Biglaw

What’s The Future Of The Brick-And-Mortar Law Office?

Law firm office plans are about to change.

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Even before the pandemic pushed the world’s economy toward laptops and dining room tables, physical offices were falling out of fashion in the business world. International companies like the Big Four accounting firms have been experimenting with hoteling and similar concepts to decrease their real estate footprint for years. Once the COVID-19 crisis was in full swing, that trend kicked into overdrive. Tech companies like Facebook, Google, and Intel have told their employees to work from home until at least summer 2021. REI recently opted to sell, rather than move into, its brand new state-of-the-art headquarters campus. The long-predicted future of remote work appears to have been finally thrust upon us.

Although law firms have overall followed the trend of moving their workforces to operating remotely, many in the legal world continue to predict a return to the office. Among the law firm managing partners I’ve spoken with, there seems to be little appetite to make the current state of affairs permanent. Most expect some lasting change, but they also believe the overall long-term impact will be less than most expect. To my surprise, several law firm leaders have even set a strategic priority of getting back to pre-pandemic normal as quickly as possible once COVID-19 is finally contained.

Are these law firm leaders prescient, out of touch, or simply locked into long-term leases? The answer may be all three.

The Only Constant Is Change

Law is traditionally slow to adopt the changes of the broader business world, but in this case I struggle to imagine that the law firms of 2022 and beyond will look like 2020. For starters, many attorneys may find they’ve developed a taste for being untethered to a physical location. No one loves spending time on a commute that could instead be spent on loved ones, personal improvement, extra billing, or just getting a few more winks of sleep. There’s also something nourishing for the soul about nailing a court argument or finalizing an eight-figure negotiation while wearing Ugg slippers. Law firm leadership expecting everyone to return to the traditional 50 hours in the office a week will likely find resistance to that notion now that the pandemic is proving we can get the jobs done in our spare rooms and guest houses.

Then there’s the pure dollars-and-cents argument. As office leases come up and firms are evaluating their next move, the lure of saving money on rent has to be strong. Real estate is usually the second-biggest line item on a firm’s expense sheet after personnel. Every dollar saved there is another dollar left over at the end-of-year distribution to the partnership. Most partnerships would jump at reducing costs and fattening their wallets.

What Will Stay The Same

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Yet I don’t expect the legal real estate market to vanish overnight. There are at least two strong reasons for firms to maintain at least some dedicated office space: collaboration and clients.

Office space fosters collaboration both in obvious practical ways and less obvious, squishier ways. Some practices can’t operate on a laptop and cellphone basis as well as others. Litigators sometimes still need to store and review physical documents and evidence. Many mediators still prefer conference rooms to Zoom breakout rooms for negotiations. Transactional attorneys may find that deals get closed on better terms in person without Microsoft Teams’ lag time and disconnections. Having dedicated space on hand to meet those needs makes sense. Even the most dedicated of cloud-based law firms like Fisher Broyles maintains some office space. Meanwhile, the jury’s still out on whether firms with brick-and-mortar roots will be able to make the transition to a digital world while keeping morale high and feelings of isolation low.

For better or for worse, there also remains a subset of clients — albeit a decreasing one — that may still be attracted to the shiny objects of a fancy law firm. There are those who want to know by the pile of the carpet or the glint of the lobby sculpture that the firm they’re looking to hire is smart, strong, and expensive enough to be worth their time. Some decisions on whether to hire a law firm may still get made when the elevator dings and the client steps out into the reception area. It may seem like empty theater, but if it matters to some clients, it’s something we need to take seriously.

Where It Gets Weird

What looks less essential with each passing day, then, are the luxe private attorney offices that so many of us associate with the basic concept of being an attorney. It’s here that I see the biggest revisions developing to the traditional law firm blueprint. Some firms may abandon offices altogether in favor of working from home, or move to hoteling concepts like the Big Four. Others may give their attorneys the option of paying out of their own pockets for office space and furniture. Still others may have offices that are half the size of their current footprint. I expect to see experimentation in office solutions, and ultimately far more bespoke, cost-efficient models of officing in the legal industry than anything we’ve had in past decades.

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Meanwhile, I wouldn’t be surprised in the least if some of the savings from downsizing on attorney offices isn’t poured back into upgrading the spaces that remain. This is especially true if the larger market demand for commercial real estate goes down, driving down prices. Some of the savings can be directed into going for broke on projecting success to new and ongoing customers, or into fostering and developing attorney and staff morale and firm culture through beefed-up common areas and collaboration rooms. Firms looking to reduce their attorney offices but keep their personnel happy might experiment with lounges, coffee house-like spaces, quiet spaces, nursing rooms, and other common goods that provide community and enjoyment in far more cost-effective ways.

I’m bullish on Biglaw’s prospects for experimentation and growth. The incentives, both personal and collective, people-centric and strictly financial, are all aligned to push us toward more effective, interesting, and well-tailored real estate solutions.

No matter how these new offices take shape, you can be sure that attorneys and other legal professionals will float in and out of the space much more regularly. The days of five or six days a week in the office are gone forever — no matter how much some law firm leaders try to will it away. In a competitive world, if firms don’t adopt flexible remote working policies, employees will leave to firms that will.

After all, why should we have to choose Uggs or dress shoes when we can have both?

James Goodnow is the CEO and managing partner of NLJ 250 firm Fennemore Craig. At age 36, he became the youngest known chief executive of a large law firm in the U.S. He holds his JD from Harvard Law School and dual business management certificates from MIT. He’s currently attending the Cambridge University Judge Business School (U.K.), where he’s working toward a master’s degree in entrepreneurship. James is the co-author of Motivating Millennials, which hit number one on Amazon in the business management new release category. You can connect with James on Twitter (@JamesGoodnow) or by emailing him at James@JamesGoodnow.com.

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