Canada, Rankings

The View From Up North: How Influential Are Canada’s Most Influential Lawyers?

Canadian columnist Steven Dykstra wonders: how much stock should we put in such rankings?

By  
on

There are about 115,000 lawyers in Canada, according to the last study conducted by the Federation of Law Societies of Canada for the year 2012. Sadly, approximately 87,000 of those lawyers actually practice.

Canadian Lawyer Magazine (“CLM”) recently released its sixth annual “Top 25 Most Influential” lawyer list. CLM whittled 87,000 practicing lawyers down to the 25 who, as the pithy title infers, make the needle move when it comes to our legal profession. These are change leaders. These are beacons that other lawyers look to for innovation, thought leadership, and subject matter excellence. Or, are they?

CLM offers up the Most Influential in five categories: Government/Non-Profits/Associations, Changemakers, Criminal/Human Rights Law, The World Stage, and Corporate/Commercial.

The winners were chosen as follows: CLM made a public call for nominations, resulting in 135 nominees. CLM then narrowed it down to 120 that met its criteria (I have no idea what that means). After that, it put all nominees online and asked its readers to vote. After the 9,105 votes were tallied, the five top vote getters in each of the five categories were honoured with inclusion on the 2015 list of Most Influential.

There are some names I expected to see on the list — Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin, for example. Hard to imagine a Most Influential list without the C.J. on it. What about the other eight Supreme Court Justices, however? Not one of them made it. That’s a little suspicious.

But, then again, it’s a beauty contest, right? I’m not saying the voting is gamed, or anything, but, as far as I can tell, CLM doesn’t make anybody disclose its reasons for nominating or voting for a nominee.

As another example, Marie Henein made the list. By all accounts, she’s a top criminal lawyer. Last year, to great media attention, she represented our favourite whipping boy, Jian Ghomeshi, during his legal woes. Does that make her influential, or just famous?

Sponsored

Had I voted, I would have cast my ballot for Justice David Stratas (who made this year’s list). Do I think Justice Stratas is “influential”? I have no idea. Have I read any of his decisions? No. I knew Justice Stratas when he was a professor at Queen’s. I drank the odd beer with him and found him to be a super nice man. That’s his influence on me and why, had I voted, he would have gotten my vote.

Is there point to all this? Probably not. Well, maybe…

I love pieces about the “25 Most Influential” lawyers. I’m a sucker for anything about lawyers that includes “influential”, “best”, “top”, etc., in its title. Articles like that are fun, gossipy and a good way to kill a few minutes when I should be doing something productive. But, do I trust these lists? Do I think a “Most Influential” list that does not include all nine Supreme Court Justices is valid? Not really.

Having said that, if I got named as “most influential,” would I tell my mom? Or course I would, and she’d be proud. I would also market the crap out of it. That’s all part of the lawyer game.

Here’s a link to the list. Have a fun read. But, unless you or I are on that list, I suggest you don’t take it too seriously.

Sponsored

That’s the View From Up North. Have a persuasive week.

Steve Dykstra is a Canadian-trained lawyer and legal recruiter. He is the President of Steven Dykstra Law Professional Corporation, a boutique corporate/commercial law firm located in the greater Toronto area. You can contact Steve at steve@stevendykstralaw.ca. You can also read his blog at stevendykstra.wordpress.com, follow him on Twitter (@Law_Think), or connect on LinkedIn (ca.linkedin.com/in/stevedykstra/).

Topics

, , , , , , , ,