Power-law distributions rarely crop up in lunchrooms and hallways. Lawyers often feel uncomfortable with mathematics, let alone something as esoteric as a function with an exponent. But reluctance and distaste does not change the fact that a number of occurrences that happen in legal departments have the frequency structure described…
Total legal spending as a percentage of revenue (TLS/Rev) leads the metrics pack in terms of importance (See my post of Dec. 5, 2007: stability of the ratio over a decade; and Jan. 12, 2009: benchmarks over time with 8 references.). https://www.lawdepartmentmanagementblog.com/median-benchmarks-for-comparables-stay-quite-stable-over-periods-of-five-or-more-years/ Longitudinal data from a law department benchmark survey…
A recent post describes a multi-column chart that color codes a law department’s metrics against key benchmarks (See my post of Sept. 22, 2009: three comparisons on nine benchmarks.). It reminded me that I have long felt the most meaningful benchmark comparisons to be with companies in the same industry.…
Connoisseur of benchmarks that I am, I’m drawn to what we don’t know (See my post of Dec. 7, 2008: four missing metrics and my article; and May 20, 2009: time spent by in-house lawyers that is non chargeable is an unknown metric.). In the category of data missing about…
During a recent consultation, I reviewed a chart that covered metrics for nine basic benchmarks. The chart had five columns, the first being the metric, such as outside legal spending per lawyer. The next column was 1st quartile, then 2nd quartile, 3rd quartile and 4th quartile. The legal department had…
Serengeti has found consistently that the law departments in its survey have spent relatively more of their total legal spend on the law department rather than on law firms. The data in ACC Docket, Vol. 27, July/Aug. 2009 at 18, states the trend in terms of the ratio of median…
The scattered distribution of posts here on statistics has reached the point where a hyperpost is in order. The accumulation so far consists of seven metaposts with a total of 84 back references (See my post of April 5, 2009: Bayesian statistics with 6 references; Feb.13, 2008: correlations with 16…
Here are 10 totally free courses on statistics you can take on your own time to help you learn, improve and hone your stats knowledge (See my post of Jan. 20, 2007: statistics with 28 references.). Whether you just want to brush up on your statistics knowledge or learn something…
The technique of averaging figures for set periods of time, such as for the previous three months, produces what is called a rolling average. Several posts on this blog have applied that methodology (See my post of Jan. 6, 2006: rolling averages help detect longer-term trends; March 9, 2007: rolling…
The Intellectual Property Owners Association (in a report issued in May 2009) asked its members about the number of applications for new U.S. patents they foresaw in 2009. Are you surprised that 29 percent thought they would increase, 41 percent thought they would decline, and 30 percent thought the number…