City Extends Deadline on RFP for New Conflict Counsel Model

The city of Philadelphia has extended the deadline for ?creative and innovative? proposals for representation in cases in which the Defender Association of Philadelphia has a conflict. The deadline has been extended to February 22 from January 18.

You're the Boss Blog: Questioning the TOMS Shoes Model for Social Enterprise

A social entrepreneur tries to change the way people shop.

After visiting Argentina and seeing the impact of poverty on some of its children, Blake Mycoskie was inspired to create a philanthropic “for-profit business that was sustainable and not reliant on donations.” The result was Toms Shoes, which promised that for every pair of shoes it sold, it would give away another pair to a child in need.

Since its founding in 2006, Toms has given more than 2 million pairs of shoes to children living in poverty in more than 51 countries. And it now has a line of eyewear that offers the same promise. The organization Mr. Mycoskie created has become a well-known example of a company that is based on business principles but also gives back.

It is also responsible for getting lots of Gen X and Gen Y entrepreneurs to think about business in a different way and for globalizing the buy-one, give-one model that is now so popular. In fact, there are many buy-one, give-one companies that have taken inspiration from Toms, and many of them apply to sell through my company, Fashioning Change. As you can see from our roster of brands, however, only two such companies have met our criteria, which we call our Promise of 5. In fact, if Toms Shoes were to apply to Fashioning Change to sell shoes through our site — it has not done so — it would not make the cut.

It’s for this reason that we have begun to question whether the buy-one, give-one model is the best choice for aspiring social entrepreneurs.

The tenets that drive Toms Shoes’s model are spelled out on the company’s Web site.

Identify Communities That Need Shoes
Together, we find communities that will benefit most from Toms shoes due to economic, health and educational needs, and where local businesses will not be negatively affected.Give Shoes That Fit
Our Giving Partners order the sizes children in their community need. …Help Our Shoes Have a Bigger Impact 
Children who are given Toms shoes receive them as part of larger health and education programs run by our Giving Partners. …Give Children Shoes As They Grow
Children grow fast! Toms works to give shoes to children in need throughout their childhood. …Provide Feedback and Help Us Improve
We rely on our incredible Giving Partners to provide feedback on shoes’ fit and durability, the giving process and the needs of the community. …

It would be hard to fault an organization that helps people and children get the things they need to survive and even thrive. But while Toms has done an amazing job of providing children with shoes, I wonder if it couldn’t do more to solve the underlying problem that inspired Mr. Mycoskie to create Toms in the first place.

Here’s my concern: Rather than solve the root cause of why children don’t have shoes, Toms has created a business model that actually needs poor children without shoes in order to sell its shoes. Those children are an essential part of the company’s marketing.

The root cause of poverty in many developing countries is a lack of access to fair-paying, sustainable employment. Imagine the positive impact Toms could have if it were to use every decision in its supply chain to address the causes of poverty. Before writing this post, I contacted Toms to see what the company had to say about the pros and cons of the buy-one, give-one business model.

Eventually, I was connected with the company’s chief giving officer, Sebastian Fries, who acknowledged that there were aspects of the Toms approach that could still be improved. When I asked Mr. Fries whether Toms might be perpetuating the poverty of the children who get free shoes, he responded that Toms is “not in the business of poverty alleviation.”

Interestingly, though, that does seem to be the business Toms is in when it comes to selling eyewear. The company’s eyewear contributes to the employment of nurses and doctors that in turn provide sight-giving support and surgeries so that people can become employable, create a sustainable living and get themselves out of poverty. What this contrast told me is that Toms is very good at public relations and marketing and recognizes that it could be doing more.

At Fashioning Change, we understand that every decision that goes into manufacturing a product — the materials, the factory, the packaging, the method of distribution — can produce social empowerment. That’s why we work with companies who are committed to doing things right every step of the way. Based on my conversations with Toms, it is clear to me that the company has a huge opportunity to share the lessons it has learned with the many Gen X and Gen Y entrepreneurs it has inspired.

In fact, I was told that Toms is now trying a program in Ethiopia in which it manufactures in one of the communities where it gives away shoes. The company has plans to do the same in Kenya and India. I asked what percentage of Toms shoes might be made in these factories, but I was told the number was not yet known. I also asked about plans to manufacture in the United States and was told that the United States did not have factories that could fill the company’s needs. I strongly disagree, but that is a topic for another post.

In any case, I think Toms may be evolving in the right direction. What started as philanthropy may now be moving toward what I think of as a real social enterprise — a business that creates systemic solutions to social issues through the use of business principles. One of the many wonderful things about Toms and many other “do good” companies is that we all share an intention to make the world a better place. And we’re all learning as we go.

What do you think? Is the buy-one, give-one model right for social entrepreneurs?

Adriana Herrera is chief executive of Fashioning Change. You can e-mail her at adrianah@fashioningchange.com, and you can follow her on Twitter at @Adriana_Herrera.

Ex-'Price is Right' model wins suit against show

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Jurors awarded nearly $777,000 Tuesday to a former "The Price is Right" model who claimed she was discriminated against by producers because of her pregnancy.

Conn. Attorney Ethel Sorokin Remembered as Role Model

Six years ago, in a feature article in a University of Connecticut alumni publication, Ethel Sorokin spoke of her days at UConn law school in the early 1950s. "There were four women and 65 men in my class," recalled Sorokin, the first female editor of the school's Law Review. "By my second year, only two women were left."

There were no women on the faculty. But if Sorokin needed a female role model, she could look to an aunt, who was Hartford's first woman allergist, and a mother who, Sorokin said, "told me that every woman should have a profession, even if she doesn't use it."

But Ethel Sorokin did use her profession. Earlier this month, following her death at age 84, Connecticut lawyers recalled her pioneering work as a female attorney and in First Amendment law. After graduating from law school in 1953, Sorokin went on to lead a firm with her late husband, Milton. Together, they founded the Center for First Amendment Rights in Hartford to promote awareness of constitutional rights.

"She saw the law as an instrument to achieve a client's objectives; she was a very effective writer of legal advocacy," said Rick Robinson, a business litigator with Pullman & Comley who got his start with Sorokin & Sorokin. "I learned a lot from her. I learned about the necessity of utter devotion to clients."

Word of Sorokin's death came as a surprise for those who worked with her, including Don Noel, the immediate past chair of the American Civil Liberties Union of Connecticut. When Noel called Sorokin to discuss an upcoming meeting two weeks ago, he was told she had died.

"Ethel was a great addition to the community and her passing is a great loss," said Noel, a retired columnist for the Hartford Courant who most recently served on the ACLU's education committee with Sorokin. "She was absolutely determined that people should recognize the importance of civil liberties and particularly that young people recognize that importance."

Ethel Silver grew up in West Hartford and graduated in 1950 from Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., a women's-only school at that point. "The first thing I learned at Vassar was that a woman can do anything she wants," she once said.

Upon returning to Connecticut, she met Milton Sorokin, who proposed to her after just 10 dates. Milton was studying at UConn law school at the time, and he encouraged his bride to do the same. Although the law was an unusual career choice for a woman in the early 1950s, Ethel was more than up to the task, graduating with honors.

After three years working for a small Hartford firm, Ethel and Milton formed Sorokin & Sorokin. They combined her interests and skills in family law, estates and trusts and media law with his interest in corporate law.

"I was pregnant with our second child when we started the firm, but I managed to get my work done, even if it meant writing briefs at the kitchen table," Ethel Sorokin told the UConn publication. "I never felt that being a woman held me back."

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Deal Professor: An American-Made Business Model Has Less Success Overseas

Harry Campbell

For years, the titans of finance have held out the promise that they could export their business model overseas and mint billions in the process. Yet, there are increasing signs that global deal-making was always a myth.

If you’ve been anywhere near a Wall Street conference in the last five years, you know the drill. Deal makers bemoan the United States as a mature and overregulated economy. They talk about heading abroad, as emerging market economies leave us far behind. To listen to them, one might think the rest of the world was a paradise out of “Atlas Shrugged,” where capital flows and where private equity, investment banks and other investors can freely seek opportunities.

So what country is No. 1 in initial public offerings so far this year? Yes, it is the United States, according to Renaissance Capital, with 75 I.P.O.’s raising $39 billion in total. Compare this activity with China, where 41 I.P.O.’s raised just $8.1 billion.

And in mergers and acquisitions? Again, it is the United States, with 53 percent of the worldwide deal volume, up from 51 percent from last year, according to Dealogic. For investment banks, this means that the United States has a 46 percent share of the $63 billion in worldwide investment banking revenue, up from 34.6 percent in 2009.

With the slowdown in once-hot emerging markets, the tide is going out, baring all of the problems and issues associated with global deal-making.

China is a prime example. Huge amounts of foreign and state investment produced an economic miracle. And in that time, wealth was there to be had.

But let’s be clear about where that wealth came from. In the United States, deal makers make money primarily by buying underperforming assets, adding some financial wizardry and riding any improvements in the stock market. Sometimes, they get lucky by making a quick profit, but often private equity works to squeeze out inefficiencies and make operating improvements in companies and then takes them public a few years later.

In China, what increasingly appears to have been a stock market and asset bubble spurred by hundreds of billions in direct investment has created some spectacular early profits for deal makers. The private equity firm Carlyle Group, for example, has made an estimated $4.4 billion on an investment in China Pacific Insurance, which it took public on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.

But now, with the Chinese I.P.O. market at a virtual standstill and the Shanghai market down more than 30 percent from its high last year, that avenue to riches is over. People are starting to say that investment in China resembles a “No Exit” sign.

Deal makers are left with a back-to-basics approach that looks to make money from companies through economic growth or improving their performance. Yet most of these investments are made with state actors and minority positions, meaning that there may be little opportunity to actually do anything more than sit and wait and hope. And you know what they say about hope as a strategy.

It appears that deal makers are starting to realize the problem. Foreign direct investment in China was down 3.67 percent from last year to $9.6 billion, and it is likely to remain on a downward trend.

And China has been among the friendliest places for deal makers. Other emerging markets have been less accommodating. Take India, which has been criticized for excessive regulation, high taxes and ownership prohibitions. David Bonderman, the head of the private equity giant TPG Capital, recently said that “we stay away from places that have impossible governments and impossible tax regimes, which means sayonara to India.” The comment about India highlights another problem with foreign deal-making: it’s foreign. Sometimes, the political winds change and local governments that initially welcomed investment change their minds. South Korea, for example, invited foreign capital to invest in its battered financial sector after the Asian currency crisis. But when Lone Star Investments was about to reap billions in profits on an investment in Korea Exchange Bank, a legal battle almost a decade long erupted as Korean government officials accused the fund of vulture investing.

And the political problems are sometimes not directed at foreign investors. South Africa, for example, is undergoing the kind of political turmoil that can stop all foreign investment in its tracks over treatment of its workers and continuing income inequality. Things are not much better in the more mature economies.

Europe is in the economic doldrums, and its governments are increasingly protectionist of both jobs and industry. France, for example, recently threatened to nationalize a factory owned by ArcelorMittal, which sought to shut down two furnaces. The national minister said the company was “not welcome.” It’s hard to see a deal maker profiting from buying an inefficient enterprise that it can’t clean up without risking national censure.

Buying at a low is the lifeblood of any investment strategy — but this assumes that there will be an uptick, and on the Continent, that is uncertain given the state of Greece and the other indebted economies in Southern Europe.

This is all a far cry from the oratory vision-making at conferences. Now that the global gold rush has ended, the belief that the American way of doing deals is portable is being upended.

We are left with a fragmented world where capital moves not so freely, the problems of politics and regulation are more prominent and investing in emerging markets becomes what it always has been: the province of more specialized investors who are in tune with the political and regulatory requirements. Regardless, the easy riches that many thought these countries would bring are now far out of sight.

And the winner in all of this is likely to be the much-maligned United States, where the economic conditions and regulatory environment first gave birth to these deal makers.

This is not to say that there will still not be global deal-making or that American multinationals will not continue to expand abroad. Of course, there will still be profits in deals overseas. But the vision that deal-making will instantly and seamlessly go global is increasingly exposed as one that was more a fairy tale than reality.

Conn. Attorney Ethel Sorokin Remembered as Role Model

Six years ago, in a feature article in a University of Connecticut alumni publication, Ethel Sorokin spoke of her days at UConn law school in the early 1950s. "There were four women and 65 men in my class," recalled Sorokin, the first female editor of the school's Law Review. "By my second year, only two women were left."

There were no women on the faculty. But if Sorokin needed a female role model, she could look to an aunt, who was Hartford's first woman allergist, and a mother who, Sorokin said, "told me that every woman should have a profession, even if she doesn't use it."

But Ethel Sorokin did use her profession. Earlier this month, following her death at age 84, Connecticut lawyers recalled her pioneering work as a female attorney and in First Amendment law. After graduating from law school in 1953, Sorokin went on to lead a firm with her late husband, Milton. Together, they founded the Center for First Amendment Rights in Hartford to promote awareness of constitutional rights.

"She saw the law as an instrument to achieve a client's objectives; she was a very effective writer of legal advocacy," said Rick Robinson, a business litigator with Pullman & Comley who got his start with Sorokin & Sorokin. "I learned a lot from her. I learned about the necessity of utter devotion to clients."

Word of Sorokin's death came as a surprise for those who worked with her, including Don Noel, the immediate past chair of the American Civil Liberties Union of Connecticut. When Noel called Sorokin to discuss an upcoming meeting two weeks ago, he was told she had died.

"Ethel was a great addition to the community and her passing is a great loss," said Noel, a retired columnist for the Hartford Courant who most recently served on the ACLU's education committee with Sorokin. "She was absolutely determined that people should recognize the importance of civil liberties and particularly that young people recognize that importance."

Ethel Silver grew up in West Hartford and graduated in 1950 from Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., a women's-only school at that point. "The first thing I learned at Vassar was that a woman can do anything she wants," she once said.

Upon returning to Connecticut, she met Milton Sorokin, who proposed to her after just 10 dates. Milton was studying at UConn law school at the time, and he encouraged his bride to do the same. Although the law was an unusual career choice for a woman in the early 1950s, Ethel was more than up to the task, graduating with honors.

After three years working for a small Hartford firm, Ethel and Milton formed Sorokin & Sorokin. They combined her interests and skills in family law, estates and trusts and media law with his interest in corporate law.

"I was pregnant with our second child when we started the firm, but I managed to get my work done, even if it meant writing briefs at the kitchen table," Ethel Sorokin told the UConn publication. "I never felt that being a woman held me back."

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Baker & McKenzie Shakes Up London Associate Pay With New Merit-Based Model

Baker & McKenzie has overhauled its pay structure for London associates in a move away from the traditional post qualification experience (PQE) model to a three-tier, merit-based system.

The three new levels are junior associate, mid-level associate and senior associate, with those adjudged to have met performance expectations rising to mid-level at two years' PQE and from mid-level to senior after five years.

Each of these roles will cover a broad pay bracket with pay levels determined by performance. The firm hopes the new system will encourage its associates to develop at a faster rate.

Bakers is also appointing partner "coaches" who will take responsibility to help associates develop within their department.

The new system is the brainchild of Bakers HR director Martin Blackburn, who developed the idea as a result of feedback received from the firm's partners and associates.

Blackburn said: "Associates were telling us that they wanted more feedback and more openness about their potential and career options. They wanted a longer-term mentor relationship with a nominated partner and we simply combined these ideas into the 'coach' who is responsible for no more than six associates over a significant part of their career."

The new structure has already been implemented, although no changes will be made to associate pay until next year's annual pay review.

The firm is also planning to make changes to associate charge-out rates in order to reflect the new structure.

Behind the Wheel | 2012 Tesla Model S: One Big Step for Tesla, One Giant Leap for E.V.’s

AUTOMAKERS have a favored buzzword for promoting important new models: game-changer.

Excuse me, but the game is not so easily changed.

Put simply, the automobile has not undergone a fundamental change in design or use since Henry Ford rolled out the Model T more than a century ago. At least that’s what I thought until I spent a week with the Tesla Model S.

The 2012 Model S, a versatile sedan that succeeds the company’s two-seat Roadster, is simultaneously stylish, efficient, roomy, crazy fast, high-tech and all electric. It defies the notion that electric cars are range-limited conveyances.

While driving a Model S with the biggest available battery pack — 85 kilowatt-hours — on a restrained run through Northern California wine country, I was able to wring 300.1 miles from a single charge. The E.P.A.’s rating for equivalent gasoline miles per gallon is 88 m.p.g.e. in town and 90 on the highway, with a 265-mile range.

On a more enthusiastic romp from my home base here to Santa Cruz and back, I sampled what the 362-horsepower electric drivetrain was designed to do: bolt. Tesla says the car can zip from zero to 60 in 5.6 seconds and tops out at 125 miles per hour, but it was the silent, near-instantaneous bursts from 35 to 65 along the Pacific on California Highway 1 that best demonstrated the S’s otherworldly quality.

I managed to make that 207-mile round-trip with about 25 miles of battery charge remaining when I pulled into my driveway. I never gave a second’s thought to range, batteries or kilowatt-hours. I just hauled amps. It’s probably best for my driving record that I didn’t test the performance version of the Model S, which raises the ante to 416 horsepower — and a 4.4-second dash from zero to 60 m.p.h.

The Model S, which went on sale in June, is built in a Tesla plant in Fremont, Calif., where a Toyota-General Motors joint venture once made cars.

The Model S’s sleek exterior suggests Maserati, Jaguar — or, especially in the shape of its grille, Aston Martin. “If people make that aspirational brand reference, I’m psyched,” said Franz Von Holzhausen, Tesla’s chief of design.

Perhaps the design team’s greatest accomplishment is lending James Bond styling to a five-passenger sedan that Tesla says has the lowest aerodynamic drag of any production vehicle — an impressive drag coefficient of 0.24. The seductive shape of the Model S beats even the appliancelike Toyota Prius.

Yet the S also has a practical side: an optional rear jump seat for two children increases the total capacity to seven. I loaded 30 folding chairs for a school event without needing to flip down the second-row seat. With no engine, the Model S has a sizable second trunk in front, which Tesla calls a frunk.

Tesla is all about cranking things up. From the technical side, the car’s chief characteristic is abundant power, delivered by exceptionally high currents put through a device called a drive inverter.

There a lighthearted side, too: in a nod to the 1984 mockumentary “This Is Spinal Tap,” the audio system’s volume control goes to 11. (The idea came from Elon Musk, the chief executive.) Big-hair headbangers will not be dissatisfied with the rock-concert sound quality.

If the Model S is Aston Martin on the outside, it’s Apple on the inside.

The Bauhaus-stark interior is dominated by a 17-inch touch screen — imagine a jumbo iPad embedded in the dashboard — giving digital control of nearly every automotive function. The interface is brilliant, but potentially spellbinding. Lighting, climate and music selection are intuitive. It let me do things as diverse as raising the chassis when pulling into my uneven driveway to switching the steering feel from comfortable to sporty.

There’s a high-definition backup camera, and full Web browsing is available — even when the car is in motion, a capability that safety regulators may one day frown upon. A Google-style search on the navigation screen, for addresses or a keyword, pulls up results that can be directly converted into turn-by-turn guidance. It is an ingenious improvement in automotive navigation.

Another innovation is Tesla’s ability to wirelessly push new features or software updates to cars already on the road. For instance, Tesla said it would soon be downloading a change on how much or how little the car creeps forward from a standstill.

Tesla Cuts 2012 Revenue Forecast Due to Slow Model S Rollout

Room for Debate asks whether democracy advocates would be better off without our money.

Despite themselves, writers are often engaged in acts of unwitting self-contradiction.