Yifan Zhao
Pronouns: She, her
Research Mentor(s): Jusang Lee
Research Mentor School/College/Department: Strategy / Business
Program: UROP
Session: Session 3 (11:00am – 11:50am)
Authors: Jusang Lee, Yifan Zhao
Abstract
This research project aims to examine the impact of audience expectations on the profit-seeking and growth strategies of high-status firms in the U.S. Law Service industry. It is acknowledged that high-status firms often enjoy benefits such as public awareness and premium pricing capability in comparison to lower-status firms. However, the study argues that these audience expectations can also create constraints for the firms in their decision-making processes, which leads to high-status firms being trapped into suboptimal decision-making. The study aims to use existing datasets to investigate the relationship between audience expectations and the strategic choices of high-status law firms. To test the argument, the study proposes to collect data on each law firm’s financial information and diversification profile across different practice areas. Moreover, to identify high-status law firms, the study uses the existing Vault 100 ranking. Finding and eliminating any errors or inconsistencies in the data, as well as making sure the data is in an easily-analyzed format, are the main parts of the data cleaning process. Excel is used to collect and analyze quantitative and qualitative data. The study’s ultimate objective is to test whether high-status law firms within each practice area will retain a smaller pool of clients than low-status law firms in order to live up to high-quality expectations and maintain the symbol of prestige.
