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There goes my hero ** One of the recurring ‘dirt

There goes my hero ** One of the recurring ‘dirty little secrets' of the time billing professions is the astronomically large number of high performing time billers that have particularly ‘bad stuff' going on in the rest of their lives.

In other words, star performers legitimately churning out 2,000 to 3,000 chargeable hours a year quite often have issues with [# insert your issue of choice, whether it be substance abuse, relationship difficulties, depression, passive aggressive behaviour, exceptionally poor health etc.]. Invariably, these issues are not discovered until the issue is at crisis point.

While undoubtedly, there are a range of factors in play, and each situation is different, arguably one thing that makes it extremely difficult for firm leaders to be aware of the problems is the psychology underpinning selective attention.

More simply for the time billing firms, how can they be expected to pay attention to anything else when the entire focus is on chargeable and recoverable units recorded? **For the trainspotters, a slightly obtuse pop reference this week. The title is sourced from the Foo Fighters song My Hero.

The memory to trigger the song was the day that Nick Cave walked past my wife in a shopping mall (at the time, as he remains now, Nick Cave is an absolute hero to us both) and she completely missed seeing him. Fortunately, I was not suffering any selective attention disorders and we managed to double back and secure the obligatory handshake and autograph.
PS: and the image my favourite Nick Cave LP, together with the ticket from one of my favourite Nick Cave shows; being the night I sung a duet with him on ‘’From her to Eternity’’ ….

Was Clayton Christensen wrong?** (aka - why all ti

Was Clayton Christensen wrong?** (aka - why all timebillers should fill in 2 timesheets every day)
Interesting argument from Tim Harford recently that Clayton Christensen and his Innovator's Dilemma actually mis-understood the key issue of disruption.

Harford's main argument: incumbent firms do not in fact fail due to the disruptive innovation itself.
As one example; it was Kodak that invented the digital camera.
Rather incumbents fail because the dominate management culture that gets the firm to be a success retains their dominance. No matter how compelling the case for change is.

As one example, to address the warfare challenge of tanks (that the British designed), the British army management mandated each solider be given 2 horses (because they accepted the first would be steamrolled quickly). Without wanting to be seen as biased to Christensen (although I likely am ...) my sense is Harford's argument is in fact exactly what Christensen argued. In a sentence indeed Christensen argued incumbent 'well managed firms fail in new markets because they are well managed'. And in turn, for all those amazingly managed BigLaw firms with your army of time billers and your search for better and better ways to capture time recorded; will you permit a new model to replace the flogging of time? Or instead will all fee-earners be given 2 timesheets to help minimise the prospect of the first one not being filled in correctly (?) PS: Listen to the full Harford argument here:

How Britain Invented, Then Ignored, Blitzkrieg from Cautionary Tales on Apple Podcasts.
https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/cautionary-tales/id1484511465?i=1000459474905 ** For the trainspotters, Everything But the Girl and 'Wrong'.

Song request poster from last AUS tour #nickcavean

Song request poster from last AUS tour #nickcaveandthebadseeds #thevampireswife #nickcaveofficial #susiebick

Brag out to world’s best brother (disclosure, I

Brag out to world’s best brother (disclosure, I am likely biased ... and have only one brother) Associate Professor, Dr Andrew Burgess

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