Law Firm Primer For Articling Students and New Associates – Part One: The Managing Partner
Photo by RDNE Stock project at Pexels By Murray Gottheil | October 24, 2023 When articling students or young lawyers join a law firm of any size, what they see at first is the carefully cultivated image that the law firm promotes and are often thrilled to be part of a fantasy world where every lawyer […]
The Ethics of Dictating Work Ethic
By Billy Hathorn, CC BY 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons By Murray Gottheil | October 16, 2023 In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Later he kicked Adam and Eve out of the Garden of Eden and decreed that going forward, people would have to work very, very hard, just to survive. From […]
BARE BONES BRIEFS: Lawyer earning $126,000 gets $1.8 million in wrongful dismissal damages | Litigation funder scores $4.5 billion in proceeds from judgment | LST sanctions counsel for uncivil conduct | NBKB imposes 3-year prison term for workplace fatality | IBA outlines challenges for profession
By Julius Melnitzer | October 15, 2023 FIRED IN-HOUSE COUNSEL AT BANK AWARDED $1.8 MILLION A UK employment tribunal has ordered digital bank Starling to pay $1.8 million in damages to Guinaz Raja, whom the bank had employed as a solicitor in its legal department at a salary of $126,000. The employer terminated Raja, an […]
Stupid, Stupid, Stupid
Photo by Andrea Piacquadio at Pexels By Murray Gottheil | September 27, 2023 I once proposed raising our hourly rates and was met with furious resistance by the head of our litigation department who assured me that no assessment officer would ever permit lawyers to charge the amounts that I had proposed. He was a brilliant […]
BARE BONES BRIEFS: Gowling director disbarred for sexual misconduct | BC lawyer fined for locker room gossip | Do employment lawyers need to report general damages to CRA? | “Unfounded attacks” on lawyer merit substantial indemnity costs against client: Div. Ct. | Alberta cabinet minister joins BLG
By Julius Melnitzer | September 26, 2023 EX-GOWLING DIRECTOR DISBARRED FOR FANTASY RELATIONSHIP WITH JUNIOR EMPLOYEE The UK’s Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal has struck Oliver Bretherton, a former senior solicitor at Gowling WLG, off the roll for his part in a sexual fantasy relationship with an 18-year-old female colleague. The 70 allegations proved against the married […]
Artificially Human?
Photo by Pavel Danilyuk at Pexels By Murray Gottheil | September 25, 2023 I have a theory about life which I espouse in my less optimistic moments. My theory is that for many people, things become less and less familiar as they age. What is socially acceptable changes, people dress and act differently, friends and family […]
BARE BONES BRIEFS: Cyberattack costs law firm $11 million | OCA: testamentary revocations ineffective against RRIF and RFSA beneficiaries | Companies ignoring law requiring disclosure of Indigenous payments | Dubai’s DEC’s first case | Dellelce gets third honourary doctorate
By Julius Melnitzer | September 18, 2023 CYBERATTACK HITS CONVEYANCING GIANT Simplify, the UK’s largest independent conveyancing and property services group, which embraces six of the largest conveyancing law firms in the UK and handles 250,000 transactions annually, suffered almost $12 million in losses from a cyberattack in 2021 that created a major IT systems […]
Would You Rather Die or Give a Speech?
Photo by Pavel Danilyuk at Pexels By Murray Gottheil | September 11, 2023 According to most studies, people’s number one fear is public speaking. Number two is death. Death is number two. Does that sound right? This means to the average person, if you go to a funeral, you’re better off in the casket than doing […]
They Care… in Their Spare Time
Photo by Tima Miroshnichenko By Murray Gottheil | September 6, 2023 The other day my wife, Maureen, told me about a friend who was complaining that his busy adult children do not call him very often. Her friend asked Maureen, “Don’t they care about their dad?” To which Maureen replied, “They care… in their spare time.” Maureen […]
BARE BONES BRIEFS: More lawyers Down Under, especially women, than koalas | 1.46 ABA members suffer data breach in strange hack | Bennett Jones opens Montreal office | SCC Justice Moldaver joins Arbitration Place | Lawyer turned Yale psychologist publishes The Thriving Lawyer
By Julius Melnitzer | September 5, 2023 Australian lawyers faring better than koalas Koalas are now officially an endangered species in Australia. Some reports list the remaining population in the wild to be as low as 43,000. Lawyers, by contrast, are thriving, with the 2022 National Profile of Solicitors reporting 90,329 practising lawyers in the […]