THERE IS LIFE OUTSIDE YOUR LAW FIRM

Whether you call it staring at your navel, being internally focused, dwelling on profit centres or whatever works at your law firm, the idea represented by any of the above is an unintended consequence of the way our business organizations are structured; the focus of the flow of ideas, information and effort is within the practice areas of the law firm.
When looking outside law land, say advertising, one of the strategies businesses have come up with to do better is to pay special attention to the interactions between different units of the business. There are two reasons for this, first; communication is what gets the business going and just like a state with poor transportation links will have trouble developing parts of its economy and will have high transport costs so will a law firm which neglects to address the communication between or among units. It will possess bad habits such as being slow to act, failing to make the most of the potential of its people etc. The human body's nervous and circulatory systems must work for the body to work and so must the way your law firm communicates, the way it does things give the best chances of making the most of what you have. Business is tough enough and your law firm does not need its hands tied.

Second, there is no profit in your law firm, just costs. The paying client or business is not in your organization and is not represented on your org chart. Law firm management exists to manage the business and after paying attention to matters in the practice areas the next place to focus on is on the flow between different areas of the law firm.
The idea being to get everyone facing the same direction, speaking the same language and making sure that when A is the order A is what everyone hears, sees and executes ; the entire firm is one unstoppable, impenetrable unit.
And as hilarious as the effects may be it is not always funny when a firm is working at cross purposes, in ignorance of how one part of the firm fits with another and how it can offer help, support. More to the point, the competitive advantages this single impenetrable unit working in one direction will give in terms of creating better products, setting service levels, addressing small problems before they escalate, being close to the client and generally being a fitter law firm will put it in a good position when it competes against other law firms.

Lots of clients are now complex entities with varying business units across several geographies and as part of understanding the field your law firm is playing in it will flow naturally for you to examine the internal working of your clients and how they manage the dynamic between its different units.