Category: News Feeds

If you thought the explosive lawsuit filed against Jones Day by former associates Julia Sheketoff and Mark Savignac was going to be boring once the initial shock of the allegations wore off, you’re in for more surprises. It was only last week that we told you about Sheketoff and Savignac’s case (not to be confused with the class-action gender discrimination lawsuit the firm is also facing), where they allege the firm’s non-gender neutral parental leave policy is discriminatory, the firm’s black box compensation system results in unequal pay, and the firm has a practice of altering firm photos to make their women attorneys more attractive/white, but the litigation machinations have already begun.

Shortly after the allegations in the complaint became public, Jones Day hit back at the plaintiffs, issuing a lengthy statement disputing the claims, calling the allegations at various points “legally indefensible,” “sensationalized,” “frivolous[],” and “gratuitous.” But now the plaintiffs are using that statement against Jones Day.

Jones Day partners Mary Ellen Powers and Traci Lovitt entered their appearances in the case, and asked for a 30-day extension to respond, citing their hectic schedules. Plaintiffs oppose the extension, arguing Jones Day should not be granted additional time to answer the complaint as their public statements reflect the firm has already investigated the claims, which they say the firm has known about for months. As reported by Law.com:

Jones Day’s contention that Sheketoff’s claims are frivolous is ”an extremely serious allegation against Julia as an officer of this court that surely would not have been made by a world-class law firm absent an exhaustive investigation,” the plaintiffs said.

The firm’s statement also provides “an inaccurate and misleading statement from (managing partner) Stephen Brogan discussing plaintiffs’ claims and smearing their reputations,” the pair asserted. “Defendants’ tactic of putting off litigation in court even as they attack plaintiffs on Facebook and Twitter also undermines the civil rights laws by deterring others from speaking out against discrimination at Jones Day.”

Plaintiffs also say that while Powers and Lovitt may have a lot on their plates, the firm still has a “small army” of lawyers to respond.

We’ll definitely be paying attention to all the twists and turns of this case as they develop.

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Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, and host of The Jabot podcast. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter (@Kathryn1).

Last week, the stock market experienced its biggest drop of the year on the news that there was something called a yield curve inversion. This is when long-term debt instruments provide a lower return than short-term debt instruments. I have no idea what that means but two people I never heard of on CNBC said that a yield curve inversion is a warning that a recession is coming.

The news in the legal sector has not been good lately which also suggests that there will be an economic slowdown. The American Lawyer reports that law firm margins are tightening. And the news of LeClairRyan’s dissolution is also a sign that law firm profits are falling from their peak or will one day.

For most small firms and business owners, a recession happens when our customers are struggling to pay us but our creditors expect us to struggle so they can be paid in full. Here are a few things smaller practices can do to minimize the negative impact of a recession or worse.

Have a cash reserves and have a line of credit. This will ensure you will have cash to pay bills when your income drops. Ideally, you should have a liquid emergency fund for at least a year.

Set up a line of credit with a bank. If you already have a line of credit, request an increase on the limits. Do it now when you don’t need it because lenders will be very cautious about extending credit to people during a recession.

Ultimately, having access to funds will allow you to pay the bills and possibly make major purchases at a discount.

Consider starting a recession-friendly practice area. During a recession, certain specialties will be more attractive such as bankruptcy, debt-settlement, or contingency-based litigation.

But if you are a newbie, you should work with an experienced lawyer and split fees in a manner permissible in your jurisdiction.

Collect money from clients and collect it now. This seems obvious but I have seen businesses struggle or go under because they did not do a good job collecting from their clients or their customers. This happens for a number of reasons. Sometimes people are too busy to collect, thinking the client will pay on their own. Other times, people don’t want to anger the client and risk losing business in the long run. Clients have to be reminded regularly because if they don’t they will usually not pay.

If you don’t collect and continue to do work, you will run up a bigger bill. When you finally have the time and the nerve to ask for payment, the bill might be so high that the client will be too scared to talk to you. Or they might start nitpicking about that value you provided to them in the hopes that they can pay you less than what they owe.

But try to offer the client options if they really are struggling. If they are genuinely trying to pay, then give them a break and give them some time to get back on their feet. On the other hand, if the client is constantly breaking promises to pay you on Tuesday, it’s best to cut your losses and to cut them loose.

Reevaluate your marketing strategy and budget.  One of the biggest unknown factors in any business is marketing. So if you pay for marketing, you should evaluate whether you are getting your money’s worth. Have those newspaper ads or the SEO guy you hired resulted in paying clients? If not, then you should think about whether it is worth it to continue paying for them. If you threaten to cancel, you might be able to negotiate a lower rate.

But don’t cut back on marketing entirely. Many people will be looking to cut costs wherever possible and will shop around to see if a cheaper alternative is available. While attorneys don’t want to be known as the discount lawyer, consumers will be focusing more on getting more for their money.

Finally, be extra thankful to your referral sources and to those who have helped you develop your business.

Cut costs, but only when absolutely necessary. A recession may provide opportunities to purchase more for less. Look for deals on office supplies, insurance coverage, and telephone and internet services, as companies will  offer specials to get you to switch.

On some major expenses, you might be able to find a good deal but the drawbacks may outweigh the cost savings. A good example is office space. While you may pay lower rent, the office may be smaller, have less benefits, may be further away from your ideal clients, and may have undesirable co-tenants or landlords.

A recession may lead to better deals but don’t cut costs to the point where you are throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

Finally, if you want to find a job, secure one now. Some people like being self-employed. Others do not and are self-employed out of necessity. If your dream is to work for someone else, start looking now while job opportunities are out there. You are doing yourself and possibly your clients a disservice by working a job that you don’t like, even if you are the boss. When the recession comes, jobs will be scarce as companies will not only institute hiring freezes and layoffs, they will be very picky about who they hire. As some of us know painfully well, if you miss the boat now, another won’t come for a very long time, if ever.

To ensure a smooth transition, you will need to do a few things. First, research the company’s hiring practices. During a recession, do they typically lay off the new hires? Or do they lay off more senior staff? Avoid positions that do the former because you are not only at a higher risk of losing your job but if you do lose your job, you might also lose the book of business that you worked hard to obtain. How do you get this information? You may need to ask recruiters or people who used to work for the company. Or you can ask the company representative directly.

Second, have an exit plan in place. Assuming you cannot take your existing clients to the new firm, do not accept new clients who are likely to take up a lot of time. Try to delegate work to support staff or contract attorneys and supervise them until the cases are complete. Finally, you may need to transfer the remainder of your clients to an attorney willing to take them. This will cost you money.

No one knows when a recession is coming, so it would be prudent to prepare for one. But at the same time, we should continue to live and enjoy our life. The time spent worrying about a recession is time that can be used to do something productive. Using the recession as an excuse to be overly cheap can alienate relationships which can do a lot more damage in the long run. So until that day comes, remember this: keep calm and carry on.

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Steven Chung is a tax attorney in Los Angeles, California. He helps people with basic tax planning and resolve tax disputes. He is also sympathetic to people with large student loans. He can be reached via email at sachimalbe@excite.com. Or you can connect with him on Twitter (@stevenchung) and connect with him on LinkedIn.

Ed. note: A version of this post was originally published on November 27, 2012. We republish it today as a public service to anyone considering posting this ludicrous “legal” notice on Facebook and Instagram, a product of Facebook.

By now, we’re sure you’ve seen the ridiculous copyright and privacy notices that have been popping up on Facebook and Instagram posts left and right — and if you haven’t, then perhaps your friends are simply more intelligent than the masses who’ve been fooled into believing they can override a social media giant’s terms of use.

We’ll put this simply to avoid further confusion: stringing together nonsensical bits of pseudo-legalese cannot save you from succumbing to the rules and regulations of the Facebook gods. On the other hand, stringing together nonsensical bits of pseudo-legalese is sometimes what law blogging is all about, so we’ll help our readers debunk the myths of privacy and intellectual property rights on Facebook and Instagram.

Aww, you thought Facebook and Instagram couldn’t use all the things you posted on their sites because of your privacy settings? Well, isn’t that just precious.

Here’s the copyright and privacy notice that’s been making the rounds on Facebook and Instagram (a similar one was circulated in 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, and earlier in 2019):

Don’t forget tomorrow starts the new Facebook rule where they can use your photos. Don’t forget Deadline today!!! It can be used in court cases in litigation against you. Everything you’ve ever posted becomes public from today Even messages that have been deleted or the photos not allowed. It costs nothing for a simple copy and paste, better safe than sorry. Channel 13 News talked about the change in Facebook/Instagram’s privacy policy. I do not give Facebook/Instagram or any entities associated with Facebook/Instagram permission to use my pictures, information, messages or posts, both past and future. With this statement, I give notice to Facebook/Instagram it is strictly forbidden to disclose, copy, distribute, or take any other action against me based on this profile and/or its contents. The content of this profile is private and confidential information. The violation of privacy can be punished by law (UCC 1-308- 1 1 308-103 and the Rome Statute. NOTE: Facebook is now a public entity. All members must post a note like this. If you prefer, you can copy and paste this version. If you do not publish a statement at least once it will be tacitly allowing the use of your photos, as well as the information contained in the profile status updates. FACEBOOK/INSTAGRAM DOES NOT HAVE MY PERMISSION TO SHARE PHOTOS OR MESSAGES.

Thank God you cited the Uniform Commercial Code and the Rome Statute, or else you would’ve been totally screwed… except for the fact that you kind of already are. (By the way, the Rome Statute? Seriously? From where we’re sitting, the only crime against humanity here is that you’ve taken the time to post this gibberish on Facebook/IG.)

One thing that Facebook (and Instagram) freely admit is that once you’ve agreed to their terms and conditions — which you already did, by signing up to use their services — you’ve granted the company a “non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, and worldwide license to host, use, distribute, modify, run, copy, publicly perform or display, translate, and create derivative works of your content (consistent with your privacy and application settings).” That being the case, you may want to delete those incriminating pictures (even though they’ll still be available on the sites’ archives and backups, so good luck with that, everyone).

For those who think they can turn it around on Facebook/IG by updating their status, here’s some guidance from Snopes, which has debunked this hoax repeatedly:

Facebook users cannot retroactively negate any of the privacy or copyright terms they agreed to when they signed up for their accounts nor can they unilaterally alter or contradict any new privacy or copyright terms instituted by Facebook simply by posting a contrary legal notice on their Facebook walls.

If only contractual agreements could be voided by posting something akin to “LOL no” on Facebook or Instagram, perhaps we’d have a more peaceful world (or a much more confusing one); but whatever, no one really cares about legal mumbo-jumbo — except for lawyers — until they think they have something to stomp their feet about online.

So why are people’s panties in such a bunch? When this nonsense first popped up online in 2012, it was because Facebook changed its privacy policy. For the details, we turned to Kashmir Hill, ATL editor emerita and goddess of all things privacy-related:

Facebook is adding a clause to the data use policy that allows it to share “information with affiliates,” i.e., other companies that Facebook owns. Bloomberg calls the move Google-like, pointing out that it will allow Facebook “to build unified profiles of its users that include people’s personal data from its social network and from Instagram.” I think it’s less like Google mashing up everything it knows about a person in one basket and more like a typical corporate clause. But it does mean that Facebook and Instagram info may now exist on the same server and won’t be kept separate, meaning the social networking can now see everything it knows about you through a Walden filter.

For additional information, you can read more at the Not-So Private Parts on Forbes. In January 2015, ABC News got a quote from a Facebook spokesperson on this topic:

“We have noticed some statements that suggest otherwise and we wanted to take a moment to remind you of the facts — when you post things like photos to Facebook, we do not own them,” Facebook spokesman Andrew Noyes said in a statement, according to ABC News. “Under our terms (https://www.facebook.com/legal/terms), you grant Facebook permission to use, distribute, and share the things you post, subject to the terms and applicable privacy settings.”

And here’s the final word from Stephanie Otway, brand communications manager at Instagram: “There’s no truth to this post.”

That’s about it when it comes to your new and improved privacy and intellectual property rights on Facebook and Instagram. Next time you post, you’ll be allowing Facebook/IG to share your stats with other affiliated platforms. Build yourself a bridge and get over it.

Here’s a proposition for you: delete the things you’d prefer Facebook and Instagram not to see. Here’s another one: don’t pretend you’re a lawyer and spread completely meaningless information to all of your Facebook and Instagram friends. Here’s the most novel suggestion of all: if you don’t like the changes (which have been in place for years), don’t use Facebook or Instagram.

We hope you realize that this copyright and privacy notice means the same thing it did when it was posted almost eight years ago: ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. You can’t change the terms of a legal agreement with a Facebook or Instagram post. Stop it.

But if you simply can’t help yourself, at least do something creative like John Mayer.

Instagram Quashes Photo Usage Rumor After Post Goes Viral [WWD]
Facebook Privacy Notice [Snopes]
Facebook privacy hoax making the rounds, again [CBS News]
Facebook Copyright Hoax Goes Viral Again [ABC News]
It’s A Hoax. Facebook Is Not Limiting Your News Feed To 26 People [Forbes]
What You Actually Need To Know About The Changes Facebook Is Making To Its Privacy Policy [The Not-So Private Parts / Forbes]

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Staci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

Three years ago, in July 2016, New York administered the Uniform Bar Exam (UBE) for the first time. Back then, when bar exam results were plummeting and seemed only to get worse and worse each year, this was viewed as a welcome reprieve to the madness. After all, New York’s former exam was once known as one of the most difficult to pass in the country, but the UBE reportedly offered an “easier” way out for both improved pass rates and law license portability.

But did New York’s transition to the UBE actually help improve test-takers’ performance on the exam?

According to the results of a new study by the National Conference of Bar Examiners (NCBE), the answer seems to be no. Before we get into the results, here’s some information on the methodology that was used.

The NCBE study looked at performance on the bar exam in New York between July 2015 and July 2017, a time when pass rates increased marginally, examining performance on the bar exam by race, ethnicity, gender, and other background characteristics. The NCBE Research Department also considered how test-takers’ performance in undergraduate education, law school, and the LSAT correlated with their results on the bar exam.

So, what helped law school graduates improve their pass rates on the exam? Here’s a relevant excerpt from the study’s executive summary: “This is not to say that the pattern was perfect, but background characteristics certainly explained at least a portion of the improvement in bar exam scores after UBE adoption, indicating that improvement in bar exam scores was likely not due to the UBE.”

Here are some additional interpretive nuggets from the study:

• “[B]ackground characteristics are critical to consider when interpreting fluctuations in bar exam performance across administrations, specifically before and after UBE adoption in New York. We don’t have data to indicate precisely why background characteristics shifted, only that they did.”

• “The observed positive relationships between background characteristics and bar exam performance were consistent with prior research. Specifically, LGPA had the strongest relationship with bar exam scores, followed by LSAT scores and UGPAs.”

• “[P]erformance on the New York bar exam before UBE adoption was lower than performance after UBE adoption, however, these differences were largely due to differences in background characteristics of candidates taking the bar exam in New York rather than to the UBE.”

The NCBE won’t come right out and say it, but we will: Bar pass rates started to improve after law schools stopped accepting anyone and everyone, or at least lessened the extent to which they were doing so. As law school application and enrollment statistics started to level off or even slightly increase, there was no longer an excuse to keep admitting students whose performance and success on the bar exam would be questionable at best.

Now that the law school enrollment crisis of the past has been averted, hopefully future bar exam pass rates will rise with the improved background characteristics of students entering law school. After all, we must make sure that those who bet their lives and careers on a legal education don’t wind up in a worse position than what they started with in the first place.

Impact of Adoption of the Uniform Bar Examination in New York [NCBE Research Department]
NY’s Transition to Uniform Bar Exam Had Little Impact on Test Performance, Report Finds [New York Law Journal]

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Staci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

Whether you’re returning to school, taking your kids to school, or missing how smart school made you feel, Legal Talk Network has the perfect podcasts to both educate and entertain. This month’s episodes include industry advice for solos and law students, explorations about diversity in the law, marketing tips, and a glimpse at the potential future of the legal industry. As a bonus, tune into Legal Talk Network’s conference coverage for conversations with notable guests like the co-founders of Fastcase and ABA President Bob Carlson. So grab your notebook and pen and take note of the wealth of legal knowledge you will find in these legal podcast episodes.

Fairness and Equality: The Current Landscape of Antidiscrimination Law

What is fairness and does it really call for everyone to be treated the same? Kimberly Yuracko uses her extensive research on gender equality to discuss current social issues and how laws surrounding these matters are changing.

The Unconference—A Viable Conference Alternative?

There are so many benefits to attending a conference but could the unconference replace traditional conference structures? Tune in to hear about the different types of unconference approaches and the pros and cons of these more informal, interactive events.

Scaling While Solo, with Erin Gerstenzang

Criminal defense attorney Erin Gerstenzang discusses how her firm has evolved, shares her vision for scaling her solo practice, and what success looks like. She also expands on the potential challenges that come with growth.

Would You Rather? But Legal

Joe Patrice and Elie Mystal answer all your random legal questions. They dive into a couple of hypothetical situations about the legal industry and discuss which path they’d rather take knowing what they know.

What Can You Do with Your Law Degree?

One of the biggest challenges for law students is honing in on opportunities that align with their personal and professional goals. Gaylynn Burroughs talks about her work at The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and ways law students can get involved in similar areas.

Why Feedback Matters

You want your clients to have the best experience possible, but how do you know if you’re delivering a good client experience? Tune in for information about why collecting, analyzing, and acting on feedback is an essential practice for law firms.

Website Accessibility and the ADA

In Robles, v. Domino Pizza LLC, a blind man filed a lawsuit against Domino’s after he was unable to order a custom pizza from the company’s website and mobile app. This episode looks at website accessibility litigation and how the ADA impacts these cases.

The Future of the Profession Crossfire Edition

Two opposing opinions weigh in about the future of the legal profession and attorney regulation. One side claims the industry needs to adapt to the rapidly changing economy while the other side argues these changes might undermine the quality of legal services.

How to train your expert

Working with an expert or expert witness comes with its own set of challenges. Author and attorney Janet S. Kole examines the complex issue of expert witnesses in her new book How to Train Your Expert: Making Your Client’s Case.

Taking Ownership of Your Legal Career

How much of your legal career is actually in the hands of other people? Kimberly Rice explains the basics of business for lawyers and gives concrete steps for developing a business owner mentality.

Conference Coverage

AALL 2019: Fastcase 20th Anniversary

From the floor of the 2019 AALL Annual Meeting & Convention, guest host Bob Ambrogi speaks to Ed Walters and Phil Rosenthal, co-founders of Fastcase, for this special episode celebrating the 20th anniversary of Fastcase.

ABA Annual Meeting 2019: A Chat With ABA President, Bob Carlson

ABA President Bob Carlson covers the four primary topics talked about during this year’s ABA Annual Meeting in San Francisco, including lawyer/law student wellness, immigration, pro bono, and membership benefits.

Zimbabwe has been battling a financial sector crisis that has occasioned pricing distortions and bottlenecks for companies and consumers alike. The situation, say some economists, has been exacerbated by the government’s ban on usage of foreign currencies for transactions.

This has seen the government enforce usage of the Zimbabwe dollar in the form of bond notes and coins, electronic and mobile money for all formal transactions.

In reality, however, foreign currencies such as the rand, US dollar and Botswana pula are still changing hands in the settlement of transactions.

With Bloomberg reporting on Tuesday that Zimbabwe’s treasury is set to introduce new Zimbabwe dollar notes to replace the bond notes, business bodies have said they are ready for the new notes as commerce companies are already trading in local currency after introduction of the Zim dollar on June 24 this year.

‘We are ready’

“Yes, we are ready for the new currency – we are supportive of government initiatives on monetary issues. Our members are already trading in Zim dollar (bond notes and electronic currency),” Christopher Mugaga, chief executive officer of the ZNCC, said by phone from Harare, the capital.

According to Bloomberg, quoting Ncube, Zimbabwe’s return to a fully functional local unit that has potential to be traded beyond the country’s borders will be underpinned by yet to be disclosed foreign exchange reserves, gold reserves and loans.

However, economist Masimba Manyanya is skeptical of this, saying in another August 20 interview that although Zimbabwe will ultimately require its own currency, the country is not yet ready for a substantive Zimdollar unit. According to data on various Zimbabwean banks’ websites, the Zimbabwean local currency is currently trading at around 1:10 against the Zimdollar.

“The Zimbabwean economy needs its own currency like elsewhere in the world. However, the issue with Zimbabwe is that the economy is not yet ready for a currency of its own, mainly because we do not have sufficient production locally,” Manyanya said.

The problem for the Finance Minister right now is how to ascertain and store value in the economy, added Manyanya, highlighting that a well-functioning industry would help stabilise introduction of a local currency.

“I suggest that Mthuli find ways to create and boost industry and production before moving to introduce a local currency. If you do not have the right frameworks in place, you may end up having a situation where you just have a valueless currency,” he said.

Zimbabwe abandoned its Zimbabwe dollar currency in 2009 and introduced a multiple currency regime. This was after record hyper-inflation ravaged the economy, leaving shop shelves empty and the economy struggling for stability.

Zimbabwe is set to introduce new notes and coins#ZimDollar #Zimbabwe pic.twitter.com/sfNDYnTrJX

— Zim Local (@zimlocals) August 20, 2019

Zimbabweans on social media have been ridiculing the introduction of the new Zim dollar notes, with twitter users saying the government will “bankrupt” the new unit.

Another Twitter user was fearful that re-introduction of substantive Zimdollar notes would lead to excessive printing of money.

Post published in: Business

Tanaka Urayai – Harare, Zimbabwe

Every morning the buzz at St Peter Claver Catholic Church in Mbare along Rakajani Street can easily be mistaken for a commercial entity.  Every day, over fifty men and women in branded work-suits assemble religiously to receive their orders before being carried off by 15 branded trucks. At the same time, forty young people in branded t-shirts armed with clipboards, questionnaires and pens are released into the Mbare community.

The challenge of two Jesuit priests

It all started in 2015 with thirty youths from two different organisations who came together on World Environment Day. They asked themselves what they could do for their community.

Challenged by their respective spiritual mentors, Fr Isaac Fernandes SJ and Fr Brian MacGarry SJ, the St. Peter Claver Catholic youths and the youths from ‘I Am Mbare,’ a local youth empowerment centre agreed to team-up and tackle the garbage in their society.  They resolved that their environmental project would be to clean up Mbare and rid it of its numerous dump-sites littered with all manner of garbage from decaying vegetables, maize husks, plastic and paper.

Cleaning-up is not a one-off activity

The clean-up endeavour had to be more than the usual once-in-a-blue-moon campaign. With this in mind, the youths committed to congregating every six weeks to clean their community, one rubbish dump at a time. They settled for ‘Team up 2 Clean up Mbare,’ by which name they are now affectionately known.

The movement grew from just thirty to over one hundred and fifty youths, comprising both local Mbare youths as well as those from other suburbs. With the numbers on their side, they decided to embark on complimentary projects that would sustain their waste management efforts. In 2017, they decided to build a bin-shed to house skip bins and contain the overflowing waste; and repurpose the largest dumpsite at Matererini into a children’s play centre. Many small children were anyway already playing at this unhealthy site.

Business houses and NGOs took notice

Inspired by what the young people were doing, a group of young professionals coalesced around this movement to form a trust that would do the necessary fundraising to see the venture through. With assistance from Jesuits who work in Mbare and many like-minded Non-Governmental entities which include but not limited to Justice for Children Trust, Plan International, The President’s Fund, and Battle of the Chefs, the youths together with the older  members of the community constructed the bin-shed and the Matapi-Matererini children’s play Centre in 2017.

Understanding society’s attitudes and habits

After numerous presentations of their concept-note to humanitarian and private sector organisations, the trust received formal partnership commitment from RioZim Foundation at the end of 2018. The Foundation, committed to partnering for sustainable waste management and other community support activities. They began by sponsoring a Mbare census and a mini waste management baseline survey. The aim of the exercise is to have an insight into the socio-economic situation and to understand the community’s attitudes and perceived role in waste management.

Opportunity does come dressed in overalls

In 2019, the trust received a waste collection and recycling franchise offer from ‘Clean City’, Econet’s waste management subsidiary whose main role has been to provide waste collection infrastructure and the technology to run a commercial, domestic refuse collection ventures. ‘Team Up 2 Clean Up Mbare’ is one of several franchisees.

What started as a voluntary youth association has gradually evolved into a Start-up business, thanks to the Clean City Franchise that now employs over 50 locals. As they say, sometimes ‘Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.’

As many people within the legal profession already know, numerous law firms offer associates a bonus for work that they bring into a firm.  Indeed, many shops award associates a percentage of any revenue from clients they originate, and this amount is usually 10 to 20 percent of all collections received from an associate’s clients.  However, a number of law firms do not provide associates with any reward if they bring in business, or merely assure attorneys that any business development will affect end-of-year bonus determinations.  Nevertheless, more law firms should offer origination bonuses to associates, since firms can increase their revenue through such initiatives and associates will be more motivated to grow professionally.

I first became aware of origination bonuses when I worked at my second job after graduating from law school.  During the interview process, the partners told me that the firm had an origination bonus program, and this really appealed to me.  In order to increase my income, I made sure to attend as many networking events as possible and cultivate my contacts so that I could originate business at the firm.

It took a while to bring in business, but over time, I originated a handful of clients that eventually accounted for six figures of revenue.  This was a decent amount of money to the small firm I worked at, and the business I originated helped keep people busy at the firm.  In addition, I stayed at that firm longer than most attorneys did, so that I could develop the business that I helped originate.  Furthermore, origination bonuses helped me develop skills and step outside my comfort zone in ways that I had not done earlier in my career. I am not sure if I would have felt confident starting my own firm if I did not have experiences with origination bonuses while working at this shop.

I later worked at a few different firms that did not have origination bonus programs.  Because the firms did not award additional compensation based on the work associates originated, I did not feel as compelled to bring in business.  In fact, none of the associates at those firms really originated business.  As a result, the firm was largely reliant on a handful of clients that were originated years ago by a few senior partners.

At one of my year-end reviews, I brought up the issue of origination bonuses when the partners opened the floor up to suggestions that could improve the firm.  The partners seemed hostile about implementing origination bonuses, and seemed peeved that I would bring up the topic.  The senior partner gave two reasons why the firm did not want to institute origination bonuses.  First, the senior partner said that origination bonuses could increase the firm’s malpractice liability, since matters originated by associates are usually outside of the firm’s wheelhouse.  Second, the senior partner said that origination bonuses could open the firm up to additional conflict-of-interest issues with our major clients.

I never found either of these arguments convincing.  Clients originated by associates would be vetted just like clients originated by partners, and simply instituting an origination bonus program does not mean that the firm needs to take every matter that comes our way.  In fact, if an associate bagged a juicy corporate client, neither of these reasons would likely be implicated.  The senior partner was honing in on a few past issues that had no bearing on origination bonus programs as a whole.

It seems like there are a few major reasons why firms do not institute origination bonuses.  Not to mince words, but the main reason is greed.  Partners sometimes do not want to share more of the firm’s revenues with associates than is absolutely necessary.  Indeed, one time earlier in my career, I was at a firm that did not have an established origination bonus program, and rather told associates any business would be considered during year-end bonus determinations.  One associate originated an extremely lucrative personal injury matter that eventually netted the firm a substantial amount of money.  That associate received absolutely nothing for the origination, and this example shows that some firms are simply unwilling to share extra revenue with associates.

Another major reason why firms do not have origination bonuses is because firms want to be in control of all of the money that is shared in a firm.  By instituting origination bonus programs, firms are less able to control how revenue is distributed, since money is provided to associates according to a calculation instead of the discretion of managers.  However, firms can establish programs that merely entitle associates to ten to twenty percent of the revenue from clients they originate so the lion’s share of revenue is still in the control of the firm.

Some might say that origination bonuses shouldn’t be necessary, and that associates should see business development as part of their job.  Indeed, some may argue that associates are not being team players if they only strive to originate business when there is something directly in it for them.  However, most associates are simply tasked with billing time to generate revenue, and developing business is not within their normal job description.  In addition, people should not denigrate associates for being motivated by making more money, and firms should try to incentivize associates accordingly.  Although firms may have to pay associates additional compensation with origination bonuses, the extra revenue and professional development opportunities are usually well worth the expense.

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Jordan Rothman is the Managing Attorney of The Rothman Law Firm, a New Jersey and New York litigation boutique. He is also the founder of Student Debt Diaries, a website discussing how he paid off his student loans. You can reach Jordan through email at jrothman@rothmanlawyer.com.