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This second round of terminations at Cooley law firm has been labeled "a layoff." The earlier round had been classified as "performance-based." Bloomberg Law  reports that 78 lawyers and 72 paralegals and business staff have been let go. That totaled 150. Unless another law firm can top that number before this year ends, the mantra could be "Getting Cooleyed." In 2009, what rang out was "Getting Lathamed," after Latham in one day axed 440. 190 of them had been associates.  Now posters and responders to those posts on the professional anonymous networks will begin bleeding out with extreme angst. The mindset will be: If it can happen at Cooley it can happen at my firm. For months associates have been counting up how many hours they have been short for their quotas. With demand stuck in slow the magical thinking was over of making an end run before January. Sure, Cooley focuses on tech and much of tech is already in a version of recessionar...

" Tesla is still dominant, but its U.S. market share is eroding as cheaper EVs arrive " - CNBC , November 30, 2022 Currently Tesla holds 65% of the EV market. By 2025, projects S&P Global Mobility, that could fall off the cliff to 20%. So far, only one of its offerings - the Model 3 - is priced lower than $50k.  Meanwhile, just as Amazon had done, other players in the EV space could sacrifice the level of profitability to build presence in the EV niche. Their brands could become the first choice of those who decide to go the EV route. Given the regulatory climate of the Biden Administration auto makers are being pushed into producing EVs. They "have to be there." Therefore, they will make it their business to be the most popular brand. A major issue with EVs is, as we know, pricing.  In the pickup segment, the initially troubled Lordstown Motors has made real progress. It is shipping the first of 500 of its Endurance trucks. As the EV market matures it cou...

  The crisis in "Mad Men," produced on AMC, was when Lucky Strike pulled its ad account from Sterling Cooper. But creative Don Draper swooped in and turned that catastrophe into opportunity. That was through repositioning the ad agency as on the side of the angels - anti-tobacco.  But even a Draper kind probably won't be able to rescue AMC, the once-hot cable network which had also aired classics like "Breaking Bad." What is triggering a massive reduction-in-force and cut short the tenure of CEO Christina Spade is the combination of a technology shift and the seeming inability to have anticipated and managed it. Obviously the lesson here is: Change before you have to, as I advise my clients. That is a pragmatic mandate I myself follow. As CNBC reports, AMC is bleeding out its former success because of the flight of viewers from cable (very expensive and requires dealiing with the cable companies) to streaming (relatively inexpensive and a simple click-on). So fa...

"Electric truck startup Lordstown Motors [based in the Ohio Valley] said Tuesday that it started shipping its pickup truck [Endurance] to customers after receiving final regulatory approval to sell the vehicle in the United States." -  CNBC, November 29, 2022 The first shipment will contain the first of about 500 EVs to be delivered for commercial fleets. Essentially this is one of those heartwarming stories of hope that engage us around Christmas.  It had been touch and go for Lordstown Motors since the get-go. Now it could be a creator of a strengthening economy in the distressed Ohio Valley of Northeastern Ohio. That region, unlike Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, never reset after the collapse of the steel industry. People in the Youngstown, OH Metro area still talk about those days of steel as a core industry as if they were yesterday. In contrast, Pittsburgh Metro diversified into healthcare, tech, and higher education.  For a while, the production presence of GM at Lordst...

Last evening some caught the news of the filing of a second lawsuit against Apollo co-founder Leon Black alle ging rape. That was “Cheri Pierson v Leon Black.” Here is my analysis of that litigation. Here is a copy of the 30-page complaint. As you will note, the defendants include the estate of Jeffrey Epstein. The alleged sexual misconduct took place at Epstein’s mansion on Manhattan’s UES. That was last night. This morning all the influential media outlets ranging from Financial Times to Bloomberg have covered this latest development in Black’s legal challenges. The first lawsuit claiming rape had been filed by his former mistress Guzel Ganieva. In an amendment she added the contention that Black attempt at sex trafficking her on behalf of Epstein. So, this morning the court of public opinion might have shifted into overdrive. The impact could be to short the possibility of Black’s ever recovering his reputational capital. Prior to the media and his own former company’s...

  The world has changed. Our industries have changed (actually, the Personal Computer seems at the end of its life cycle). Our companies/clients have begun to panic about costs during this era of inflation and how much of that they can pass on. And we professionals are one year older as Gen Z disrupts the future of work and has digital down cold. Yet, some professionals haven't changed. Usually that doesn’t end well, even in less volatile times. Recall how former GE CEO Jack Welch kept up frenzied M&A to accelerate growth. He stuck with that and that is assessed to have contributed to the collapse of that once-prestigious corporation. The struggle continues to undo what he had done. Well, here we are at the end of quite a year. Some things don’t change. Still out there every major holiday is public relations expert  Bob Dilenschneider.  His MO has been to publish a feel-good reflection.  Here  is the one for Thanksgiving. Of course, there is a gl...

In a 30-page lawsuit filed in New York state court, Cheri Pierson contends rape and more by co-founder of financial firm Apollo Leon Black. Here is a  copy of that complaint  - "Cheri Pierson v Leon Black, et al." Another defendant in the litigation is the estate of Jeffrey Epstein.  Although the alleged misdeeds occurred a long time ago – two decades - the lawsuit is allowed under the Adult Survivors Act. There is a one-year window for doing that. Pierson is represented by Wigdor law firm. As  Reuters Legal  and the New York Post report, the details of the alleged sexual misconduct happening at Epstein's mansion on Manhattan’s UES are shocking.  One aspect of the claim is the infliction of brutal oral sex on the plaintiff when she was turned upside down. That left her in pain for weeks. The encounters with Black also allegedly included her administrating paid massages ($300 a pop) while he masturbated. The association went on over time. Obviously, B...

No surprise, the adaptation of Helen Wu’s 2013 novel “The Partner Track” isn’t making it to another season on Netflix. Most of the responses on Fishbowl Big Law weigh in that the series had been a clunker. Here is the thread. Essentially the novel and how Netflix depicted the content is a vilification of the ethos of Big Law (what muckraker hasn’t been there including most recently “Servants of the Damned” and a bit before that "The Caesars Palace Coup”) and, specifically, the treatment of minorities. The setting, predictably, was New York City.  The way the series had been promoted it was probably expected that fear would be struck in the hearts of the leadership of Cravath, Paul Weiss, and the Big Apple office of Kirkland & Ellis. Instead there was probably no interest from Big Law NYC brass. From the initial episode, the Netflix offering was an insult to everyone in the loop of the business and culture of large law firms. To begin with, none of the associates looked sle...

"China's Covid revolution: Three years of growing anger over Beijing's obsession with failing lockdowns is exploding across the country.... but Xi 'will crack down and punish protesters severely'" - Daily Mail , November 28, 2022 This development could be a signficant negative.  That applies overall to the US economy.  Supply chains as for Apple are already impacted.  The export market to China could be frozen, resulting in widespread Reductions-in-Force.  Professional services, ranging from management consulting to law firms, could experience a falloff in client accounts.  All could be worsened if international and US institutions put sanctions on China for human rights abuses if Xi decides to impose brutal measures to silence the new voices of protest.  The ramifications are also personal. Forget those recreational travel plans to China. Want to conduct research in China? Probably that won't happen now or in the near future. Considering enhancing a resum...

" ... what public polls indicate many viewers claim to want – unbiased news. But few can agree on what that looks like or if it exists. Nor is it clear they would tune in if it did."  -  The Guardian,  November 27, 2022. In commercial journalism, ranging from CNN to Abovethelaw, what is experienced as "biased" is being questioned. Its positioning as an advocacy venue doesn’t get it off the hook.  In ordinary life, the rant has gotten old, along with that myriad movements such as #MeToo which emerged during less scary economic times. The focus has shifted to the need for information and insight about inflation and the marketability of skills/experience in the labor market. More and more of us have to keep working, even into our 70s. Meanwhile fierce exposes such as "Servants of the Damned" by David Enrich and "Bully Market" by Jamie Higgins which had made an initial splash have already descended into the five-figure rankings on Amazon. Also ...

 Establishment media enthusiastically has been chronicling the slowly demand in Big Law as well as raised-the-bar performance reviews generating more layoffs.  Simultaneously on professional anonymous networks such as Reddit Big Law and Fishbowl Big Law junior associates bleed out their angst about not making their billable hour quotas and assuming being cut from the firm. And, of course, not-so-hot anymore Abovethelaw is clawing at any bad news for clickbait. The takeaway should be: Big Law is a troubled industry, perhaps poised for some version of catastrophe.  The reality is quite different. For one thing, Big Law is no longer a monolith. Each firm has its own homeruns, fresh opportunities, and challenges. Within each of those firms different practices and different teams within each of the practices could be producing different results. It is ludicrous to generalize.  Secondly, demand could and often does change on a dime. A deal may come in, then die. A deal may...

Workers advocate for what they designate as their rights in a lot of different ways. Back in colonial times Ben Franklin bolted from an oppressive apprenticeship by becoming an entrepreneur - and a founding father of America.  More recently there have been the class action and individual employment lawsuits as orchestrated by labor champion David Sanford of  Sanford Heisler Sharp . The law firm's signature is winning settlements. Employers know what they are in for when they go up against Sanford. Another advocacy tactic, which has had a comeback, is the strike, usually timed to inflict maximum damage on the business of the employer. That had suffered a setback when Ronald Reagan fired 11,359 striking airline traffic controllers. Right now, some Amazon workers in 40 nations and US states ranging from Oregon to Pennsylvania have embraced the strike tactic. The timing has been Black Friday. It had been renamed Make Amazon Pay Day. And the grievances include alleged ...

 From Abbott Labs to Chevy, half of the usual advertisers on Twitter had stopped doing business with that social network, documents Media Matters in America.  That totals a lot of money not becoming revenue for Twitter. Since 2020, those purchases of ad space added up to about $2 billion. In addition, seven other advertisers are downsizing their orders.  The analogy here comes from fictional AMC series "Mad Men." Recall how the loss of the Lucky Strike account rocked that ad firm Sterling Cooper.  In that dire situation creative Don Draper saved the firm. He leveraged the loss as the opportunity for Sterling Cooper to become a front-lines advocate for anti-tobacco causes. That worked. Later, it seemed that Draper went on to invent that iconic commercial about the joy of giving the world the taste of Coca-Cola. Both the ad agency and Draper's career went on to thrive.  So, some of us Twitter watchers are wondering: Can the financially wobby social network come up...

  Jeff Bezos has decided to donate most of the wealth he has built as an entrepreneur to good causes. Deep-pocketed law firms such as Paul Weiss have been in the front lines of funding social-justice issues. Bill Gates has also been sharing his assets to, among things, save planet earth. All are examples of what is known as "Effective Altruism," that is earning a lot, then contributing a lot to what society needs done but probably wouldn't be able to afford to do on its own. Without that kind of intervention, so many non-profit institutions would have to be continually involved in fundraising, which is time-consuming and usually expensive. Now,  Bloomberg BusinessWeek  is looking at that concept of Effective Altruism through the lens of an alleged bad actor in the game of acquiring riches. That's the unfolding saga of crypto player Sam Backman-Fried. His alleged conduct in managing FTX probably will result in a broad range of constituents losing money. Meanw...

"I’m putting them on delay send from now on. 😂😭 plus you’re right… it will set an expectation that my work product always comes back early, so the day it doesn’t because I’m busy, people will be mad."-  Here is an excerpt on the thread about submitting a work product before the deadline. Fishbowl, November 2022.  This original post about turning in work early probably is from a relative newbie to Big Law. In a niche focused on perfection, that provides the opportunity for supervision to revise the content. In addition, since billing is likely per hour, this opens the door to added billing - and more work for a time-pressed associate. Seasoned players know this.  Also, the expectation is embedded that this lawyer will always be ahead of the deadline. When that doesn't happen the perception of him or her could sour. That's just the way it is. This reality isn't only in Big Law.  In Big PR, from the get-go, when I was a vendor and dealt directly with clients I was...

"Corporate America is bracing for a potential economic downturn by shrinking the employee base as part of its streamlining measures. Job cuts announced by U.S.-based employers jumped 13% to 33,843 in October ..."  Reuters Legal , November 23, 2022. It's come to this: It's now downright necessary to hedge your financial situation in terms of income from your full-time corporate job with side gigs. That has nothing to do with becoming an entrepreneur envisioning being the next Amazon. But it has everything to do with being entrepreneurial. That is, spotting earning opportunities, going after them, and moving on to more lucrative ones.  It seems downright reckless to bet the ranch on any one job. A growing number of my clients who have "good" jobs have moved on from that to multiple sources of income from work. Those can be as simple as delivering meals (tips often make that a high-revenue venture) to the bit more complex such as being known in the communit...

  An exhausted nation tried to settle into a relaxed restful Thanksgiving weekend. In the process, some told me, they were annoyed with the greetings wishing them Happy Thanksgiving. Essentially they wanted to be left alone to retreat into private space. In addition, we have become an overcommunicated society, with messaging, both personal and commercial, coming through voice, texting, email, DM, social networks, and more. The joke could be: Next, advertisers and those trying to sell to us on LinkedIn Updates will resort to smoke signals. One business issue in all this is, of course: Should you transmit a holiday greeting to those in your professional life, ranging from customers/clients to colleagues? Maybe not. Several clients for my intuitive career coaching practice ran by me their dismay that those they have contacted hadn't responded back. Had they made an interactional mistake? This question looms big, given the myriad holidays coming up in December. My recommendat...

  Everything has become entertainment.  The wild popularity of social network TikTok is due to its being positioned and packaged for entertainment, not personal connection. As we notice, Meta can't make that leap. The once-titillating legal tabloid Abovethelaw seems to have gone stale, can no longer entertain, and is being attacked on the influential professional anonymous networks such as Fishbowl Big Law. And the joke is on "SNL" because it no longer provides comic entertainment. Given the culture's business tilt toward entertainment that makes Disney very marketable. The speculation out there, reports  Wrap-Pro,  is that Bob Iger's agenda is to sell Disney to Apple. The Disney ethos could permeate all of Apple's products and services. In particular, Apple would have access to Disney's streaming expertise and assets. Streaming might constitute the new national addiction. Part of Iger's signature is that of a dealmaker. During his "Ride...