Professional Development

A personal brand is the thing that sells you when you’re not there to sell yourself. Here’s a primer on lawyer branding. To borrow a phrase from Charles Dickens, for young lawyers in today’s legal market, it’s both the best of times and ...

It’s highly unlikely that your law practice is anywhere near as noisy and chaotic as Times Square. Quite the contrary: When you go to meetings, or present to groups of lawyers or potential clients, the space is relatively calm and quiet. Most ...

If you speak English and only English, does it make sense for me to explain something to you in French — even if I speak slowly? Of course not. While you probably never make this specific mistake with your clients, almost all of us commit a ...

This time last year, many of us were anxious for 2016 to end. But instead of smooth sailing ahead, I feel like the universe started 2017 by saying, “Hold my beer” and it has spun chaos ever since. During the past month, I’ve been looking back ...

Across professions, there is a process to mastery. Hard work and perseverance don’t guarantee success, but it’s almost impossible to achieve success without them. This is particularly true in the legal profession, which is as competitive as it ...

Today Attorney at Work readers get the first look at Bob Denney’s annual “What’s Hot and What’s Not in the Legal Profession.” For the past three decades, Denney & Associates has been taking the temperature of the profession and reporting on ...

In the competitive world of law, it is not uncommon to feel (consciously or unconsciously) that failure is not an option. However, the quest for perfection is a double-edged sword. While striving toward it can motivate us to improve, perfection ...

When I was practicing law at a large firm, the associate annual review period was always an interesting time around the office. This may not be true at all firms, and perhaps there’s more frequent communication happening these days, but in my ...

As a lawyer and businessperson, you have two jobs in one. Some of us, including me, add the job of professional speaker to our already teeming calendars. Maybe you've considered taking on some speaking gigs yourself. What's a typical day in the ...

Your law firm cares about your personal and professional growth. But make no mistake, the law is a business — often a cutthroat one. Your firm has made a big investment in you in terms of salary, benefits, training and overhead. It expects a ...