At first blush, this letter to the editor criticizing the Duxbury school board for considering the possibility of replacing its current law firm with a one-person “cut rate” shop seems discouraging for most solos who compete with the big boys. Among other things, the writer expresses concern about the solo’s cut rates, noting that “you
Future Trends
From Little Shingles, Big Law Firms Grow
Everyone starts somewhere, law firms included. Consider this story from Forbes about Jere Beasley, one of the nation’s most successful personal injury lawyer who’s secured multimillion dollar settlements and verdicts against some of the largest corporations in the country. According to the story, Beasley started a solo practice because he couldn’t find a job. …
Author’s Cut: Solo Practice – Looking Back, Looking Forward
When I sat down to write Solo by Choice, the context mattered most. One of the my goals in starting MyShingle was to discuss solo pratice not so much as a category of law practice unto itself , but rather to view the role of, and opportunities for, solo and small firm practitioners in the…
The Rich Choose Solo and Small Firm Lawyers
Worth Magazine just published a list of the top hundred lawyers who serve some of the nation’s wealthiest individuals, with net worths ranging from $2 million to $200 million. (H/T ABA Journal News). The wealth of these lawyers’ clients ranges from In particular, the editors sought out “lawyers with great tact, discretion and stellar…
Do Ethics Committees Pick On Solos? Yes, yes and yes!
Back in February 2003, when MyShingle was still in its infancy, I wrote this blockbuster post, entitled The Bar’s Dirty Little Not So Secret Secret, which offers some powerful evidence to demonstrate that solo and small firm lawyers are the targets of disciplinary actions far more than our large firm counterparts. Apparently, the disparity…
Are ethics rules biased against solos? Call me a conspiracy theorist if you want, but there’s proof….
Back in 2003, I wrote a post (not presently available online) entitled the Bar’s Dirty Little Not So Secret Secret. The article highlighted how most bars’ disciplinary systems disproportionally target solos, when there’s plenty of incompetence to go around. But there’s a problem far worse than disparate enforcement – and that’s disparate impact, i.e., where…
Loan Forgiveness – Why Not For Solos?
This article, Debt Relief May Be In Sight for Lawyers (Chicago Sun Times 11/27/06) reports on the status of legislation proposed by Senator Dick Durbin back in 2003, that would grant student loan relief to public sector lawyers in the criminal justice system. From the article:
The average young lawyer from a private law school…
Ivy League Solos
Whether you like Harvard Law School or not, you have to agree that virtually every HLS graduate can write their own ticket to whatever job they want. So it’s gratifying to see that with so many career options, young HLS grads are still choosing solo practice, as reported in this article from the HLS Bulletin,…
Great News for Law Firm Start Ups: 80 Percent of Dotcoms Survived!
I’ve always likened the rise of modern day independent practice (call it the Third Wave if you will) to the dotcom era. Before dotcoms, small entrepreneurship wasn’t cool. But the success of little garage companies forced our profession to look at law firm start ups in a different light.
And because law firm start ups…
Be A Shlep!
One of my favorite blogging buddies, David Giacalone, on a partial blogging hiatus as f/k/a, has resurfaced again with a new proposed blog, shlep: the Self-Help Law ExPress. As the name reflects, shlep will provide commentary on and resources for pro se litigation. From the introductory post:
Self-Help Law deserves its own weblog. …