Big, as a business model (let alone as an expression of the national mood), seems bound for obsolescence.
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Big, as a business model (let alone as an expression of the national mood), seems bound for obsolescence.
Spencer Fry
on 09 Jun 09With fewer investors out there, entrepreneurs are forced to keep things small and grow organically. It’s certainly a good thing for the consumer.
Dave!
on 09 Jun 09Size only scratches the surface of the problems with the “BIGLAW” business model.
GeeIWonder
on 09 Jun 09Wow. I disagree. Big is in. Ask India, China, or any of the other populous G77 that are primed to
I think America may be moving towards small, and therefore America’s lawfirms and economy must follow and focus on specialization and increased efficiencies, like others have done before. That’s ok, but don’t mistake predictable patterns of state-centered realism as a conscious ‘lesson learned’ in something akin to defensive realism.
GeeIWonder
on 09 Jun 09*primed to pounce
Erik
on 09 Jun 09I disagree—the big guys will always have a spot. It’s just everyone is down on the big guys right now because of the economy and such. They’re not going anywhere.
On a separate note, that article is not a very good one. “A Study in Why Major Law Firms Are Shrinking”...a study perhaps, but by the slimmest of margins.
pwb
on 09 Jun 09I think this is a very interesting topic. There’s a widespread perception that bigger is better and that the benefits of being bigger outweigh the detriments. I’m wondering if that really is the case? I think many of us experience that the bigger something gets the worse it becomes. Or maybe that growth to a certain point is good but then beyond that starts becoming a net negative.
Dan Thornton
on 09 Jun 09Oddly enough I just moved from a large company to a much smaller one in terms of employees etc, and it’s down to the changing economy and methods of business in the UK.
It’s faster, more responsive, more flexible and more intuitive.
But it does come with a caveat – although the company is lean in terms of numbers, it does have significant resources in a parent company, which effectively gives us the best of both worlds.
Adam Wood
on 11 Jun 09The article made me yo-yo back and forth between giggling and nausea. Of course power is shifting away from the big firms. And it isn’t just the economy. The market for everything is shifting away from the old guard and towards the long tail of innovation, creativity, and niche specialization.
I know more than a few law firms that are experiencing double-digit growth. Tell them that a recession is bad for business.
I wrote a response to the NY Times article, which you can read here.
Thanks, 37Signals, for bringing this article to my attention.
Anonymous Coward
on 15 Jun 09gfgdf
This discussion is closed.