This is a study of the impact of business on legal practice exploring the attitudes and aspirations of lawyers and linking the findings to questions of the effective management of legal services. Included is a comparative analysis of trends in the UK and Australia, a portrait of the forgotten men of the legal profession, using this material to shed new light on the nature of the legal profession. It looks at the impact of big business on the nature of the legal profession and provides a comparative analysis of in-house lawyers and lawyers in private practice. The author is on the panel of independent arbitrators of the Advisory Conciliation and Arbitration Service and was a Visiting Research Fellow in the Australian National University in 1985-86.