Why I like Dispute Resolution First of all → I'm a business analyst. So how does being a business analyst solve that- question? Easily → there are many coherencies between business analysis and dispute resolution! The first coherency belongs to a common dispute resolution practice- mediation. Mediation seeks to determine points of conflict between disputing parties, then work on its derivative in an attempt to resolve it. In business analytics, a similar process occurs. The analyst look at a given work problem, the implements diagnostic techniques to gather data about the problem, The analyst doesn't care as much about the facts of the problem as the individual elements that make it up. These elements are usually transformed into something concrete that is quantitative, then analysed to interpret the main derivative. Once the derivative is found, a list of solutions can be implemented to resolve the conflict. Many mediation techniques break the conflict into parts. where its not particularly broken into parts, it is batted once an element presents itself. Then that element is either worked through immediately, or noted, brought to the attention of the conflicted party, then addressed as an individual issue after the initial story gathering process. In business analytics, many analysts use either a mind may or a decision thee. Each tool separates topics into nodes, containing subtopics, some software call it classiaications.ca sees, codes, and subcodes. A classification can be as broad as a business Area, or they type of employees effected, or a department of the company, A case break the problem down into specific instances, or else any ongoing issues that may have many instances. The coding begins to attach known concepts to particular details of the problem, then sub codes break 'the concept into its elements of analysis, In dispute cases, a similar elathorn can be used to break down the conflict into its earricular issues and elements. For instance, classification could be the type of conflict to resolve, Cate would be the specific in stare or group of instances, code would be the derivation elem s that create the case, and sub code are the theoretical elements of the code that can be used to analyze a solution. And, of course, the overall coherency is finding a solution to help other people resolve their problems.
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One of the items that is most often brought up during talks about ethics among legal professionals is the repeated talk about what cannot be disclosed during the ongoing administration of a case, and the handling of a case after disposition. Even hidden within conversations about things that are not barred for disclosure is the topic about why there still is a duty not to disclose. However, there is generally very little talk about what SHOULD, under all circumstances, be disclosed. This post attempts to address a few of those items that require disclosure. These items include, but are not limited to:
The Client Communication Plan The first on the list is the client communication plan. Although there is no ruling requiring it, you'll find that the satisfaction that the customers have towards the firm will be largely increased, as well as their willingness to cooperate, when the client gets to help create the plan prior to beginning the procedures in the case. When clients know ahead of time when their attorney will be communicating with them, when staff will require that the client communicate with the firm, and that their legal team is willing to adjust the plan according to those needs, it leaves little room for complaining about it afterward. Let’s delve a little into the ethicality of a predetermined communication plan. First, aside from a conflict by the courts for time slots available for booking procedures what is the biggest thing that creates a conflict to due diligence? Many times, it is the customers. This isn’t because the customers are not willing to cooperate, because they've given up, or because they've found another attorney - it's usually because they do not know their attorney is trying to communicate. Lack of Communication Examples This has been witnessed many times in the past, where the customer held up the process because they have gone about their time not realizing the firm is attempting to gain their cooperation to move forward with the case, otherwise they would have cooperated. Then the customer will call a week later wanting to know the status of their case then at that time they have to be told that their case has experienced conflicts to the legal time frames for filing things, causing more fees in the form of extensions. Then the customer gets upset because no one told them. There was a case once where the associate assigned to close out the file ended up having to schedule multiple times a day to show up at the client’s house because all other firms of communication were not working. It was a simple procedure needing to have the client sign the authorization forms to be able to release the settlement check from the trust account in order to pay the client. However, the client has no idea that communication was supposed to happen, so it delayed the case closure for at least a month. This is highly unethical since the settlement check is supposed to be processing through the bank while the authorization is signed so that the check can be cut immediately after, following ethical and procedural requirements for the time it should take for clients to get their money once a case has settled. Case Progression In that regard, another set of disclosures relates to the progression of a case. Many attorneys cover the separate steps in the case when they go over the scope at the initial signing of the contract. A lot of times the original scope is entirely obscure. This overview of the case plan lists the name of the individual processes and the associated price, but they do not talk about the client's necessary actions during each separate part of the scope, nor what each relevant task does for the case, unless the client asks. First, the client needs to know in detail what each step does to affect the outcome of their case, and any actions that can be taken during those steps to help increase the chances of winning and winning big. They also need to know about time limits, including what the regular time limits are for each step in the process, especially according to due diligence requirements, as well as any steps needed so that the time is not held up. Further, they need to be able to leave the signup meeting with a deliverable that gives them a reminder of the timeline of tasks the client will be involved with assisting to completion - such as signing authorizations, etc. During this time, the attorney needs to go over with the client any details of the case that might create a risk for the client as far as any settlement amounts are concerned. It is unethical to allow the client to sign on to the case with an unrealistic set of expectations about the outcome. In the end, a differential outcome from the client's expectations may hinder any future relationship with that client, or the client’s friends and family. Settlement Offers Aside from communications and process disclosures, attorneys also have an ethical obligation to report all settlement offers made. This may seem like a contrary statement since the highest settlement is usually the goal of the attorney and the client. However, clients may have various reasons for accepting a settlement offer. For instance, some may have rent due or upcoming car payments for the vehicles not effected in a settlement, prior medical bills that are keeping them from getting treatment in this instance. There are several reasons why a client might need their money at a time when it may require accepting a lower settlement amount. They may also have pre-existing plans to go back home, to another state, or move across the nation, they may be visiting from another country and must leave earlier than when a higher settlement amount might dispose based on their visa, etc. A lot of times earlier settlements are much smaller, and the attorney does not want to have to disclose those offers to their clients when they know the client will be able to earn more from the case. However, there is an ethical obligation to disclose each settlement amount offered, including the timelines for settlement. IT is up to the client what amount to accept and when. Compromised Trust Another, less desired disclosure happens when a trust account becomes compromised. In the world of cybersecurity and high technology, it's becoming an increasingly wide black-market business to hack into accounts and leak money and/or information from them. Even if money is not stolen from the account, the compromise cannot be fully confirmed, or a ransomware threat has not been fully confirmed, the attorney will still need to inform the client of the situation. This is scary because the client might decide to go elsewhere as soon as they find out that their funds have been exposed to a threat. Attorneys are required to maintain insurance in case of such an occurrence, but any compensation from such claim depends on how much the insurance can cover once an occurrence is confirmed. Such insurance won’t necessarily hold a client during a compromise. Other Compromises Other compromises include expenditures that become larger than what was estimated in the scope of services (unless the attorney is willing to pay for those expenses from their own account without penalizing the client), and any extra fees endured from the courts that were not expected in the scope - such as fees for extensions, objections, or to cure misconduct. Even fees from late payments to suppliers must be disclosed to the client if the client's settlement amount may be effected by them. A final compromise is when the firm goes into bankruptcy. The trust account should remain separate at that time, and rarely will any court allow for debtors to touch the trust since it belongs to the clients, however, the client should still be notified in case somehow the court does approve for the trust account to be accessed. All these possible compromises should always immediately be disclosed to the client under all occasions. Data Handling Under a similar frame, anytime there is a compromise to the electronic data handling systems - files, accounts, correspondences, trial courts systems and efiling systems, all clients should be made aware of the compromise. It should be disclosed to them the type of files that could at all be compromised, and how accessed. There should be notice that the compromise could cause a release of information about the client that may fall into the category of privilege of privacy between the attorney and the client. Even if the compromise is not confirmed, and even if it is highly unlikely that any private data was shared in the compromise, all clients should still be made aware of the fact that some of that data COULD be compromised. In this regard, it should also be disclosed to clients any steps that are being taken to cure the compromise and any time frames that the firm is aware of in dealing with the compromise. Sometimes the situation may be that the client’s data was purged, and not compromised at all, the attorney still has a duty to disclose this occurrence. Information is required to be kept for a certain amount of time, even at the closure of a case. Further, if the case is still open, the attorney may need to re-gather than information in order to continue with the case. Finally, clients are allowed rights to access any information maintained in files at the firm, and when the information is compromised or purged, this also compromises the clients access to it. It is imperative that the client know. Other Data Handling Issues Aside from data handling compromises, there are some other data handling disclosures that need to be made. For instance, if the company experiences a merger, the acquired/acquiring company may have access to the client’s data, and usually does. Furthermore, many companies use external firms to assist with handling data. This may be a cloud service for records software, a company that handles legal research and records management via software that also codes the software for reporting, a full fledged data handling company that gathers records, holds records, and disseminates records reports to the firms, and companies that maintain data for the company under legal timelines. Since such an organization will have access to client privileged data, the client needs to be made aware of this company and to what extent they have access to the data. Finally, the client needs to know how the firm handles the client’s data internally. This includes timelines, if it is all electronic or if there are hard copies kept, the chain of command for the data, and how the firm will use the data, including all possible uses of that data. Conflict of Interest Another disclosure that should be made immediately is when there is an allowable conflict of interest with another client of the firm or one of its attorneys. If it IS an allowable conflict of interest, most courts will require a signed consent form from both parties involved in the conflict for the case to move forward. Furthermore, even when a client is the one that referred a friend or family member, it is important to disclose to the client that such a person is also a client of the firm. The reason is that both parties may have information regarding the other that the firm may not already have and all parties need to be aware that when they are providing information they may be divulging facts that are not already privileged to the firm about someone who members of the firm are familiar with. In this example, both parties should still be required to sign permission for representation by the firm as a no conflict claim. Finally, when one client is a medical provider or employer of another, the same occurrence happens as if the situation involves friends or family members. There may be information retained by one party that has not been made aware to the firm that could affect the case of the other party, requiring that all parties be aware and sign consent for their cases to move forward with that firm. Interest on Trust Currently there is no rule regarding this, but there is some controversy regarding the need to disclose what law firms are doing with the interest earned on trust accounts. The conversation goes that clients should be made aware that there is interest building on such an account in case the client wants to collect the interest from it. Some attorneys may argue that the interest is to cover the fidelity fund, which will serve as insurance in case of the occurrence of malpractice. Many attorneys say that malpractice should not happen, and therefore the attorney should have to pay for any occurrence of malpractice out of their own pockets. Other attorneys argue that if there is no insurance to cover such an occurrence for the trust account, the trust account might be compromised, harming the clients. Still others mention that such funds would not have earned interest had it not gone into the attorneys hands and the attorney decided to build interest upon it through the choice of accounts; and the counter argument to that is that the client was the one that chose that attorney, based on an expectation of full disclosure of those types of decisions and such client may have built interest themselves, there is no prior knowledge of if they would or would not have. Since many effected people are currently in the process of demanding rulings about it, it is best to leave it at the idea that some clients might not know their accounts are earning interest. Clients have the need to have all handling of their trust account disclosed to them, beyond just interest. In this regard, the lack of disclosure also keeps them from deciding for themselves if they can collect that interest or not. Closing While this list of items is extensive as to what SHOULD be disclosed to clients, it is not meant to be exhausting. There are many other items that should be disclosed. This post is meant to start interest in the conversation regarding the way disclosure is also ethical in some instances of disclosure. It is not a bad word, just a contingent reference. I recently took a course in funding commercial litigation. The funding of litigation cases is as much of a finance issue as it is an ethical consideration. This is because funding normally happens prior to the disposition of a case. However, at the time of funding the status of the case at disposition is an unknown. Therefore, it becomes an ethical issue regarding how much to have funded, how much of that funding to spend prior to disposition in order to run the firm, and whether to use the single case method, portfolio method, or corporate method to determine funding amounts. The good news is that analytics allows a predictive platform for generating a more accurate estimate of how much the case will settle for, the cost to settle, and how much could be immediately paid back to the funding company upon disposition. Analytics can even predict an average time it will take from the initial intake of a case to the final disposition.
This last predictive inference is an easy metric but could be complicated to achieve. What it entails is the ability to enlist good tracking software into working mode at the law firm. It also requires that employees be well trained in how to use case tracking software. Further, the software needs to be coded accurately with the right kind of time sequence to properly chart full case timelines. This means being able to predict the time from intake to disposition for a case that settles prior to litigation as well as for a case that settles after reaching litigation. Further, to track litigation cases that dispose before a court hearing verses after trial, and how many go from trial to appeals, including that timeline. Also, the tracking of how long it takes from the time a case settles to the time that the law firm can recover expenses and cut the settlement check to the client. Each step in the process needs an individual timeline, plus there needs to be an overall timeline that tracks the entire processing of the case; i.e. how long for this step verses how that for the entire case, what portion of the entire case active time does this step take in the process. This will help predict the beginning to end statistic based on the case type, which will be discussed below. The tracking software used should be able to decipher case types by area of law, typical opponent company or type, features of the individual case, such as injury type, impact level, length of marriage, proper history, e.t.c, and amount of assets or insurances involved. There are many sub factors that can be tracked as a coding inference or as an extra effort during data extraction, but this blog is only spaced to suggest main points. The individual features, focal opponents, and case type should be cross referenced with time to disposition, as well as case status at disposition to accurately predict the timeline for each case. Accurate cross comparison will help to more accurately predict hours the case will settle and can be cross compared to the case status of pre-lit, lit, meditation, trial or appeals, etc. These features can also be cross compared to assets/ insurance amounts accrued prior to starting a case to more accurately predict settlement amounts. Remember this will be a full assessment of previous case type, features, timelines, and assets against previous settlement amounts. Usually being able to produce a chart of historical case statistics after generating a confidentiality agreement will help the funding company determine the true merit of case predictions. Once predictions are complete and accurate, there are two other steps that could increase the ability to fund - benchmarking and continuous improvement if processes. Benchmarking entails a look at the regular time span per case type for the entire market that the law firm works in. This could be a comparison of the immediate region or it could span to state courts, federal courts, or a cross comparison of multiple regions. The most basic benchmarking study entails time from filling to disposition with settled pretrial, during trial, or within a higher court. However, there are ways to drive data about individual case features, opposing party specifics, settlement amounts, and client demographics. I have heard of comparing legal practice tactics with opposing party practices to decipher what characteristics make an opposing party more likely to settle out of court. Also, predictions can be skewed based upon the opposing counsel statistics. Once benchmarking displays a vulnerability, law forms can use analytics to find new practices within their organization to strengthen the weakness. Displaying evidence of these two tasks will increase the chances of getting approved for funding, and at greater amounts. How to Advance a Law Firm from Contingency Pricing to a Flat Fee Structure
Many law firms work under a contingency fee, meaning that clients pay at the end of the case based on either an hourly rate, or a percentage of the settlement price. While there are a few benefits to this -> Lawyers are more likely to want higher settlements so that the attorney fee will be higher for the firm, there are a lot more benefits to the clients if the fee structure is set as a Flat Fee. This is because the fees are more predictable, allowing customers to imagine a budget for them, and it allows the firm to create a pricing sheet that potential new clients can look through to decide what services they are looking for from the firm. There is a large set-back to switching from contingency fees to flat fees. First, the firm will need to be on top of which of services they provide usually are not flexible, the regular costs of handling a case for a client, and to be able to understand the flow of the budget from year to year in order to set prices that will benefit rather than harm the firm. The good news is that there are several ways this can be accomplished. The first thing that will need to be accomplished is to split the different tasks normally included in a package, and split it into separate, billable tasks. For instance, the law firm can split court events into each separate event for pricing per event. Various legal drafts can be split by the regular time it takes to complete the draft from the research aspect to the final version, then generate a price based on the “warehouse price” which is the cost of the draft (billable hours and any resources used, such as a portion of the legal research site fee, or a portion of the software fee, the materials used to print any documents not remaining in electronic portion, etc) plus 1 – the decimal point value of the percentage the firm would like to make above the cost of the draft times the cost. There is also the power of attorney form, and any notary services. Any and all services that can be individualized somehow, should be. Many times, a firm is not sure how much they will want to make above the warehouse price. This is fine. The firm will need to delve into their financial data over the last 3-5 years to find a consistent pattern in case types, as well as services offered per case. Hopefully a firm will have some sort of financial tracking service in place, such as Quickbooks or any other money management software, and they can track settlements and fees derives from the settlements. They can also track expenses running into the trust accounts to find out client costs. Many times, these costs can be categorized to derive further services for individualization. Further, firms can delve into operating expenses and categorized these to find trends and case percentages that will allow the firm to add a percentage to a base price to discover its overall warehouse cost. To be completely accurate, one could also track billable hours per case and per case task to derive a billable hour quotient to each task given a flat fee. Once clear patterns are derived from the financial information, price calculations can be established. Once all fees are established, the firm can create a price sheet, giving them the option to generate a scope for each case. The law firm who is switching their services from contingency to flat fee will generate a price list and then affix it to a storefront on their website. Many firms will allow clients to go through this list to drop services into a cart. An advantage to this is that the firm can begin to create templates, checklists, and packages that clients can use if they prefer to go pro-bono instead of full on legal handling of their case. Law firms can still benefit by aiding those pro-bono clients will a very minimally priced guideline for handling their own case. Further, this is where the firm will add auxiliary services pricing and change pricing when the client beginning the lawyering of their case and decides to add a service, or otherwise make a change to the original scope/package. Finally, the firm can still offer the contingency structure for clients who prefer it. In order to include those services on a more predictable basis for clients, they will need to add an interactive scale, or some may use a calculator. For this, find the most likely settlement amounts to a case, then allow the clients to use a slider to navigate to their expected settlement amount where the fee will display (if there’s a pre-lit / lit pricing difference, they can both be listed and labeled as is). For the calculator version, the website will ask the potential settlement amount then do calculations to display the fee amount(s) once inputted. Make sure that clients are aware of what is not included and provide a list of extra services with their charges when the client signs up for either fee structure. This will make the process more predictable, and may increase the number of clients willing to sign on with the firm. In today's global atmosphere, the global corporation has to align leadership priorities is a way that will develop global leaders that can surpass boundaries and meet over corporate goals. These leaders may be diverse in culture and function, but they need to be alike when aligning with company visions and goals. One way to ensure that leaders align properly with the corporation once they are actively in position is to provide One way for companies to deal with the changing face of technologies and market advancements is to adopt an organization of learning culture. This culture entails the act of learning by employees as well as the facilitation of learning and task of learning by upper management. This conjoined effort towards innovation has reached the oil industry with open arms. Exxon Mobile and Chevron, exercising position in the top three seats of the Fortune 500 (Fortune, 2014) list, have created a structure of learning in their respective organizations in order to encourage innovative practices at all levels. This post will seek to explain what organizational learning is, some information about the backgrounds of these oil industry competitors, the different levels of organizational learning at these companies, At one point in history businesses are managed by a system known as the mechanistic organization. This organization entails the use of humans as if they were machines (Morgan, 2006). This means that the humans are set to one very basic task and are challenged to work against efficiency levels and time clocks with very little room for communication between one employee to the next. These are the type of systems that lead employees to want learn how to talk with one another while continuing the task, speaking in short sentence languages to save time and go with distance. Eventually the technological age brings about an evolutionary change in business systems so that The origin of the business establishment began with a functional strategy of working humans as if they were inanimate machines. They were given small, repetitive tasks that required only one specific skill. These tasks were practiced every day of work and employees were given rewards for longevity of service so that the repetition could create maximum efficiency. Eventually culture changed and technologies evolved Product evolution is the essence of business innovation. Some products are merely evolved with advances that match the current societal trends, some are evolved to match a need, and many are evolved after market research found a hidden consumer desire. The best way to explain the way that products evolve is to actually use a product as an example. This article will explain evolution as it has occurred in plastics over the years, beginning with glass. Henri Fayol is known for created a classical management theory that is very similar to Morgan’s mechanistic metaphor (2006). His theory suggests functional management structures for both cost leadership firms as well as differentiation firms (Yoo, Lamek, & Choi, 2006). This post seeks to discuss Fayol’s theory. The post will discuss what his classical management theory is, any strengths in his theory related to today’s business culture and any weaknesses of the theory related to today’s business culture. |
AuthorBonnie enjoys publishing poetry, fiction, social media and non-fiction. She has created numerous technical documents and research dissertations. Bonnie has also assisted in teh writing of movie scripts that have gone into production. Archives
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