Curiosity May Kill The Cat, But Can Lead to a Killing for Lawyers

Curiosity may have killed the cat, but for some lawyers, a little bit of healthy curiosity can lead to a killing in new business niches.

At least, that was the experience of Philip Rosen, co-head of big law firm Weil Gotshal’s real-estate practice.  As the Wall Street Journal recently described, while dropping his daughter off at college, Rosen noticed a line of cars with Amazon Prime decals on the side. Curious, Rosen asked about one of the drivers to share some information about the company. That information, coupled with a trip down the New Jersey turnpike to tour various high-tech warehouses helped Rosen gain entre into the industrial real-estate space (pun intended).

In fact, as technology changes the need for office space, law firms are finding new markets in advising co-working spaces. And with data storage moving to the cloud, there’s a robust market for representation of data storage facilities – including energy procurement, an issue near and dear to my heart.

Believe it or not, your old law school skills can help you identify and develop niche markets. Although law school doesn’t teach creativity, it does ingrain issue-spotting skills which can come in handy for developing a niche.  So each time you observe a new trend – whether it’s legalization of marijuana or drones or the rise of farmers’ markets or wearable technology – quiz yourself on what legal issues it might raise and decide whether there might be market.

If you’re interested in niche practice, there’s still time to register for the December 18, 2015 webinar – for details, click here .