When Dan Duncan died in March, he became the first American billionaire since the inception of the estate tax in 1916 to die without a taxable estate. A true self-made man, Duncan was the owner of Enterprise Products Partners, L.P., a natural gas and crude oil pipeline company. He started out in 1968 with $10,000 […]

The federal Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), has just proposed a new rule broadening patients’ rights to have visitors in the hospital. The Proposed Rule would allow patients to name the individuals whom they want to visit them in the hospital, and the hospital must honor these wishes. Their choices wouldn’t be limited […]

Are you where you wanted to be when you started practicing law? Has your law firm grown according to your plan? Did you start out with a plan? Many attorneys don’t have a plan for their practices – they just jump in and start practicing law, and keep doing it, thinking that if they’re good […]

In order to become – and remain – a top performer in any field, it’s my belief that you need a coach.  Even if you’ve been adept at your practice area for decades, you’re not exempt from a basic, universal human truth:  it’s impossible for us to see ourselves the way that others see us.  […]

This week my wife’s grandmother passed away and I was reminded how similar weddings and funerals really are. I know this sounds crazy, but these two events have all of the same basic elements. Weddings and funeral ceremonies are both held in a church, synagogue, or some other type of facility. They both have flowers […]

As my friend Michael Gerber says, “Without people, you don’t own a practice – you own a job.”  Yet, managing the people in your firm can be one of the most stressful aspects of your practice. Most lawyers, when they have a position to fill within their firm, advertise the vacant position and then conduct […]

When New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner died this month, he left an estate with an estimated value of $1.15 billion, primarily the Yankees major league baseball team. The fact that he died in 2010, during the one-year repeal of the federal estate tax and the Generation Skipping Transfer (GST) tax, was especially good timing […]

Our profession seems to be reaching a crisis point. More and more attorneys have become slaves to their practices. They’re constantly putting out fires, and the way they use their time is dictated by the circumstances that surround them. They’re on a treadmill, working endless hours while they sacrifice time with their families, time for […]

Do your earnings justify the hours you work? Especially in this economy, the answer I hear from the vast majority of attorneys is a resounding “No!” Particularly if you’re a law firm owner — there’s just too much to do on a daily basis, and inconsistency in revenues is the order of the day. We […]

Last week, Judge Joseph Tauro of the Massachusetts federal district court ruled that the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) is unconstitutional on Tenth Amendment and Equal Protection grounds. DOMA is the 1996 federal law that defines marriage as the legal union exclusively between one man and one woman. It also prohibits the federal government and […]