Anything Worth Doing . . .
. . . is worth doing right!
Lots of Big Law firms give great weight to that old adage, but others act as if it’s a very strange notion.
What gets me to mention this old adage? I’ll tell you:
The other day, I ran across this client alert (published by a very large firm that emphasizes the quality of its work) that had a misspelling in the first paragraph. Here it is:
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, pulled the Senate’s comprehensive immigration reform bill on June 7 so that the Senate could move to other business. He stated that the bill is not dead, but many deservers now question whether major immigration reform in the next two years is likely.
The misspelling is deservers.
Since I have considerable experience editing client alerts, I thought the attorney who wrote this alert would be happy to have me polish it. I mean . . . an attorney who charges people $400/hr for his expertise must care about the quality of his writing, right? Wrong!
So, I decided to review some other alerts this attorney wrote, and here are just a few of the rusted gems I discovered in 10 minutes:
Not my idea of a vacation, but medical tourism is becoming increasingly popular as health care service offerings abroad even while costs at home increase.
By make this also a state law, however, this empowers state law enforcement officials to take action without waiting for the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency or the Department of Labor, the two federal agencies charged with oversight on the federal law.
These companies provide the economic engine the drives not only the tech sector, but so much of our economy.
I discovered a number of other odd things about this firm’s alerts. For instance, at the bottom of each alert, the following notice:
If required, put the stationery disclaimer here.
That’s a strange notice to add to a client alert. And right below that notice, there was this:
If you wish to opt out of these communications, visit http://www.acmelawfirm.com/vtu/p70978671VVyMcf98
The client alert was posted as an HTML file. It wasn’t sent to me. I just selected it from the firm’s list of alerts.
Well . . . if the attorney who wrote these alerts doesn’t care about misspellings and nonsensical assertions, the firm’s marketing people surely will, right? Wrong!
I contacted the marketing manager, but she couldn’t be bothered. “Talk to someone in Global Marketing,” she told me. So, I called the firm’s director of global marketing and left a phone message. This morning, she returned the call and I explained what it is I do: I edit client alerts; I polish them; I make their authors and their publishers look as good as can be.
“We have an offshore group that edits our alerts, so thanks for the offer but we really don’t need your services at this time.”
Yeah, right! It looks like somebody who speaks Hindi is doing the editing for this firm. It really does.
I guess I just don’t get it. I know attorneys who charge people $400/hr and each of them is so concerned with appearance. Before they go and speak to a potential client, they get their shoes polished and their hair cut and their nails manicured. They know appearance matters.
Then why would an expensive attorney not bother to engage an editor to make sure that a publication — one with his name attached to it and one which might be read by hundreds or thousands of readers, many potential clients — why would he not bother to have an editor polish it?
I suppose he figures that client alerts (and those who edit them) are not worthwhile. And I suppose his figuring his flawed. By saving a few bucks on not having an editor review his work, he’s sacrificing big bucks by scaring potential clients away. They’re looking at his work and asking themselves, “if he doesn’t know the difference between observers and deservers, do we want him handling our work? Would we want to work with this firm if they put their name to such slop?”
Of course not! At $400/hr, “Hell No!”
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Update — 20 Aug 2007: I just reviewed the latest alert written by this attorney. He certainly needs an editor, else the alert would not contain nonsense like this:
It is unlawful in the US for employers to employ employees who are unauthorized for such employment in the US.
