Featured in the National Law Review · June 2026
Define the destination. Align your course.
The Financial Planning application built on Law Firm Economics. See where every part of the firm stands against the plan, while there's still time to act.
Get in touchLaw firms grow more complex every year. Visibility rarely keeps pace.
The average Am Law 100 firm has grown from $381 million in revenue in 2003 to over $1.3 billion today. Firms add offices, practices, and attorneys, and the reporting grows with them. But most of it describes what already happened. Leadership often learns a year went off plan in January, when the only options left are cuts and hard conversations.
Why Alidade
An alidade is a centuries-old sighting instrument used to take an exact bearing on a fixed point. It doesn't steer. It shows precisely where you stand relative to where you're going. Alidade FP does the same for law firms. Leadership defines the destination, and every level of the firm can see how it's tracking against the plan. The decisions stay with the people closest to the work.
Law Firm Economics
A management discipline for how law firms plan and measure profitability. It sets agreed expectations at every level, from the firm down to each timekeeper, so everyone knows exactly what they're working toward.
Alidade FP
The application that puts the discipline to work: compiling financial data, comparing every unit to its expectations, and showing exactly where results drift from the plan. The finance team spends less time gathering numbers and more time explaining them.
Runway to act
Year-end reports reveal problems the following January. Alidade FP would catch them in March: a practice group running 15% behind on cash collections appears as a shift in its Trinity chart, with most of the year to get back on course.
ExpectedActual (illustrative)
Review Cash collections fall behind while WIP and AR build up.
The Business Trinity Chart
Law firms don't lack reports. Utilization, realization, WIP, AR, collections: the information exists. What's missing is a way to see it as one picture.
The Business Trinity Chart draws each business unit's expectations as an equilateral triangle: cash collections, operating income, and the WIP and AR carried to produce them. When results drift, the shape distorts, which tells a story.
A practice head sees the distortion at a glance and knows exactly where attention is needed without wading through reports or interpreting dozens of metrics. When the triangle sits in alignment with expectations, no action is required. When it doesn't, the specific dimension driving the deviation is immediately visible. The chart identifies where a response is needed, in time to actually shape the outcome.
Same shape. Different plans.
Expectations aren't one-size-fits-all. Transactional work converts to cash in weeks; contingency work can carry WIP for years. The data behind the chart adjusts to each practice's expectations, with the baseline consistently rendered as an equilateral triangle.
Transactional practice
Work is meant to convert to cash quickly, so the plan expects strong collections and carries little WIP.
- Cash Collections
- $12M
- Operating Income
- $3.5M
- WIP / AR
- $2M
Contingency practice
Matters lag by design, so the plan expects a large WIP balance and less cash in the near term.
- Cash Collections
- $4M
- Operating Income
- $2M
- WIP / AR
- $15M
Figures shown are illustrative quarterly plans. The triangle confirms each unit is meeting its agreed numbers.
Focus your energy
Practice heads and managing partners are exceptional practitioners, and their time is their scarcest resource. One glance shows which units are on plan and which warrant a closer look, so their judgment goes where it will produce the most value.
Each chart reads consistently: Cash Collections at the top, Operating Income on the left, WIP / AR on the right. Navy outlines show expectations. Actual performance is shaded blue when on plan, green when above expectations, and orange when below. Charts are illustrative.
See where your firm stands.
Tell us about your firm and what you want to see more clearly. We'll follow up personally.
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