It is often said by management consultants, business process engineers and senior IT staff working in the legal profession that law firms should adopt a more “corporate” management structure – not least in the pages of this magazine. This, the pundits claim, would create more of a synergy between firms and their clients; it would make the firms generally more efficient and it would increase the positive impact that technology can deliver.
Similarly, the high failure rate of technology and marketing projects in law firms is often ascribed to the culture of firms and their management structures. But are these factors really significant impediments to progress or just convenient scapegoats for ill-conceived strategy and badly implemented technology?
