I convinced my wife to go watch the new Brad Pitt movie, “Moneyball,” with me. The movie is based on the true story of an Oakland A’s baseball team that, with a payroll of $30 million, had to compete with teams like the New York Yankees, which spent more than $120 million. Many regional law firms face a similar dilemma, lacking money, advertising and name recognition. What lessons can they learn from “Moneyball?”
• Ask the right questions. Pitt’s character, Billy Beane, realizes that he can’t beat teams like the New York Yankees by playing their game. He is told by a recent Yale economics graduate that baseball teams are asking the wrong questions. They are locked on three statistics: runs batted in, home runs and batting averages, while overlooking the on-base percentage that takes into account when a player is walked. Beane changed the focus from whether a player will be an all-star to whether he would increase the odds of winning games. At law firms, instead of asking new recruits about law review and class ranking, we should be asking, “Can you bring in business?”
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