You can find clients on Facebook and LinkedIn. Or, more to the point, they can find you. But only if you go about it the right way. The good news? That usually means following your interests and passions and being yourself. Find out more in the April Illinois Bar Journal.

Illinois Judges Association President Hon. Rita M. Novak presented the organization’s Distinguished Service Award to Judge Carole Kamin Bellows on March 28 at the Richard J. Daley Center in Chicago.The Distinguished Service Award is intended to recognize judges who have demonstrated exemplary service to citizens, bench, and bar as shown by devotion to the law, efforts to improve the legal and judicial communities, reputation for honor, integrity, legal knowledge and diligent service, and otherwise distinguishing him or herself as an Illinois judicial officer.Judge Bellows was first appointed to serve as a judge of the Circuit Court, Domestic Relations Division, by the Illinois Supreme Court in 1986. By being successfully retained by the voters, she continued to serve on the bench for 26 years. Prior to becoming a judge, she was an attorney for 26 years.

Asked and AnsweredBy John W. Olmstead, MBA, Ph.D, CMCQ. Our firm is a 26 attorney firm in Louisville, Kentucky. We are considering merging/acquiring a 12 attorney firm in the local area. This is virgin territory for us as we have not done this before. We would be interested in your thoughts as to where we should start and the process we should use to minimize the risk of making a mistake.A. While mergers can be a valid option making them work is often another matter. Research indicates that one third to one half of all mergers fail to meet expectations due to cultural misalignment and personnel problems. Don't try to use a merger or acquisition as a life raft, for the wrong reasons and as your sole strategy. Successful mergers are based upon a sound integrated business strategy that creates synergy and a combined firm that produces greater client value than either firm can produced alone.There can be a whole list of reasons for failure including poor financial performance, attorney defections, loss of key clients, and leadership and management issues. However, it has been our experience that most failures have been the result of poor cultural fit. The merging firms - after they have moved past conflict checks and excitement about new client potential - jump immediately to an examination of practice economics and the financials. They fail to perform proper due diligence on the people. It is critical that firms insure that cultural due diligence is a key component of the merger assessment process. Philosophies, personalities, and life styles should be generally compatible. The partners should like each other and the deal should make sense.

VR Election Services, ISBA’s election provider, has e-mailed e-ballots to members with valid email addresses and mailed paper ballots to members without email addresses. If you haven’t received your e-ballot, please check your email spam under the suffix vres.us. If your e-ballot is not in your spam folder, or if you received an electronic ballot and want to vote by paper ballot, please contact VRES at (800) 218-4026 or by email at custserv@vres.us. The last day to request a paper ballot is Tuesday, April 16, 2013.Online voting ends at 4:30 p.m. CT on Tuesday, April 30th. Paper ballots must be received at VR Election Services in Texas by 4:30 p.m. CT on Monday, April 30, 2013  in order to be counted.The Tellers of the Election will complete the Canvass of the Election no later than May 6, 2013 .All members with their dues paid by March 1st are eligible to vote if there is a contested race in their area. The contested races in the 2013 Election are: 3rd Vice President; Board of Governors: Cook County, Area 2, Under 37 Cook County; Assembly: Circuits 7 and 16.View candidate bios at www.isba.org/elections/bios