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Insurance law team jumps ship for lure of less pressure and lower billing rates
Dickstein Shapiro has lost a ten-lawyer team to Liner in LA - not because the lawyers were unhappy or concerned but because they were offered the chance to concentrate more on client service and the law and less on the needs of hourly billing.
The move could have been seen as a lack of confidence in Dickstein Shapiro which has halved in size to about 200 lawyers since 2010. But in an interview with Bloomberg Business of Law, the head of the transferring group, Kirk Pasich, said he was optimistic about the prospects for Dickstein and that he and his team had been 'very happy' there.
Non-legal products
What persuaded him to move was something different. He said: 'I just thought Liner presented something that I hadn’t seen, big or small. It’s a law firm that sets a platform that makes it easy for you to practice and do some business ventures as well.' At Liner, he said, he would have the opportunity to design products - such as insurance - which would help the clients but do not fall within the definition of a legal service.
Quality lawyering
He added that at his new firm the emphasis is on 'the quality of lawyering not the quantity of hours billed'. Source: Bloomberg Business of Law
