Mid-law is broken: fixed fees and the junior lawyer

Juniors on the tightrope - high flying acrobats or the mid-tier's sacrificial clowns..

Mid-tier law runs on a delicate piece of theatre.

The client is sold competence at a price low enough to win the work. The partner protects the margin. The firm protects the spreadsheet. And somewhere, usually several floors below the conversation in which the fee was agreed, a junior lawyer is handed the file and told to make the economics come true.

Thi…