In a demonstration of how law firms are adopting disruptive business practices, Howard Kennedy has unveiled an innovative new scheme. And in an unusual twist, the firm intends to disrupt its own business - by shutting its lawyers' computers down if they fail to complete their timesheets.
Real estate chairman Julian Hindmarsh told The Lawyer magazine that fee-earners at the firm are required to record seven hours work every day, of which 5.6 hours must be chargeable. At the end of the week, any individual who has failed to achieve that target is sent a reminder by email, and if the target is still not reached after a month then the fee-earner is locked out of their computer.
According to Hindmarsh the policy is designed to "name and shame" the lawyer. However, it may not be the most practical solution given that offenders would then be prevented from recording any time at all, and from doing anything much in the way of useful work.
Howard Kennedy is not the first firm to resort to desperate measures to get people to record their time. Nabarro told its lawyers recently to continue billing clients even when they're having a loo break.
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Real estate chairman Julian Hindmarsh told The Lawyer magazine that fee-earners at the firm are required to record seven hours work every day, of which 5.6 hours must be chargeable. At the end of the week, any individual who has failed to achieve that target is sent a reminder by email, and if the target is still not reached after a month then the fee-earner is locked out of their computer.
According to Hindmarsh the policy is designed to "name and shame" the lawyer. However, it may not be the most practical solution given that offenders would then be prevented from recording any time at all, and from doing anything much in the way of useful work.
The Howard Kennedy approach to making staff more productive |
Howard Kennedy is not the first firm to resort to desperate measures to get people to record their time. Nabarro told its lawyers recently to continue billing clients even when they're having a loo break.
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Which will all lead to bigger bill, falling standards and customers (yes, customers you really can't hide behind pretending they are clients when you're milking so hard) moving to AI service providers.
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But if the problem is endemic to the point of needing this sort of thing, it just shows that there are more serious underlying problems.
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