Comments on: Internet Lawsites Encounter the Profession’s Guild Mentality

By: shlep: the Self-Help Law ExPress » Blog Archive » Cisco turns to legal self-help and unbundling

Thu, 01 Feb 2007 14:25:43 +0000

[...] Chandler is tasked with utilizing technology to streamline legal processes. He notes that the legal industry sometimes seems to be ‘the last vestige of the medieval guild system to survive into the 21st century’.” [It’s nice to see someone other than Your Editor deride the profession’s guild mentality; e.g., here and here.] [...]

By: shlep: the Self-Help Law ExPress » Blog Archive » LegalZoom and the future of lawyering

Tue, 23 Jan 2007 18:56:20 +0000

[...] Having said that, I am not at all certain that the change — a revolution that brings true price and service compeition to the lawyering marketplace, and creates more viable choices for consumers – will benefit a large percentage of consumers any time soon. Under the fold, I have excerpted a posting from my weblog f/k/a, ”Internet Lawsites Encounter the Profession’s Guild Mentality“ (Sept. 16, 2003) that discusses why the legal profession’s “guild mentality” has kept if from adopting new techology and responding to competitive forces, as lawyers try to hold on to income, control, and status, in the face of a new breed of consumer. Excerpts from “Internet Lawsites Encounter the Profession’s Guild Mentality,” Sept. 16, 2003, at the ethicalEsq-f/k/a weblog: . . . [M]y experience looking at learned professions from the competition-consumer perspective tells me that the real culprit [in the failure of websites offering legal services] is the historic “guild” mentality, which fears and opposes virtually every type of innovation in services or marketing. This is especially true if most guild members see themselves as threatened with the loss of business and income, the need to become more efficient, or the pressure to engage in price or quality competition. In addition, in the last few decades, doctors and lawyers have been most reluctant to cede their position of unquestioned authority to mere consumers. (see our posting on Sept. 4, 2003, discussing the new breed of client and unbundling) . . . . I’m not saying that there will never be a financially viable format for delivering legal services online. I am say, however, that expecting a broad and significant amount of interest from the bar or its members is unrealistic. Most likely, individuals or small groups of lawyer-entrepeneurs will have to carve out target markets of consumers and attract them to their sites. Piggy-backing on the self-help services of courts — by offering complementary unblundled services — might be a good place to start. Just remember: the guild won’t make the efforts easy. . . . . [...]

By: shlep: the Self-Help Law ExPress » Blog Archive » a guide or a guild: where does your bar group stand?

Fri, 15 Sep 2006 17:20:09 +0000

[...] Is your bar group a guide (helping to improve and expand self-help) or a guild (building walls against self-help and looking after the financial interests of lawyers first)? Please let shlep know what is happening in your bar association, and help make things happen yourself. [click to read more thoughts about the profession’s guild mentality] [...]

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By: David Giacalone

David Giacalone — Tue, 30 Sep 2003 03:34:39 +0000

Stephen, thanks for taking the time to give a thoughtful reply.   I’d like to know about your experience.   What state are you practicing in? There are very few that seem to fit the rosy picture you describe. Would the lawyers have embraced it if the court system or the legislature had not, OR if the public did not know about it?

I believe mediation is far too good of an idea to stymie, if there is a great enough core of public information about it.   My point was that attorneys in general did not embrace the idea until forced to by public demand or government mandate.   If you know of a state where the experience is different, I’d love to know about it.   Despite all of its benefits, mediation is still unknown and therefore unavailable in most states to the “average” consumer of legal services (not the corporate or wealthy client who has leverage with the legal profession). Its share of the legal services market is still very small. From my perspective, unless mandated to do so, most lawyers do not willingly suggest mediation to clients who have not initiated the idea.

I’ve glad you and your wife had such good options and made such good choices. Your story is an important part of the story for those within the profession who feel somehow trapped.

By the way, I used the term “ghetto” in quotes to show that it was not my term nor my feelings.   My mediation roots are in community mediation and I respect it completely.

By: Stephen R. Marsh

Stephen R. Marsh — Tue, 30 Sep 2003 03:11:36 +0000

I have to disagree about mediation and lawyers reactions to it. In most markets, all it took was familiarity with mediation for lawyers to embrace it. As for the collaborative law model, it is alive, well and expanding.

Yes, some people have anecdotal evidence of bad experiences — but usually while others in the same communities are having good experiences.

As for golden handcuffs, with my wife out of her residency we are still in the same house, still with the same friends, still pretty much the same clothes and spending habits. We accelerated paying off debt and then taking the same revenue stream into savings. By Christmas, if she decides to just walk away from any work at all, we can afford it.

Anyway, I feel comfortable talking on both topics, and realize that the illustrations are not the point, but they are important to the point, as is the truth.

As an aside, the roots of the mediation movement were in community centered pro bono programs. Far from being a “ghetto” such programs are authentic to the roots and found across the country, many of them going on forty or more years of age.