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Being in the right place at the right time

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In his recent book Outliers: The Story of Success Malcolm Gladwell suggests there was a time to be born in New York if you wanted to succeed in law. He builds the case based on the study of several individuals who made it big in the expansion in corporate take-overs in the 70s and 80s in New York. His point was not just that these successful people were born at the right time but they also did 10,000 hours of practice in a field not popular with the big firms of the 50s and 60s and this is what meant they were ready for the brave new world when it came.

The question is therefore - were we born at the right time for the current changes in the business environment and have we spent the last 10 years practicing enough to be ready now?

Mark Jarvis

mark@penningtonhennessy.com

The changing world we work in

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There is a lag between what's happening in "the real world", and the effect it has on law firms.  

So have a look at the short video on the landing page of Right Brain Media http://www.rightbrainmedia.com/, and ponder how long do we have to adapt, and what will adaption look like?

Jamie Pennington  
Jamie@penningtonhennessy.com

The 7 things I wish I had known when I became a Partner at Pinsents

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It may be an inevitable condition of life that it takes so long to learn so little. When I was catapulted from senior litigator at a major City firm to partnership with Pinsents in 1994, building a practice would have been easier if I had known:-

1. That all high performers receive coaching, not because they are poor performers, but to become the best, because they are restless to improve
2. That selling was an art, needing tuition, then constant practice – just like the piano, learning a language
   
3. That there were people outside the law who had the skills and experience to give me a head start – that sales skills were not something that would just happen by magic
   
4. The elements of Key Account Management – that the intensity of approach needed to achieve success was the same as the most complex areas of litigation
   
5. What was really needed to win a pitch – what was going on in the mind of the buyer
   
6. That networking was much more than being affable with as many people as possible
   
7. That I would differentiate myself from most other lawyers by actually doing it - putting sales and other learned skills into practice

Patrick Raggett
Patrick@penningtonhennessy.com