Law People: Practice Management

Home -> Law Blog Directory -> Practice Management Blogs

OR PHONE (866) 635-1838 for Bankruptcy Help, (866) 635-6190 for Divorce,
(866) 635-2689 for Personal Injury or (866) 635-9402 for Criminal Defense

Find a Local Lawyer

Bankruptcy (866) 635-1838
Divorce (866) 635-6190
Personal Injury (866) 635-2689
Criminal Defense (866) 635-9402

Practice Management

Law People

Ronda Muir is a senior consultant at Robin Rolfe Resources, specializing in the area of law firm and law department organizational development and dynamics.
By Ronda Muir

Post Frequency: 1.1/day

Last Entry: March 23, 2011 at 19:58:24

Emotions of the Times

Posted on November 27, 2008
At a time of roiling emotions in the legal and financial sectors, successfully charting a path to the future may be impacted by how we perceive and respond to those emotions in our organizations. A recent article entitled "Associates Should Keep Their Emotions in Check" advocates guarding the emotions associates experience in the law practice setting...

Friends, Tweets and Yammers

Posted on November 17, 2008
There is no denying that Gen X and Y are most comfortable interacting via technology--IMing, texting, emailing--possibly to the detriment of their face-to-face skills, as some contend. Employees in large corporations have come to use this technology, particularly on line social sites, as a way to form community and communicate within vast, impersonal organizations...

The LIfe Cycle of Teams

Posted on November 13, 2008
Teamwork may be the 21st Century's technology, in that it promises greater productivity--but only when used well. After seeing double digit increases in firms that have implemented team systems--management, marketing, industry and client teams--an initial question many interested law firms have is how to go about achieving teamwork...

The Future of Law Practice, Heller Ehrman Style

Posted on October 27, 2008
In an article entitled "Welcome to the Future: Heller Shock?", Paul Lippe, founder and CEO of Legal OnRamp, a private interactive legal services site, makes the case that, in the future now dawning on the legal services industry, the inevitable downsizing will not only be a matter of laying off lawyers, but, as with the case of Heller Ehrman, the failure of large, global firms...

To access this complete feed in the blog feed reader login or register for free.

Muir Participates in CCM's Audio Conference on Profitability

Posted on October 22, 2008
Ronda Muir is participating as a panelist in CMM's audio conference on "Revenue Per Lawyers: Increase Profitability not Billable Hours" being held at 2pm on Wednesday, October 29, 2008. To register, please go to www.c4cm.com/lawfirm/lawyerrev...

Muir Presented ABA's Edge Award for Article on Emotional Intelligence

Posted on October 17, 2008
At the meeting of the American Bar Association's Law Practice Management section today in Tucson, Arizona, Muir was presented with the 2007-2008 Law Practice Magazine Edge Award for Bronze Feature Article for her article in the July/August 2007 issue of the magazine entitled "The Importance of Emotional Intelligence in Law Firm Partners...

The Brave New World of Testing for Hiring

Posted on October 08, 2008
Norton Rose, a 200 year old UK firm with over 1000 lawyers in 20 offices around the world, is considering scrapping its academic requirements for new hires in order to increase diversity. How then to decide who to bring on board? Like a number of leading UK law firms, it will rely on aptitude and psychometric testing instead...

Bad Financial News Before It Got Worse

Posted on September 29, 2008
Citibank's Law Firm Group has recently issued its mid-year financial assessment of the legal industry and it is not a pretty sight. But that bad news is based on results as of June 30, 2008, well before the takeover of Freddie and Fannie, the bailout of AIG, the disappearance of WaMu and Wachovia and Merrill, and the bankruptcy of Lehman, not to mention the failure of the Congressional rescue plan, all of which portends even worse carnage to come...

The Depression Demon Coming Out of the Legal Closet

Posted on September 05, 2008
The depression demon attacks lawyers with particular vengeance, and denial and secrecy have long been the response. The recent loss to suicide of prominent lawyers from across the country, and the near loss of others, has inspired the courageous to speak out, a first step toward turning the professional spotlight on a condition that is rampant, but also treatable...

Girl Power at Work

Posted on September 02, 2008
In a recent article in The New York Times entitled “Girl Power at School, But Not at the Office,” Hannah Seligson gives some good advice to all working women, even those of the “post women’s right movement” generation in which she grew up...

Working Toward Happiness

Posted on August 09, 2008
Sonja Lyubomirsky, Professor of Psychology at the University of California, Riverside, admits being surprised by the results of the research she conducted on how to permanently increase happiness, funded by a 5-year million-dollar grant from the National Institute of Mental Health...

Blackberry Withdrawal

Posted on July 29, 2008
Linklaters is reported having decreed, in a fit of concern for work/life balance, that lawyers leave their Blackberrys at home while on holiday (vacation to us).The order is designed to insulate associates, in particular, from the relentless rat race for a few sweet weeks a year, according to management...

The End of Lawyers?

Posted on July 20, 2008
It isn't a tardy response to Dick the Butcher's rallying call in Shakespeare's King Henry VI to "kill all the lawyers" that may end it for us, according to the forthcoming book The End of Lawyers? Rethinking the Nature of Legal Services...

Muir Recognized for Emotional Intelligence Article

Posted on July 18, 2008
The American Bar Association has announced that Ronda Muir's cover article in the July/August 2007 issue of Law Practice magazine, entitled "The Importance of Emotional Intelligence in Law Firm Partners," has been awarded the 2007-2008 Law Practice Magazine Edge Award for Bronze Feature Article...

Developments in Associate Compensation

Posted on July 14, 2008
Muir will be participating in an IOMA audio conference presentation entitled "Associate Compensation: New Alternatives for a Difficult Economy" on July 22, 2-3:30 pm EST. For more information or to register, go to www.ioma.com/audioconferences/1053...

The Ultimate in Telecommuting

Posted on July 14, 2008
Is a four-foot tall robotic standin the next step in telecommuting? And what use would such a fellow be in a law firm or law department? Currently telecommuting is often an adjunct to an employee's presence in the home office-- three days in, two days telecommuting, or three weeks in, one week telecommuting--and poses its own challenges: how to condense complicated discussions into an email, how to make sure everyone gets enough face-time...

The Key to Commitment

Posted on July 03, 2008
The keynote speaker at the opening of the 2008 International Conference on Emotional Intelligence this week was Jim Kouzes, coauthor of the award-winning best-seller The Leadership Challenge, executive fellow at the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Leavey School of Business, Santa Clara University, and, according to The Wall Street Journal, one of the twelve best executive educators in the U...

Working with Introversion

Posted on June 21, 2008
Lawyers are introverts, big time. According to Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) results, almost 3/4th of lawyers, compared to only 1/4th of the general public, are introverts. That means they go inward to charge their batteries-- preferring internal introspection to external interaction...

Historic Hillary--and Hesitation

Posted on June 09, 2008
Regardless of your politics, the last year has been a fabulous display of woman-power in the political arena. For the first time in American history, a woman was a major contender for her party's presidential nomination, and came damned closed to winning it...

The Evolving GC and Other Developments in Law Firm Management

Posted on May 28, 2008
The role of the full-time general counsel at law firms is evidently becoming entrenched, and also valued enough for firms to devote significant funds to the role. So why does a big-law firm swim against that tide?Results from Altman Weil's 2008 survey of the Am Law 200, released at the end of April, found that, compared to the last survey conducted in 2006, the number of firms with full-time GCs remained stable at 85%, 83% percent of whom are litigation partners...

Coda: Happiness Hits the Bottom Line

Posted on May 10, 2008
In April, Shearman & Sterling's entire Mannheim office packed up and reverted back to its original form, Schilling Zutt & Anschutz. What prompted the schism?"There are some great lawyers at Shearman & Sterling," one former partner is reported to have said...

The Pro Bono Angle

Posted on May 10, 2008
At a time of some idling in the legal industry, a good use of lawyer time may be to spiff up the old pro bono program. Davis Polk & Wardwell recently announced the addition of Ronnie Abrams, former Manhattan US Attorney's Office prosecutor and daughter of renowned First Amendment litigator Floyd Abrams, as its first Special Counsel for Pro Bono...

"Gross National Happiness"

Posted on April 21, 2008
Shedding additional light on earlier explorations in this forum of the subject of happiness is a new book written by Arthur Brooks that distills mountains of data on the subject. For one thing, politics and happiness turn out to be clearly correlated...

Testing for Law

Posted on April 05, 2008
The use of assessments worldwide is rapidly expanding and lawyers are still lagging at the back of the pack--way back. An article by Lisa Belkin in yesterday's New York Times notes that there are 2,500 "profiling instruments" that companies rely on more every year when deciding whom to hire or promote...

Testing for Law

Posted on April 04, 2008
The use of assessments worldwide is rapidly expanding and lawyers are still lagging at the back of the pack--way back. An article by Lisa Belkin in yesterday's New York Times notes that there are 2,500 "profiling instruments" that companies rely on more every year when deciding whom to hire or promote...

Making Law School Practical

Posted on March 20, 2008
Washington and Lee University School of Law has announced a plan to replace all third-year academic classes with hands-on "experiential" learning. Recently approved unanimously by faculty, the new curriculum will be phased in over 3-4 years and teach practical skills by using simulations and real-client interactions...

Making Law School Practical

The Secret Life of Success: Spitzer and Other Masters of the Universe

Posted on March 14, 2008
Of the gallons of ink dedicated to analyzing the eye-popping follies of Eliot Spitzer, by far the most trenchant view is contained in the March 14 New York Times OpEd piece by David Brooks. Permit me to quote whole sections of his article...

The Secret Life of Success: Spitzer and Other Masters of the Universe

Joining the British in the Hunt for an Identity

Posted on March 05, 2008
Now that the British are doing it, maybe even law firms should consider giving it a try. Articulating an identity, that is. According to an article in the New York Times last month, Prime Minister Gordon Brown's new government has announced an effort to formulate a British "statement of values" defining what it mean to be British, much as the Declaration of Independence sets out what Americans stand for...

Previous | Next

Related Law Bulletins

Eminent Domain in Utah and India: Letting the people decide
by Priya Prakash RoyalOne problem with the power of eminent domain...

Eight People Killed in Maryland After Being Hit By Car During Street-Race
At least eight people are dead and five others injured in Accokeek...

5 Top Mistakes People Make When Getting Divorced
Excellent tips if you are going through a divorce.

What Should We Call People Here Without Authorization?
There is an exhaustive article at ILW.com about how exactly we sho...