Practice Management

Can "professionalism" be a smokescreen for mediocre lawyering?

By Dan Hull

"Professionalism"--like good crops, the flag and motherhood--is indeed hard to criticize. It is also tough to define. Is it always good for clients? Or can it even hurt?

It's not about the lawyers anymore. In litigation, and in other contentious projects, does the practice of routinely and without question granting extensions, expanding deadlines, and saying "yes" to an adversary's requests for an accommodation really help clients? Or are such courtesies merely effete and provincial folkways that take the focus off the main event: solving problems for clients? See "Professionalism Revisited: What About the Client?" in San Diego's The Daily Transcript of April 29, 2005. Has anything changed in five years?

Full post as published by What About Clients? on August 06, 2009 (boomark / email).