Clawbie 2011 Nominations
Here are my last minute Clawbie nominations. This year, there are way too many excellent Canadian legal blogs to choose from, so here is my unscientific and utterly biased criteria:
- Must focus on employment and labour law (because frankly, I rarely have time to read other blogs and wouldn’t have a clue anyways).
- Must be an individual’s blog, rather than a firm blog. I prefer to get to know the voice, personality and perspective of the individual writing. I also want to applaud the extra effort it takes for an individual to keep up the hard work without having the resources of ghost writers or a marketing department.
- I like frequent postings. This is my most hypercritical criteria, since I never blog as much as I’d like to.
My Top 3:
Doorey’s Workplace Law Blog - Lots of opinions, lots of passion and frequent, interesting updates on Canadian employment and labour law.
Quebec Labour Law -Gabriel Granatstein does a great job of regularly posting relevant, accessible and interesting blogs on Quebec employment and labour law. It’s a unique and valuable resource.
Stewart Rudner’s blog posts in the HR Reporter website are a great source of employment law concepts and practice points. As the king of legal social media in the employment realm in Toronto, Stewart is a great example of how to communicate, interact and relate to his audience.
Runner’s Up:
Donna Seale consistently writes interesting, compassionate, topical pieces. She has told me that business was unusually busy for her this fall, so her posts are not very frequent, but are still great when she manages to fit it all in. I would have put her in the top 3 if she wasn’t such a successful, busy lawyer.
Michael Fitzgibbon has been a long-time blogger that provides brief yet dense posts that highlight new developments in employment law in an interesting, accessible manner. His business model and approach to client fees makes him both a business and thought leader in our field.
Greg Gowe’s blog has been around since 1997, long before most of us had heard of the word “blog”. Based in BC, he provides diverse, frequent and current employment and labour law updates.
Yosie Saint-Cyr and her team of bloggers have become my go-to starting point on many issues. In depth, timely and well written articles. Yes, I know this one doesn’t meet my second criteria, but it’s such a good blog and has a small team, and the posts still read with lots of individual personality.
Happy holidays everyone!
DECEMBER 31, 2011 UPDATE:
I am pleased to note that my blog has been selected for a 2011 Clawbies Award for one of the 3 best private practice legal blogs in Canada. Thank you to everyone who nominated me, to those on the panel who made the decision, and to the readers who keep me on my toes!
