San Francisco Area Event -
Time(s)11:00 p.m. - 11:00 p.m.
Topic: Budgeting Process and Approach: Advice and Insight From Your Peers
Date: September 27, 2006
12:00 pm – 1:30 pm
*Lunch will be provided
Lunch provided by: Hanson Bridgett Marcus Vlahos & Rudy
Description: In response to requests from ILTA members in the NorCal region, we have scheduled this peer-powered meeting just in time for budget season. Three of our colleagues from NorCal law firms have volunteered to share information about how they approach budgeting, what their process is, and how they prepare and manage their budgets. Our esteemed speakers (bios below) are Mal Mead, providing larger firm perspective; Werner Gehrke, providing smaller firm perspective; and Maryanna Bell, moderating. Some of the mysteries they will explain include:
• How do you plan/identify what should occur, what you would like to occur, and what could possibly occur via the budget?
• What are the best ways to explain/present variances?
• What happens when after everything is approved/submitted, you realize you missed something big?
• How do you present your budget and get it approved?
• What do you do if you're asked to cut 10% across the board?
• How do you track what you've spent?
• How do you determine what your projects and initiatives will cost?
Presenters: Mal Mead is the Chief Information Officer at Sedgwick, Detert, Moran & Arnold LLP, an international trial and litigation firm of 350 attorneys with headquarters in San Francisco, California. He is responsible for the strategic and operational aspects of the firm's IT and practice support groups, striving for the "Three Rs" of technology - responsiveness, reliability, and revenue.
Prior to joining Sedgwick, Mr. Mead was Director of IT Project Development and Management at Fenwick & West, LLP in Mountain View, CA, Director of Technology for Bingham McCutchen in San Francisco, and IT Director at Brown McCarroll in Austin, Texas.
Mal holds an undergraduate degree from Austin College and a Masters in Public Administration from the University of Houston. He has been involved legal technology and administration for twenty-odd -sometimes very odd - years. He is a former board member and past president of ILTA and an editor of the 2005 ILTA Staffing Survey. He is on the Editorial Advisory Board of Law Technology News, and the Educational Advisory Board of LegalTech.
Werner Gehrke has worked in technology-related fields since 1993. Prior to the legal industry, he worked at Allstate Insurance's Northern California Regional Office, first in Human Resources and then migrated to the newly-formed Technology Department as a LAN Administrator then as a Technology Consultant. Werner joined Archer Norris in 1998 and is currently their Information Technology Director, overseeing all Information Technology functions for the firm. Archer Norris is one of the largest law firms headquartered in Contra Costa County, with offices in Walnut Creek and Los Angeles.
Maryanna Bell, IT Director for the 70 attorney, three office firm of Steefel, Levitt & Weiss, has spent more years than she cares to count working in San Francisco law firms researching, budgeting, justifying, deploying, and supporting all forms of technology. At Steefel her mission is to bring new technology to the firm on a regular basis while keeping costs under control and as close to the meticulously prepared annual budget as she can.
Location: Hanson Bridgett Marcus Vlahos & Rudy
425 Market Street
26th Floor
San Francisco, CA 94105
Host: Christopher Fryer (415) 995-5850
cfryer@hansonbridgett.com