In-House Counsel

More research on what a general counsel can learn about a law firm on LinkedIn

By Rees Morrison

Kevin O?Keefe, an expert in all things having to do with lawyers online, disputes part of my post about LinkedIn and its law firm members (See my post of Jan. 20, 2009: find out more about law firms through LinkedIn.). I thank him for pushing me to review what I wrote, as my post suggests there had been an over-statement regarding information on LinkedIn about law firms and their profiles. Kevin took me up on that characterization.

I searched a few minutes on LinkedIn. Under the company category ?Law Practice? there are 3,105 listings, pages and pages of law firms and without doubt all the AmLaw 100s, 200s and 500s you want. When I searched ?Cravath Swaine? I found that 1,055 members of LinkedIn have identified themselves with Cravath in some form. That is, they may be practicing law there now, or working there in a support role, or once worked there, or had some other connection. Skadden Arps has 3,797 hits and my alma mater, Weil Gotshal has 2,036 hits. But the hits are for individuals, not for a firm-submitted profile (We should have a Wikilexpedia for law firms.).

I looked at some heavy-hitter law firms under ?Law Practice? and Clifford Chance, for example, has a short paragraph on it being a huge global firm that practices in all areas of law. So did Jones Day, but Baker & McKenzie only said ?Global Law firm.? The firm information includes dribs and drabs of ?comparable firms,? related links, and offices ? the latter compiled I believe from the individuals who listed the firm, but I am not sure.

In short, Kevin is absolutely right that LinkedIn has a presence for all the major US law firms, if not many of the global mega-firms, but the information provided about them as a firm is minimal.

Full post as published by Law Department Management on January 21, 2009 (boomark / email).