Story of Don't Ask, Don't Tell

• Author: Adam Newhouse
• Pages: 23-28

23

CHAPTER 3

Story of Don’t Ask, Don’tTell

While “there was a time in the first half of the 20th century, before

the proliferation of MBA programs, when law school was a common

path for corporate leaders,” today only about 10 percent of CEOs

of companies listed on the Standard & Poor’s 500 stock index hold

legal degrees. “Nearly all of these executives have had to overcome a

common prejudice: that lawyers make bad corporate leaders. Often

unschooled in core skills such as accounting or finance, lawyers start

their careers in a strange world where risk is frowned upon, colorful

marketing is unethical, people rarely work in big teams, and nobody

makes a decision without reviewing stacks of paperwork first. Business

attorneys are often considered the ‘vice-presidents of No,’ says Jeffrey

A. Sonnenfeld, associate dean of executive programs at Yale School of

Management.”89

In the years leading up to the Great Recession I sometimes wondered

why various technically non-legal advisory services were offering de

facto legal services while most of us in the legal profession shunned

expanding into non-legal fields. If we found comfort keeping our legal

offerings pristine, we are no longer amused.

Despite the controversial90 ban on nonlawyers’ holding own-

ership interest in law firms,91 investors have been making gradual

inroads on lawyers’ monopoly. William Henderson predicts that

in several years, deregulation will take place without any formal

89. Mike France & Louis Lavelle, A Compelling Case for Lawyer-CEOs, Bloomberg

Businessweek, Dec. 13, 2004, http://www.bloomberg.com/bw/stories/2004-12-12

/a-compelling-case-for-lawyer-ceos (visited Mar. 29, 2016).

90. See, e.g., Robert C. Weber, Law Firms Should Spurn Outside Investment, Bloomberg

Businessweek, Sept. 21, 2011, http://www.businessweek.com/management/law-firms

-should-spurn-outside-investments-09202011.html (visited Mar. 29, 2016); and Robert C.

Weber, quoted in Joe Palazzolo, IBM General Counsel: Nonlawyer Ownership Is a Nonstarter,

Wall St. J. (Law Blog), Feb. 14, 2012, http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2012/02/14/ibm-general

-counsel-nonlawyer-ownership-is-a-nonstarter/ (visited Mar. 29, 2016).

91. See Model Rules of Prof’l Conduct R.5.4 (Professional Independence of a Lawyer).

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