Paul Kedrosky writes today on managerial (in)competence. There is just no question in my mind that this is true. From the vantage point of outside counsel to public companies (as I often used to be), you see an awful lot of just plain goofy nonsense. How many times I’ve said “if the shareholders only knew …”. If Spitzer could sink his teeth into this one, well, it’s probably a good thing he can’t.
In any event, one of the biggest learning experiences I had during my first few years as a lawyer was that very often the client who was giving me “instructions” didn’t have a clue what he / she was doing, and spent a good deal of time cultivating the surface impression of competence and managerial ability. The lawyer who can help the client down this road is adding an enormous amount of value. But at the end of the day a core element of the business model of much of biglaw (and many other service providers, no doubt) is to use this sad reality as a revenue opportunity.
Interesting sidenote for solo’s – my experience so far is that the entrepreneurs and SME people I tend to work with now are by-in-large better at their jobs than my former public company clients’ employees were at theirs – and this has been one of the best outcomes from my decision to start my own practice.