Cara Rhodes

Cara Rhodes was one of the four founding Principals of Hoffman Alvary, the predecessor firm to Archway Research Group.  She has been advising law firms on strategic, management and financial issues for thirty years. Her clients include international, national, regional and boutique firms.  Ms. Rhodes also has a niche practice working with Intellectual Property firms.

In her thirty years of practice, Ms. Rhodes’s consulting engagements have addressed:

• • Firm strategy, positioning and defining investment and growth priorities;
  • Merger and acquisition considerations including identifying target candidates, assessing the desirability of a combination, pro forma and economic balance sheet analysis, term sheet development and implementation;
  • Partner compensation system reviews, restructurings and blending compensation systems in combinations;
  • Unfunded partner retirement programs from design through assessing the economic impact on current and future partners and reaching closure on modifications that minimize or eliminate future payments;
  • Practice and client-based analyses to enhance firm positioning and profitability;
  • Earnings improvement programs and management reporting practices;
  • Partnership structure alternatives, admissions criteria and career tracks;
  • Governance and organizational structures;
  • Partner capital systems as stand-alone structures as well as blending systems in firm combinations;
  • Succession planning programs;
  • Issues unique to first- and second-generation firms including governance, accrual-based compensation and founders’ benefits;
  • Demand / capacity assessments for right-sizing the practice; and
  • Firm dissolutions and bifurcations when stand-alone and/or combination options are not viable.

  Ms. Rhodes speaks widely at organizations interested in trends within the legal profession.

• Prior to starting Hoffman Alvary in 1996, Ms. Rhodes was a senior manager at Price Waterhouse.  She also started her career as a financial analyst for Digital Equipment Corporation as part of their Financial Development Program.