candidates have the same set of credentials as their predecessors. It is nothing but semantics. Few have true BD experience, backgrounds or credentials. But that has not stopped many of these management committees from moving forward with their umpteenth marketing head of the last decade.

I often find myself reminding law firm management committees that there certainly is a connection between business development and marketing. In reality, every single employee of a law firm is somehow engaged in BD. We are all in business and we all are trying to develop more of the same. Marketing provides the image, messaging, tools and resources to develop said business. In corporate America, many CMOs are held to a number–meeting a revenue target, increasing market share, balancing the budget between them. In most law firms, it is the attorney that either generates a number–or not. They rely on the marketing team to give them what is needed to develop business. There are exceptions. But generally that is how it works.