Cohen & Buckmann case study: sold on Ajax in two days
Cohen & Buckmann, P.C. practices executive compensation and ERISA law from New York. Founded in 2016 by Sandra Cohen, formerly of Sullivan & Cromwell, and Carol Buckmann, formerly of Osler, the firm is ranked by Chambers USA, Legal 500, and Best Lawyers, and advises corporate boards, C-suite executives, and investment advisers.
The firm bills between $550 and $1,100 per hour. At those rates, a forgotten 0.1 email review is $110 that never reaches an invoice. Multiply that across a team and a week, and the missing money is real.
The problem is physics, not discipline
Cohen's team handles complex matters, structuring deferred compensation plans, analyzing IRC 409A compliance, reviewing ERISA filings, and jumps between them constantly. Nobody, regardless of billing habits, captures every interaction in real time while doing that work.
Cohen knew the firm was losing revenue, so she went looking. She is thorough about vetting technology, and she demoed PointOne first. For her practice, it came down to what the tool could see: she wanted entries that reflect the actual substance of the work, the difference between a generic line and a narrative that justifies the rate to a sophisticated client. Ajax reads the content on screen and drafts entries that sound like the attorney wrote them.
Her own words, from a note she posted to a professional forum, unprompted: "I had previously demo'd PointOne and did not buy it. But I was sold on Ajax within 2 days of my demo based on how easy it is to use."
The results
Measure | Before Ajax | With Ajax | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
Billable hours per day | 3.6 | 4.3 | +0.7 |
Billable dollars per day | $2,777 | $3,316 | +$539 |
Extra revenue per user, per month | $12,400 | ||
Recovered across the team, per month | $74,403 |
Senior associate Sherrone Torres pointed at the narratives as the thing that won her over: "The descriptions are great. That's been the easiest sell in getting me using this thing." Her entries went from generic lines like "revising employment agreement" to specific ones that name the focus of the work, which her clients can actually evaluate.
And the rest of Cohen's unprompted forum post is worth quoting as she wrote it: "Now I do less work than ever releasing my time entries, and I know it has already 'found' $$$ in lost time. Obviously, I'm a fan and this is an unpaid promotional endorsement."
Frequently asked questions
Why does content capture matter at high billing rates? Because the narrative has to justify the rate. A client paying $1,100 an hour deserves an entry that says what was analyzed and why, and that level of detail only comes from seeing the actual work, not calendar metadata.
How fast does Ajax learn an attorney's style? Within days. Ajax drafts in each person's own voice, learning from entries they wrote before and from their edits as they go. Sherrone Torres found the drafted descriptions were sometimes better than her own.
Is Ajax worth it for a smaller team with high rates? The math scales with rates. Cohen & Buckmann recovers $74,403 a month across its team, from increments that used to vanish.
If your firm's rates make every missed 0.1 expensive, book a demo. For the wider tool landscape, see our honest rundown of the best AI timekeeping tools for lawyers.
