2008 Summer Reading List: Solo by Choice

We are definitely into the 2008 summer reading season now and so I am going to feature some great summer reading materials over the next few weeks--all in the law practice arena.

I can almost hear some of you chuckling now. Reading about law practice ideas in your summer recreation time probably sounds very unappealing. I'd agree for the most part, but for the solo or small firm lawyer or the lawyer who is seriously contemplating a move in that direction, I will suggest one book that you might consider dropping in the beach bag (next to the trashy novel or thriller, of course!) The book is Solo by Choice by Carolyn Elefant and it may contain more great advice, inspiration and common sense per page than any other book a small firm lawyer can locate. At three hundred pages, you will find that you actually can read it from beginning to end. The $45 price is affordable to even the most cash-strapped beginning lawyer.

In fact, I have to confess that I've been negligent in not mentioning this book, which came out near the first of the year, before now. Many of you should know Carolyn Elefant from her ground-breaking blog, My Shingle, with its numerous resources for small firm lawyers. If you have looked at Carolyn's blog output, you know that she could easily pen a 300, 500 or 1000 page book entirely on her own. But Carolyn made the decision to include many other voices and opinions in the book, from familiar experts to practicing lawyers from across the country. This makes Solo by Choice a very rich and easy-to-read information source indeed.

I could say more. But in the months that this book has been available, it has received detailed reviews from Inspired Solo Sheryl Sisk Schelin,  Scott Greenfield of Simple Justice and, quite recently, from Al Nye the Lawyer Guy. The reviews are all raves. If you are considering a jump to solo practice, buy this book. If you are a solo or small firm lawyer and could use ideas, inspiration or affirmation, buy this book. If you are very thrifty, then buy this book from Amazon instead of the official site linked above. Just buy it. Congratulations, Carolyn. We appreciate the hard work that led to Solo by Choice.

2nd Annual GPSSF National Solo and Small Firm Conference a Success

Last week's 2nd Annual GPSSF National Solo and Small Firm Conference in Philadelphia was a success by any measure.  We had over 230 registered attendees and a large percentage of them were members of the Solosez community from all across the country. Marion J. Browning-Baker, an attorney from Stuttgart, Germany won the "farthest travel to attend" award. On behalf of my conference co-chairs, Ross Kodner and Deborah Matthews, I want to thank everyone who helped us organize, encouraged us, presented at or attended the NSSF conference. It is not yet finalized, but looks like next year's conference will be in Santa Fe, N.M.

I note reviews of the conference from Allison Shield at her Legal Ease Blog and Susan Cartier Liebel at her Build A Solo Practice blog.

2007 GPSSF National Solo and Small Firm Conference

I've got a presentation this morning for the statewide Legal Aid Services of Oklahoma Conference and then I rush to the airport to catch a flight to the 2007 ABA GPSSF National Solo and Small Firm Conference in Philadelphia. This conference looks to be a great success, with attendance approaching perhaps 200 solo and small firm lawyers. You can check the conference website for more information. I understand that there are still a few places available for walk-ins to attend.

It has been my great pleasure to once again co-chair this conference. My co-chairs Ross Kodner and Deborah Matthews are so pleased that the time for the conference has arrived. We are going to host many attendees who participate in Solosez. They will be enjoying the conference and meeting each other for the first time. Remember this event the next time someone tells you that the American Bar Association doesn't do anything for solo and small firm lawyers.

From Business Boot Camp to The New Lawyer Experience

The American Bar Association publication Your ABA recently highlighted a program that had me as one of the panelists at ABA Annual Meeting. Read this nice article about our Business Boot Camp for Lawyers. We had a nice audience and my co-panelists were great.

In Oklahoma, it is time for lawyers who are either in the process of opening or thinking about opening a private law practice to register for The New Lawyer Experience. This free program will be held September 28, 2007 at the Tulsa County Bar Center and October 2, 2007 at the Oklahoma Bar Center. Oklahoma lawyers can see the schedule and get more details online here. We'll cover a lot of the basics that you may not have learned in law school, but we'll also have some cutting edges concepts to discuss.

While we schedule this program to take place a few days after the admittance ceremony for new lawyers, we always have a good number of experienced lawyers who are either changing careers or just updating/refreshing their information. I hope to see many of you who follow this blog at the program. However, you don't have to be an Oklahoma lawyer to benefit from this program in one way. Our Starting a Law Practice Web Directory has lots of information for you to read and review.

Site of the Week: The Inspired Solo Blog

Several blogs about solo law practice have sprung up recently. Some are very good. Some are perhaps still in the developmental stage. And, I don't mean to sound cynical, but I know many of them will not survive long. The lawyer will get busy with "real work" or discover after a few posts that they have said most of the things they were burning to say.

An outstanding addition to the legal blogosphere is The Inspired Solo. It is brought to us by Sheryl Sisk Schelin, who is a solo practitioner living and working in North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Some people think that to be a great blogger you need a lot of opinions. Well, I think that you need to be a great writer. Sheryl is.

The blog now has a new appearance - very crisp and clean. Sheryl does have an agenda with this site. She wants, as the title suggests, to inspire solo lawyers and to inspire other lawyers to consider the solo path. For entrepreneurs, inspiration is very important. (Of course, I'd have to add that realistic expectations are important as well.) I think many of you will enjoy The Inspired Solo and that is why I am naming it my Website of the Week.   (Note to Sheryl: I've now publicly placed my bet that this blog will be around for a while, so don't let us down.)

Must Read Material for Solos II: Best of Solo and Small Firm Conferences

Near the end of January two great magazines focusing on solo and small firm law practice showed up on my desk. Both magazines had several personal connections to me (and several friends and colleagues) along with lots of material I wanted to highlight for you. In my prior post I noted that the American Bar Association's differing intramural Web posting policies made it difficult to cover on my blog what was so simple when it happened.

So the subject of the first post, Law Practice magazine, is freely available on the web, but may go behind the password shield in a few weeks. Today's subject is GPSolo magazine and the January/February issue of that publication has yet to be posted online. You should be able to find it here soon. And later, like all of the prior issues of GPSolo back to 1995, you should be able to find it here. It is great that the GPSSF Division leaves all this content available online for members and non-member lawyers alike.

So what got me so excited about this GPSolo issue? It focused on the Best of the Solo and Small Firm Conferences, a topic near and dear to my heart. So forgive the lack of links in this post, but with ABA TECHSHOW next week, it is do this now or probably not at all. In this GPSolo Editor-in-chief jennifer rose noted that my colleague with the Missouri Bar, Linda M. Oligschlaeger, is known as the mother of the solo and small firm conference movement. I know when I started our Oklahoma SSF conference calling Linda was the first thing on my list. The Missouri SSF conference still has the largest attendance.

These are really great events and great opportunities to meet other lawyers in similar practice settings. Most conferences mix substantive presentations with practice management and technology programs suited to the small firm market. Some smaller firm lawyers have often felt underserved by some bar associations. These conferences demonstrate a commitment to these lawyers.

For this issue of GPSolo magazine, the editors reviewed materials from numerous SSF conferences for reprinting. The titles should spark your interest. They include Foonberg's Favorite 70 Rules of Good Client Relations, Keeping 'Em Happy: Secrets of Client Satisfaction, Representing Non-English Speaking Clients, Sample Engagement Letters and Fee Agreements, two articles on Setting Up a Home Office, The Lawyer as Employer and "Pay Less in Taxes, Sleep Better at Night and Enjoy Life More." So does that sound like a line-up for a great Solo and Small Firm Conference or what? Both the Missouri and Oklahoma conferences were well represented in the articles selected.

Hopefully this great content will be posted online here soon. The good news is that it will be online thereafter without being hidden behind a password.

Several of these conferences are scheduled this summer, including a brand new one in Nebraska, where they've invited me to speak. If you are a solo or small firm lawyer, consider attending your local SSF conference or, if you don't have one, maybe you should do a scouting trip to a nearby conference on behalf of your bar association.

Must Read Material for Solos: Law Practice - SOLOS, Rising to the Challenge

I'd love to point you to three great collections of materials for Solo and Small Firm lawyers, all from the American Bar Association. (Well, two graded great and one "needs improvement.") But, due to inconsistent ABA policies, the explanation of what is available, when and to whom, is a bit complex. So I'll cover these three potential gold mines in my next three blog posts.

The current good news should be first. The first issue of Law Practice magazine under the able leadership of new editor-in-chief David J. Bilinsky came out several weeks back and much of its contents is now available on the ABA web page. This great issue is called SOLOS, Rising to the Challenge and is all about solo lawyers. Here's the link to the table of contents. If you are not an ABA Law Practice Management Section member, you should go there soon and read/save/print what you deem important as the LPM section may soon lock up this content behind a member's only password. (Hopefully there appears to be movement within the LPM Section to reevaluate this policy.)

But what an issue!  A newly launched section is described by Bilinsky as "our new Law Practice Case Study feature, which looks at a lawyer facing a complex real-life decision and asks the experts to provide forward, context-relevant advice." The first one is Wide Open Spaces: Advice for Starting Up a Solo Practice. Here, a fictional lawyer contemplates moving from a large firm to solo practice. Offering advice are practice management advisors Jim Calloway and Reba J. Nance, law firm administrator Lori J. Kannenberg and two well-known small firm lawyers—Stephen J. Harhai and Cory Furman.

Other articles include Going Solo: Rising to the Challenge, How to Set Up a Law Library: Solutions for Solos and Small Firms, A Financial Checklist for the New Solo Firm by David Bilinsky and Laura Calloway and Locking the Doors and the Windows: Security in the Solo World by  Catherine Sanders Reach.

As I said, there's a lot of great content in this issue and I have not mentioned it all. Go. Read. Don't delay, especially if you are not an ABA LPM Section member. (And if you are already an ABA member, why aren't you?)

New Lawyer Training Holds Lessons for All Lawyers

Our fall edition of the New Lawyer Experience program is completed. Over 150 lawyers attended in either Oklahoma City or Tulsa, with the majority being brand new lawyers who were sworn in the week before. (When you learn that they were forced to listen to me for five hours, it might sound more like new lawyer hazing.)

My column in the Oklahoma Bar Journal this month shares part of the program's content with you. Check out New Lawyer Training Holds Lessons for All Lawyers.

The article provides a link to download the *Ten Commandments of Client Relationships. I encourage you each to download it, frame it and hang it on the place on the wall in your office where you tend to stare when someone has hacked you off.

Technology Purchases: When is the Best not the Best?

Don't we all want the very best? Dennis Kennedy has recently been republishing on his blog some of his older writing that were originally published elsewhere. There's a lot of good, very relevant information to be found in those posts. But I really wanted to highlight one concept because it relates to my daily work. I often discuss with lawyers their intended law office technology purchases. Lawyers by their education and daily tasks are trained to do exhaustive research and produce the very best result for their clients. So when they are considering buying new technology they apply these same skills and this same approach. That's not inherently a bad thing. Unfortunately, achieving perfection with technology purchases is sometimes impossibly difficult.

Dennis quotes author Harry Beckwith in his post "The Best is the Enemy of the Good: Making Good Technology Choices." This well-written post illustrates something many of us find to be a struggle. You can read and compare features until your vision gets blurry, but buying the very best hardware or software is extremely hard. Is a laptop that is 2 pounds lighter really better than one with a slightly faster processor? Should I buy now when I heard that there may be a new version in a few months? Then, after you've made a tenative decision, any comment from anyone about the product or a competitor's product can cause you to start the process all over.

Here is Beckwith's ratings of the "best" options:

Very good
Good
Best
Not good
Truly god-awful

Note that "best" as a concept ranks third? Why?  "Because," Beckwith says, "getting to best usually gets complicated." I really appreciate Dennis pointing us to that thought.

When I talk to lawyers agonizing between a choice between two or more software packages, I sometimes tell them, "I want you to think about a few things. Any of these packages can do a good job for you. As a matter of fact, you probably won't fully use the power and features that any of these packages offer. So rather than continuing to analyze the relative apples and oranges, just do two things: 1) Commit to spending money and effort on education and training to more fully utilize the software you do purchase, and 2) Set a deadline by which you agree to make a decision, even though you still may not have all of the facts." Now I will be adding to those comments that getting to the best is often just too complicated.

After you have read the post from Dennis linked about, then read his prior post "Seven Easy Ways for Law Firms to Throw Away Money on Technology" and you'll be all prepared for your next technology purchase. Just remember that we will all make purchasing decisions that we question later when a new version of the software is released or an ad in the newspaper makes us think we could have purchased more inexpensively. It is worse for your business to devote dozens and dozens of wasted billable attorney hours to decision making than to have purchased "very good" instead of "best."

Support Your Local Bar Association

Before I ever went to work for a bar association, I was involved with three types of bar activities: 1) My local hometown bar association, The Cleveland County Bar; 2) The Oklahoma Bar Family Law Section and 3) The Oklahoma Bar Association Annual Meeting, which takes place this week. (Info here.) I think beginning lawyers make a real mistake by not getting involved with their local bar and the Young Lawyers Division of their state bar. There's no better source for so many things young lawyers need: mentoring and wise advice, possible referral of work, insider info on how things really work at the courthouse, potential employment in small firms that may not be advertised and much more. You may be a bit uncomfortable the first meeting or two as you get to know everyone, but don't let this deter you from a great networking opportunity.

For Oklahoma lawyers who do any family law, the OBA Family Law Section is an incredible resource. At their meeting this week, one of the doorprizes is a trip to the ABA Annual Meeting in Hawaii this summer.

There was a recent online article bashing the volunteers who work in bar associations. I won't even dignify it with a link. You can come to our OBA Annual Meeting and get to know some of the best lawyers in our state. Stop by the OBA Management Assistance Program exhibitor's booth and say "Hi." Sharon and I would love to hear from someone who we didn't know that follows the blog. We even have a modest giveaway.

(I'll bet most readers don't connect a movie reference with the title of this post. It starred a native Oklahoman who grew in my hometown.)

A Father's Advice on How to Succeed as a Lawyer

Over 40 years ago, a Texas lawyer wrote a letter to his son about how to succeed as a lawyer. The advice is still inspirational today. I read it long ago, but Richardson, Texas attorney Mike Koenecke posted it to Solosez yesterday and I wanted to pass it along to those of you who may not have read it.

Site of the Week: GPSolo's Resources for Starting a Practice

Starting a law practice is a challenge many lawyers accept each year. But, for many, all that is associated with running a business in addition to doing the legal work for clients can prove intially demanding. This is particularly true for those fresh out of law school or those leaving a large firm where most administrative and management matters were kept out of sight and out of the minds of most of the lawyers. Resources for Starting and and Running a Law Firm is a web directory from the ABA General Practice, Solo and Small Firm Section. It provides links to many resources including back issues of the section's New Lawyer, Unlock Your Potential (a 79 page PDF from the ABA Young Lawyer's Division on setting up a practice) and the link to subscribe to Solosez. (We'll talk more about Solosez later this week.) GPSolo's fine collection of Resources is our Website fo the Week.

The Lawyer’s Bank Accounts

The Lawyer's Bank Accounts is the topic of my article in this month's Oklahoma Bar Journal. It is a brief overview and may be particularly valuable to the new lawyer setting up a law practice. There are links to other resources about bank accounts for lawyers, including a recent article by Dan Pinnington on internal controls to fight fraud.

The Initial Client Interview

"In many ways for lawyers the initial client interview is like a first date. You do not know each other that well and hope to get better acquainted. There is often a bit of tension or wariness. There are lots of unanswered (and unasked) questions, and it may have its awkward moments. But both of you hold out the hope that this may turn into a long term, mutually beneficial relationship."

That was the beginning of an article I wrote on The Initial Client Interview some time ago. I believe this is still very worthwhile reading, particularly for young lawyers. It covers the agenda of the interview, good listening skills, the critical issue of what potential clients to avoid, attorney's fees and managing the information. There is even a link to a few sample client intake forms donated by Oklahoma lawyers.

Mom's Advice About Starting a Law Practice

This is a brief follow-up to my post to law students earlier this week.

Attitude is everything. It is great to be confident, but not good to be cocky.  As a Norman lawyer advises new lawyers, "You've been given your driver's license, but you aren't ready for the Indy 500, or maybe not even rush hour on the freeway." Understand that once you get your license, you will much to learn from court staff, other lawyers, judges, and even from your clients.

You may be surprised to learn that even your parents and grandparents have a lot to teach you about opening a law practice and being a good lawyer. See my article "Everything I Need To Know About Practicing Law I Learned From My Mom."

Advice to a Law Student About Opening a Law Practice

When should I begin serious planning about starting my own law practice?

Well, even if you are still in law school, the answer is sooner rather than later. While you can certainly “hang out a shingle” without much planning, your chances for success will be greatly improved if you have a business plan, a marketing plan and a budget before you even consider signing the lease on office space. It will certainly be difficult to prepare a budget when you have little idea about revenues and expenses, but it’s better to have some outline than nothing - especially when you open the doors and the salesmen descend on you with “must have” services and products.

You should already be working on this if you are taking the bar exam this summer. First of all you need to buy, not borrow, Jay Foonberg’s How to Start and Build a Law Practice, 5th Edition. This will be a book you will refer to again and again. You will note on the link that members of the ABA Law Student Division can purchase it really cheaply. Start reading it for the first time now!

For marketing ideas for the solo and small firm lawyer, I’d direct your attention to my Marketing Magic pieces here and here. I've received more reprint requests for these articles than anything else I've ever written. Jay Foonberg also has a book on this topic titled “How to Get and Keep Good Clients.” You must prepare a marketing plan in writing with deadlines even if it is rather modest at first. Do not fail to send an announcement of your new law practice to everyone you know (and everyone your parents know, if you are starting in your home community) with a business card enclosed. There’s a budget item for printing and postage.

On financial issues, start by reading the online article “A Rose by Any Other Name: Characteristics of an Efficient Practice” by Pat Yevics of the Maryland State Bar. Visit the resources linked at the bottom of the article. There are many articles about law firm finances at Law Practice Today and the ABA Law Practice Management Section’s Website. Your state bar may have other resources.

I’ve referenced hours of reading and planning fun here. That’s why you need to start many months before you open your door. The law student, whose head has been crammed full of torts and defenses, and codes and cases, will need to do some mental adjustment. Opening your own law practice has little to do with all of that. You will be immersed in issues common to opening any small business: marketing, cash flow and overhead, location, staff, tax deposits, bank accounts, budgeting, finance, invoicing and billing, office policies and procedures, office supplies and dozens of other things you haven’t been thinking about much in law school. Get going!

Site of the Week: The Ten Minute Mentor

"Imagine if, at the click of a mouse, young lawyers could receive mentoring from some of the legal profession's most highly regarded practitioners."  That's how Bob Ambrogi opened his post about The Ten Minute Mentor yesterday. Yes, this idea is not only a reality, but an extraordinarily well-executed reality recently launched by the Texas Young Lawyers Association and Texas Bar CLE. So far there are over 100 streaming videos from experienced lawyers placed on the web for free. I can't speak highly enough of this idea. It is inspired.  It is so difficult for young lawyers to establish a relationship with a mentor these days. Everyone is so busy. Getting ten good minutes of advice from a great lawyer is extremely valuable and having access to it 7/24 is, as the saying goes, priceless.

Since this is an Oklahoma-based weblog, you can imagine how tough it is for me to brag on Texas. Thanks for making this tremendous resource available to young lawyers everywhere, not just in your state. Not only am I having a second "site of the week" this week for this great accomplishment, but I'll be showing The Ten Minute Mentor off at ABA TECHSHOW 2005 during "60 Sites in 60 Minutes."

Twelve Ways Technology Can Make You a Better Trial Lawyer

Today "Twelve Ways Technology Can Make You a Better Trial Lawyer" was posted to Notes from the Legal Underground by David Swanner. It is, in my judgment, a "must read" for all lawyers, even those who never see the inside of a courtroom. Read it once. Read it twice. Add it to your favorites and then send the link to some lawyers in your firm and other lawyers you think may need this advice. It has great links to a number of products and resources.