Industry Experts to Offer Strategies for Law Firm Success – Creating Opportunities From the Recession

SAN DIEGO, June 23 /PRNewswire/ — Nationally recognized experts within the legal community are coming to San Diego on October 23rd & 24th with the message that law firms must change now in order to be competitive in the future. The conference titled “Inside the Law Firm of the Future” is a rare opportunity for attendees to meet key industry experts all in one place to discuss this broad range of topics.

For two days, industry experts such as author Ron Baker, legal strategist, Peter Zeughauser, CEO Chris Marston, Womble-Carlyle’s Director of Sales, Steve Bell and others, will convene and discuss the trends and changes affecting the business of law, and why change is necessary.

“No longer do we have the ‘business as usual’ attitude,” says Chris Marston, CEO of Boston based, Exemplar Law. “One good thing that has come out of our poor economy is that inherently defective business models have proven to be unworkable.” Marston also added, “Our goal is to jump-start those firms that want to get the competitive advantage while others are running for cover. We are there to show them the way.”

Peter Zeughauser of The Zeughauser group in Newport Beach, CA, advises firms to invest during the recession in developing their brands; a recession provides opportunities to build a brand even more quickly, because as many firms retrench from brandbuilding activities as a cost-saving measure.

Zeughauser’s final bit of advice is that we are certain that the best firms will lead the industry out of the recession by seeing and seizing opportunity in change.

This conference will be of vital interest to firms that are ready, willing, and able to shift gears into a more productive business model. With the experts advice, the transition should be easier. Attendance is limited and advance registration is required. See www.insidethefirmofthefuture.com for more details.

Inside The Firm of the Future is a presentation of The Catalyst Effect, Inc. A legal education conference company that focuses on providing advice for law firms. Founded in 2009 with offices in San Diego and Chicago. The website for the conference is: www.insidethefirmofthefuture.com . For more information

about this conference, or to schedule an interview, please contact: Bryan Weaver, 501 West Broadway, #1770, San Diego 619-544-0086 ext105, or bryan@insidethefirmofthefuture.com.

SOURCE The Catalyst Effect, Inc.

Bryan Weaver, +1-619-544-0086, ext. 105, bryan@insidethefirmofthefuture.com,

for The Catalyst Effect, Inc.

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The letter can be read at Huliq here and below.

Employee Free Choice Act Raises Concerns

As one of Chicago’s largest business associations, representing over 80 communities and 700-plus business members, the Greater O’Hare Association, www.greaterohare.com, recognizes the need to address business concerns such as the proposed Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), AKA the “card check bill.”

Essentially, the bill will make it much easier for unions to organize businesses of all sizes and antagonize business owners and operators. This is why the bill is so controversial, and why so many business associations and chambers across the U.S. are against it.

We are solidly against this bill because in our global economy the assertion that a third party entity such as labor unions actually help businesses maintain global competitiveness is diminished when you consider that the EFCA does away with one of the our most sacred democratic tenets—the secret ballot election. Just as importantly, the EFCA can lead to a business’ unionization when it’s too late for that company to do anything about it.

Our members’ businesses require the freedom and flexibility to work with their own employees to decide the best course of action to take regarding the generally accepted subjects of labor negotiations—wages, hours and conditions of employment. Without this freedom and flexibility, smaller businesses, which generally don’t have the resources or wherewithal to effectively deal with labor unions, and that don’t have the luxury of being “too big to fail” or buffered by government stimulus funds, are likely to be reduced to 3rd party participants in their own businesses.

Moreover, our members could lose the ability to quickly and cost effectively deal with and resolve workplace related issues. They’ll have to rely on the costly and time consuming intervention of other 3rd party regulators such as mediators and arbitrators, which is some of the baggage that comes with labor unions. Moreover, it’s commonly understood that once a union is legally in the workplace, it’s extremely difficult to decertify it (get rid of it) while still maintaining the business’ core operations.

There are many reasons why the percentage of the private sector unionized workforce has been in decline for years (recent estimates put this at 7%-8% of the overall private sector U.S. workforce). Some of these reasons include the fact that since the 1960’s came the passage of many of our toughest civil rights and employment laws covering almost all employers in the U.S. Today, due to these same laws, plus greater safety and child labor law enforcement, there is greater equality in the workplace relative to race, gender, age and other protected classes. Many of these same civil rights and employment laws were passed subsequent to our era of major labor law legislation. Additionally, pay equality (which generally doesn’t exist in union workplaces because poor performers are protected) has improved. In other words, workplace relations, safety and child labor standards have improved, while union popularity, efficacy and integrity have declined.

Should this legislation pass in any form, even in a watered down version, we’re extremely concerned of the detrimental impact it could have on the economy, Illinois and our member businesses.

Shirlanne Lemm, President, Greater O’Hare Association, 630-773-2941, slemm@greater-ohare.com; & Charles Krugel, Labor & Employment Lawyer & Member, Board of Directors, GOA; Both Are Members of GOA’s Government Affairs Team.

I am currently completing a dissertation on the ways that various jurisdictions courts classify employment

It seems wrong that in 2009, people in Ireland should have to forego basic employment protection due to the inadequacies of the courts tests in to distinguish between a contract for service (independent contractor) and contract of service (employee). The question as to a person’s status of employment is becoming increasingly important in the recession as more people are being made redundant and an individual is only entitled to redundancy payment and other protection if they were employed under a contract of service. Judges in Ireland currently use 3 outdated tests (control test, integration test and mixed test).

In my dissertation I would like to examine whether there is a better way to determine if it is a contract of employment with a stricter approach that will take the circumstances into account. It is clear that the current method of classifying employment in Ireland leaves much to be desired due to the amount of uncertainty.

Would you be able to point me in the direction of where I would find information on how the courts deal with this matter in the United States?

Thank you for all of your help

Kind regards,
Barbara Mangan

My response was:

Interesting thesis that your working on. Timely and always relevant.

On January 1, 2008, Illinois (the U.S. state where I live/where Chicago is located) implemented the “Employee Classification Act” This law defines independent contractor and employee in the construction, landscaping and hauling industries. Various labor unions in Illinois were upset that many employers were classifying their employees as independent contractors in order to avoid paying payroll taxes and overtime and to avoid joining unions.

On the federal level, the U.S. Department of Labor discusses this in the “Fair Labor Standards Act,” which regulates who is exempt from overtime, and who an employee or supervisor is for purposes of the overtime exemption. More specifically, most supervisors can be paid a salary, and are therefore exempt from overtime. Also, the Internal Revenue Service goes into great detail via the U.S. tax code and regulations regarding who is an employee and independent contractor.

Also, many states define employee and independent contractor for purposes of payroll taxes such as unemployment compensation (I think that means the same as “redundancy payments”).

In general, U.S. courts and governments consider degree of control over the employee or contractor–ability to set hours, use of tools/implements, ability to work other jobs for other companies, structure of the business (both the principal and the contractor), how the employee or contractor portrays themselves to the public, and whether the work assignment is of a definite duration or indefinite.

All-in-all it’s pretty complicated because their are various state and federal laws at play here, and although there’s a great deal of overlap, it’s the subtle differences that cause confusion and get people in trouble.

I hope that this helps you and feel free to followup with additional questions, etc.

Additional Respone:  In my opinion, the U.S. legal system and government are years behind the business community regarding the changes in the employer/employee/contractor relationship.  This seems to apply to state and local governments more than our federal government, which tried to address this in recent Fair Labor Standards Act amendments (close but still “no cigar”).

Government and courts don’t seem to understand highly specialized technology and information professionals, how many of them wish to maintain an independent contractor relationship, and how they do in fact fit many of our varied definitions of an independent contractor.  Our laws and regulations indicate little comprehension of how businesses utilize highly specialized professionals on projects such as most anything in nanotechnology, WiMax, server technology, “green” technology, and on and on.

For example, I’m dealing with a matter right now where it’s clear that a regulatory agency has so far shown no understanding (or motivation to understand) engineering and technology professionals in the WiMax, cellular and server technology fields. Consequently, instead of taking the time to understand how this contractor’s duties do in fact fit the agency’s definition of an inedependent contractor, they’ve arbitrarly designated this person an employee and assessed taxes and penalties to the business.  This matter is currently on appeal.

The BoDeans are performing that evening.   Food, drink, parking (limited), admission are all included.

It’s starts at 5:00PM and ends around 10:30, and includes a two hour open bar (beer, wine and soda), appetizers, salad, light dinner and desserts. All food and beverages are served under a tent and seating for the concert is in the Pavilion, which makes this is a rain or shine event. FREE parking will be available to the first 15 cars that arrive at Elliot’s house.

It is an awesome deal and will be a great time.  If you’re interested in attending please contact Sherri at srichardson@hrbattorneys.com or call 847-804-0978 no later than May 20, 2009. Ticket price is $100 per person. Tickets must be purchased in advance via a check made payable to Y-Alliance on or before June 5. Limited tickets available all on first-come first-served basis.  Additional information is available on the event’s Facebook page or in this PDF flyer.