CLE Program Details

Audrey H. Rubin, president and founder of Rubin Solutions, Ltd., designs and implements strategic business processes that improve the financial performance and operations of corporate law departments professional services firms. Rubin creates and implements plans that turn inefficiencies into income in a matter of days and free executives and partners to focus on service and growth. 

As a seasoned Chief Operating Officer for large and small law firms and significant experience as General Counsel for three global companies, she has been on both sides of the business.   She excels in assessing legal budgets and systems, and negotiating profitable, valuable fee arrangements.  Rubin understands how front and backend processes can be streamlined and redesigned to build the bottom line. With her ability to understand how to drive the bottom line, reduce expenses, improve profits and collections, increase efficiencies, motivate personnel and extract additional value from existing client relationships, she gives clients and their service providers a competitive edge during precarious economic times.

In addition to improving established practices, Rubin sets new businesses on the path to profitability. For firms seeking to expand through mergers, she conducts due diligence and instills operational and financial discipline to help firms maximize the marriage. She is also a speaker and columnist.

Prior to her role as a COO for the large Chicago firm Wildman Harrold Allen and Dixon, and the boutique firm Butler Rubin Saltarelli and Boyd, she served as General Counsel and Vice President of Legal and Human Resources for three global companies (Orbitz (in formation), Grant Thornton and Apollo Travel Services), and before that, a business lawyer in private practice. She has also served as a board member of several domestic and international businesses and not-for-profits.

Rubin received her J.D. from Northwestern University School of Law where she was on the Dean’s List. She graduated cum laude from Yale University with a B.A. and was a Yale National Scholar. She received certification as a mediator and arbitrator from the De Paul University School of Law.  She was certified in Business for Executives at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business.  Rubin has served as a board member of the Association of Yale Alumni, the Chicago Bar Association, the Jewish National Fund, and is currently President of the Yale Club of Chicago. You can learn more about Audrey Rubin and Rubin Solutions, Ltd. at http://www.rubinsolutions.com.

 

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Program Title:	Professionalism Series: Attorney Alternative Billing Options and Their Ethical Considerations
Total CLE Hours:	1.00
General CLE Hours:	1.00
Professionalism or Ethics CLE Hours:	1.00
Registration Fee:	$ 20.00
Description:	This program has been approved for 1.0 hours of Professionalism Credit by the Illinois Commission on Professionalism.   “Attorney Alternative Billing Options and Their Ethical Considerations” provides the viewer with a workable understanding of billable time for professional services that starts with the most basic form of billing, the “billable hour.” The presentation quickly moves on to work with everything from discounts on hourly rates to success fees, flat fee agreements and bond arrangements. Each billing form, including the billable hour is subject to the Illinois Rules of Professional Conduct and must conform with the requirements of those guidelines or an attorney can face discipline from the ARDC. The seminar will highlight particular points of contention between clients (the source of most complaints sent to the ARDC) and attorneys. More than simply addressing how to avoid censure, this seminar delves into billing from a fundamental level to provide an understanding and realm of reference for debate and discourse on the ramifications of billing on the profession as a whole.   Attorney Alternative Billing Options and Their Ethical Considerations provides the following learning objectives: 1) To increase the lawyer's understanding of Alternative Fee Arrangements by using established definitions 2) To prepare an attorney to set up their own fee agreements through use of specific examples of successful and failed alternative fee agreements. 3) To explain the requirements of Rule 1.5 on fees, reasonableness of fees, and staying within the rule's scope when drafting fee agreements that are non-traditional 4) To explore some of the arguments for and against an attorney's ability to ethically use alternative billing methods. 5) To prepare an attorney to deal with the external ethical implications of taking on clients in riskier financial positions using alternative fee agreements. 6) To prepare a lawyer to establish Alternative Fee plans with existing and potential clients.
Materials provided with the program (click to view a sample of the actual materials)	Written Material Video Material
Approved for CLE credit in these Jurisdictions:	IL
Available Formats	Windows media, iPod, Quicktime, Flash video
Presenter:	Audrey H. Rubin
Presenter Email:	audreyrubin@rubinsolutions.com