News of a six-person marketing team moving from Cooley to Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson has many in the legal industry saying this could be a bellwether of things to come, including more group moves of law firm business professionals.

If so, law firms — if they want to keep their best talent in the staff ranks — will need to have a deeper understanding of what their marketing and other professionals want out of a work environment, as well as taming a so-called caste system that afflicts many law firms, industry observers say.

"There are certainly those who look on the business services people as second-class citizens," said John Lamar, managing director at The Alexander Group, a consulting and recruiting firm. "And those are the ones that will find that they need to change their tune."