I found a business book from 1916 that is only 56 pages long.
Already more respectful than most strategy books.
It is called Obvious Adams.
David Ogilvy reportedly loved it.
The hero is an advertising man who succeeds by noticing things everyone else considers too obvious to mention.
My favorite story is about a retailer that had two stores in the same city.
Same brand. Same products.
One made money. The other kept losing it.
The company tried more advertising.
Very logical.
Small problem.
The advertising made the successful store even more successful.
The bad store remained bad.
So the executives held a three hour meeting.
Sales reports. Ideas. Cigar smoke. Nothing.
Then they sent Adams to investigate.
He found the first store in twenty minutes.
The second took forty five.
When he finally found it, he realised he had already walked past it three times.
There was the answer.
The store was on the main shopping street.
But it had a tiny frontage.
Its large window faced the wrong direction.
Pedestrians were looking at the traffic lights, not the shop.
The problem was not advertising.
The problem was that nobody could see the door.
Legal does this too.
A complex project starts drifting.
So we add another law firm.
Another tracker. Another meeting. Another opinion.
Sometimes the real blockage is much simpler.
Nobody owns the next decision.
The local advisers are answering different questions.
The contract structure no longer fits the deal.
The business sponsor has not chosen between speed and protection.
At Ambar, senior project counsel can step into complex cross border matters and find where the work is actually stuck.
They take control of the facts, workstreams, advisers, deadlines and decision points.
The GC gets clarity.
The traditional firms focus on the legal questions that genuinely deserve their best partners.
Before buying more advertising, walk past the store.
The door may be in the wrong place.
Before you go: how Ambar can help
We help GCs access senior independent legal talent when their teams need more range, more speed or more specialist judgment.
1) Fractional counsel for capacity gaps
When a key lawyer moves role, goes on leave, or gets pulled into a strategic project, we help cover the gap without adding permanent structure.
2) Specialist expertise for new areas
Privacy, AI, technology contracts, payments, cybersecurity, energy, regulatory or new jurisdictions — senior lawyers who bring knowledge into the team, not just hours.
3) The layer between in-house and traditional firms
For work that is too senior for junior execution, too close to the business for a law firm machine, and too temporary for a permanent hire.
4) Legal AI that learns your standard
We help legal teams turn senior judgment into playbooks, model answers, red flags, evals and error-analysis frameworks for the AI tools their teams already use.
Not generic AI. Your legal standard.
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Stay cool,
Dr. No