Biglaw, Midsize Firms / Regional Firms, Partner Issues, Real Estate, Small Law Firms

Reinventing The Law Business: On Competition

Does a law firm need to crush the competition in order to succeed?

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I guess at heart I am a competitor. I want my law firm to be the absolute top law firm in the world – at least in our niche of being The Pure Play in Real Estate Law.

I would like us to be loved by clients — loved by lawyers — incredibly profitable — the greatest law firm that ever hit the legal world. And to do this I need to crush my competition — right?

Or maybe not right. Let’s think about this a bit and see what happens….

My first thought is that no matter how amazing we are, we can never be the last man standing. There are always going to be multiple players in the real estate world and every deal involves at least two law firms (and often many more). So there always will be adversaries. Therefore, ruthless competition among law firms doesn’t have as logical an end-game as in other industries.

My second thought is that I should always be thinking about what my clients want. Do they want me to crush my competition? I should say not! We are in the real estate world, representing clients who are trying to do business and typically repeat business. They would be horrified at that plan of action. None of our clients are anything but miserable when they watch lawyers fighting over things while the legal fees rise and tensions increase – that went out of style in the eighties. Instead, our clients want our firm to be one that achieves their goals but at the same time (magically?) fosters business relationships. This would mean we should “play hard but play nice with the other boys and girls.”

My third thought is that our competition defines and even inspires us. This is a strange thought, but I think it is true. I remember being a kid and playing basketball with incredible determination, practicing every single waking hour. Believe it or not, I wanted to be a professional basketball player — I wouldn’t listen when people pointed out that a 5’9” kid from Scarsdale wasn’t a likely candidate to make it to the NBA. I do remember from long ago that when you played a great adversary you just played better — and the converse. Our saying on the basketball court was “When you play with s**t, some of it rubs off on you.” Consider, if you have a deal opposite a law firm with a top reputation, does that kind of push you to show your stuff and really let it all hang out? When you get right down to it, a top-level adversary brings out your greatness, which is what it is all about.

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My fourth thought is that the world is awfully fluid. Lawyers don’t stay at one firm forever. They move around and show up in different places in their careers. If our business model is to “attract, train and retain talent,” where are we going to find this “talent”? Ultimately, there really is no other place than our top competition. So maybe it isn’t in our interest to convince our competition that we are nasty ruthless [fill in bad word].

My fifth thought is hard to put into words, but I am sure you have seen how a bunch of restaurants next to each other can do better than a single restaurant alone, because all of them together create an area with “excitement” — sort of a “strip” where people want to go as a “destination place.” So ironically the extra competition creates more for all of the competitors. And what is more, the competition inspires higher quality, since no one can get away with being poor, complacent or even average. I think the same thing happens with us lawyers too. Clusters of high-quality lawyers practicing in a single location foster a higher reputation for all the lawyers in the location, pushing up the general quality of legal service.

My sixth thought is that all of this very friendly and cooperative “stuff” I am writing about is partially contradicted by a basic rule of the legal profession that no one — and I mean no one — wants a “wuss” for a lawyer. All clients want someone who is effective and can push, and even push hard, when needed. We can’t live on love. We have to be effective and strong adversaries. Teddy Roosevelt might have had it right by saying to walk softly but carry a big stick. No one – but no one – messes with my client and gets away with it!!!

So as I try to synthesize all of this, I come to the conclusion that we lawyers should push hard to achieve our clients’ goals, but at the same time respect our competitor law firms, not be threatened by them, recognize them as worthy adversaries, recognize that having them around is actually helpful to us and, most importantly, realize that beating up our competition will actually make it a lot harder to achieve our clients’ goals and just create needless animosity.

I will end with what I think should be a logical and informal code of conduct among us law firms:

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  • Don’t undercut or badmouth your competition — if you are doing that, a bell should go off that you are cheapening yourself and most likely you are concerned that your competition is in fact “better” than you are. Instead, compete by doing excellent work in an open and respectful manner.
  • If your competition can truly do something better than you can, then put your client first and refer your client there.
  • On a personal level, reach out to your competition to create genuine friendships or at least positive relationships. When your clients have a tough deal, this will make it that much easier to reach agreement and solve tough issues. Clients really like it when lawyers can work smoothly with adversaries.
  • Recognize that going up against your high-level competition truly raises the bar so that you can achieve excellence for yourself, and your best work for your clients. Don’t be afraid to admit the times you learned from your competitors – maybe even used the documents they drafted on a future deal (yes, really) – or maybe, in the earlier part of your career you learned a lot (really fast) when you got your butt kicked by a better negotiator. Ultimately, think how much worse your law firm would be – and you would be as a lawyer – if you did not have high-quality competitors.
  • If you have an adversary that is not interested in playing by these rules, don’t be shy in calling them out on it and making it known that that is not going to be acceptable. Being friendly and trying to achieve win/win solutions should not be taken as a sign of weakness. It is an overture for a positive way to do business; however, if an olive branch is rejected, you need to put your client’s interests first and not be afraid to be aggressive as needed to achieve your client’s goal.
  • Finally – possibly the highest level to achieve – is to try to have a good time with your adversaries – both lawyers and clients – and of course with your own team and your own clients. There is no reason that work has to be, well… work! In this regard, one of the goals of a real estate deal could be for it to end with handshakes, champagne, good will and a desire to do more business together.

Bruce Stachenfeld is the managing partner of Duval & Stachenfeld LLP, which is an approximately 70-lawyer law firm based in midtown Manhattan. The firm is known as “The Pure Play in Real Estate Law” because all of its practice areas are focused around real estate. With over 50 full-time real estate lawyers, the firm is one of the largest real estate law practices in New York City. You can contact Bruce by email at thehedgehoglawyer@gmail.com.

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