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Resources for the Legal Practitioner
Opening a Profitable Law Office in the New
Economy
By Daniel M. Breen
BookLocker.com,Inc., 2016
Reviewed By Daniel A. Cotter
T
he practice of law has changed
substantially in the last several
years. After the economic crisis of
2008-09, an increasing number of lawyers
opened their own practices after law school
graduation rather than associating with a
firm. At the same time, the nature of the
relationship between offices of general
counsel and their outside lawyers changed,
with more work going inside. In these two
Daniel A. Cotter is a Partner
at Butler Rubin Saltarelli &
Boyd LLP, where he chairs
the Insurance Regulatory and
Transactions practice. He is
also a member of the CBA
Record Editorial Board.
The Inside Counsel Revolution: Resolving the
Partner-Guardian Tension
By Ben W. Heineman, Jr.
ABA Publishing, 2016
books, authors Daniel M. Breen and Ben
W. Heineman, Jr. have given some guid-
ance to lawyers in those two arenas.
In
Opening a Profitable Law Office in the
New Economy,
Breen provides an outline of
lessons he learned when he opened a small
law firm. As the back cover of his book
notes, “Dan began his legal career when
he opened The Law Offices of Daniel M.
Breen, P.C., on the same day that he earned
his law license in 2009.” (Full disclosure:
I know Breen and was a fellow board
member onThe JohnMarshall Law School
Alumni Association.)
Good Roadmap for Lawyers
Having experienced the challenges and
opportunities, Breen provides a good road-
map for lawyers interested in opening their
own practices. Breen covers marketing,
office space, legal tools, technology and all
other aspects of starting an independent
legal practice, including checklists for the
establishment and operation of a new law
office. At times, Breen writes in a flippant
manner (he uses the term “idiot(s)” sev-
eral times as well as other colloquialisms).
Although the book perhaps could have
been edited a bit more, it is still a quick and
lively read at under 100 pages and is recom-
mended as a useful primer for any lawyer
looking to start his or her own practice.
In
The Inside Counsel Revolution,
Heine-
man, former General Counsel for General
Electric, provides an excellent description
of inside counsel’s changing stature within
the legal profession. The dustcover for the
book opens:
In the past 25 years, there has been
a revolution in the legal profes-
sion. General Counsel and other
inside lawyers have risen in quality,
responsibility, power and status.
Once second class citizens in cor-
porations and the legal profession,
they have become core members of
top corporate management, equaling
in importance the Chief Financial
Officer and the finance function.
Heineman’s experience and wisdom as
part of that revolution comes through loud
and clear in this book, which addresses the
issues of culture, compliance, and integrity
within corporate legal departments.
Changing Role of Outside Counsel
Heineman also discusses the relationship
between offices of general counsel and law
firms and prescribes how law firms can best
provide value to their clients. Heineman
devotes an entire chapter to this impor-
tant facet of the General Counsel’s job,
“Law Firms–And Alternatives.” He opens
the discussion by detailing the “dramatic
shift in power from outside law firms to
inside legal departments” and lays out the
reasons for that shift, including lawyer “free
agency,” law firm staffing and increased fee
issues, and the emergence of the megafirm.
Heineman offers a powerful warning that
law firms and the profession must adapt to
the changes taking place in offices of the
general counsel or further disruptions will
take place. Heineman also makes it clear
that in his opinion, “it is still the ‘lawyer not
the firm’” that is sought and hired by inside
counsel, and notes his personal “presump-
tion against big firms if there are outstand-
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OCTOBER 2016
SUMMARY
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