Canada

The View From Up North: A Look Back At The Canadian Legal Profession In 2015

Canada columnist Steve Dykstra identifies the most salacious, the most interesting, and the most inspiring stories of the year.

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Let’s kick this column off with a little holiday-themed poetry…

‘Twas the night before Christmas and all through the firm, not a creature was stirring… except for those suckers lawyers still working their butts off to finish year-end transactions, instead of hanging out with their family and friends, and drinking way too much, and actually taking some much-needed time off…

But at least they got fat bonuses. Ho! Ho! Ho!

Okay, I’m not much for poetry.

But, I thought it might be nice to take a quick look back on the year that was in 2015. As you might recall, the biggest Canadian legal story of 2014 (as decided by a distinguished panel consisting of… me) was the Heenan Blaikie collapse.

Sadly, all the major Canadian firms survived 2015 without going under. I say sadly because when a major law firm keels over, it makes it easy to choose the year’s top story. This year I actually have to think about it.

Maybe we’ll do some categories instead:

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Most Salacious Story: Prominent Quebec lawyer Marcel Aubut resigned as both the President of the Canadian Olympic Committee and from his law firm after facing allegations of sexual harassment.

Most Interesting Story/Most Interesting International Merger: Dentons merging with virtually the entire Pacific Rim. First it hooked up with the Chinese megafirm, Dacheng. Then it announced further mergers with significant firms in Singapore and Australia. If you believe, as I do, that China will one day rule the earth, it seems almost strategic to line your ducks up all over the Far East. Wow, a law firm acting strategically. Who knew that could happen?

Coolest Moment for Yours Truly #1: I wrote a column about Ontario’s best regional law firms that mentioned David Shore, the former Lerners’ lawyer who is now a Hollywood mega-producer (you would probably know him best as the Executive Producer of House M.D.). A few days after I wrote the column, I got this cryptic email:

my family loved your article

Shore

I have no idea whether this is the real David Shore, or some imposter. I suspect it’s the real one because, notice the lack of capitals? Notice he didn’t sign it with his first name? That just seems Hollywood to me.

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Coolest Moment for Yours Truly #2: I reached out to lawyer/novelist Brad Meltzer’s peeps to see if I could interview him for Above the Law. They got back to me and said I could do an interview in the spring of 2016 (so watch for that). A few weeks later I got a nice email from Brad himself. Très classy. I’m a big Brad fan. He writes terrific thrillers.

Coolest Moment for Yours Truly #3: Interviewing Tim Green. Tim is what I like to call a slash. He’s an ex-NFL player/lawyer/television personality/terrific fiction writer. Dude is a quadruple threat and also couldn’t be nicer. He’s the type of guy you want to hate, but just can’t.

I’ll end with this one:

Most Inspirational Story: Sabrina Fuoco is a Toronto lawyer fighting incurable cancer. She blogs about her fight at Cancer Girl Smiles. It’s a tremendous blog filled with humour, hope and a wealth of knowledge for people fighting this terrible disease. Check it out and, for all you lawyers reading this, Sabrina is one of us, so please support her in any way you can.

That’s the View From Up North. I wish you Happy Holidays and fantastic New Year.

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 [email protected]. 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/).

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