The cure for the overworked and overwhelmed attorney

November 23, 2010 by
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I don’t know a single attorney who wants to work more. Oh they want more work, they just don’t want to work longer hours.

Unfortunately, we have been trained to believe in an absolute correlation between our income and the amount of work we do, but that correlation simply does not exist.

As a young lawyer starting my career, I had very little work and an income to match. When I finally learned marketing and starting bringing in more clients, naturally, my income and work hours increased. Eventually, I had lots of clients and incredibly long hours, obviously proving there is a correlation, right? Well, that depends.

I realized that I wasn’t happy working so much but I wasn’t willing to cut back my schedule if it meant cutting back my income. I struggled with this for a long time and, thankfully, I figured out how to do it. I was able to significantly reduce my work week without reducing my income. In fact, when I got things fully underway, my income took a dramatic leap.

There were a few things I did to make that happen. One of those was to get comfortable with delegating.

Attorneys are famously bad at delegating. There are a number of reasons, ranging from fear that the person to whom the work is delegated will screw up, to ego, the notion that, “nobody can do it as well as I can.” I had a little bit of both going on in my head; it took some effort to come to terms with these beliefs, but I did.

On the “screw up” issue, I realized that I would still be supervising my employees, I was the failsafe. I also realized that happiness (or a successful law practice) doesn’t require the complete absence of risk. Risk can be managed. That’s why God created “E & O” policies, after all.

As for the idea that I was the best one for the job, I simply had to accept the premise that if I was ever going to have relief from eighty hour weeks, “good enough” would have to be good enough.

Once I crossed the threshold of acceptance,  I began to see that there were many functions in our office I could let go of and, in fact, there were many functions where I really wasn’t the best person for the job. Once I started the process of handing over responsibilities to others and saw that the sky did not fall and, in fact, good things were happening, I embarked on a quest to delegate as much as possible. Eventually, my philosophy was to only do that which only I could do, and this was a major turning point in my career.

If you are overworked because of reluctance to delegate (or delegate as much as possible), I urge you to do as I did. Change your philosophy and learn some techniques. Your kids will be glad you did.

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Filed Under: Career satisfaction, Dealing with stress, Increase your income, Law office management, Productivity Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

A marketing plan for lawyers–part two

June 22, 2010 by
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In a previous post, we examined the four steps to creating a marketing plan. You learned that a marketing plan should be simple, and that it is an ongoing process, with most of the planning taking place on a monthly and weekly basis.

You also learned the importance of having a long-term vision statement and annual goals.

Before we move on to discuss monthly planning and daily activities, let’s delve a little deeper into the goal setting process.

There are six major areas of life–Career/Financial, Physical/Health, Family/Home, Mental/Educational, Spiritual, and Social/Cultural. For most people, happiness comes from having a well-balanced life, with success in all six areas.

This doesn’t mean you need to set annual goals in all six ares. Some areas may be going well for you right now, or there may be one or two areas that are more important to you this year. Throughout your life, your priorities will change and so will your goals. So, right now, if you want to focus on just one or two areas of your life, that’s fine.

For each area of focus, you should have no more than three annual goals. One is even better.

Sometimes, people confuse “benefits” with “goals”. For example, in the area of Career/Financial, you may have a goal to earn a certain amount of money, another goal to buy a new house, and a third goal to pay off your credit card balances. But the second two are really benefits to be obtained from the first goal, so, in reality, you have just one goal.

Right now, I have just one area of my life I’m focused on and I have one goal in that area. There are many benefits to be derived from achieving that goal and there also many sub-goals I need to hit before I will achieve it. This works for me and you should do what works for you. (You can always change your goals.)

For each annual goal, follow these five steps and you will be well on your way to achieving them:

STEP ONE

Make sure your goal is S.M.A.R.T.–Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Tangible. Write your goal in the present tense, as though already obtained, make it specific, and attach a date. Since we’re focused on marketing, here’s an example of a S.M.A.R.T. financial goal: “I’m excited that I am now earning a net income of $15,000 per month, or more, in my law practice, by or before December 31, 2010.”

STEP TWO

List (a) the benefits to be obtained and (b) the losses to be avoided by achieving this goal. It’s important that you understand the value and importance of your goals and have some emotional investment in them.

Benefits to be achieved

  • Pride, feeling of accomplishment
  • Pay off debts
  • Increase savings, build for the future
  • Hire another paralegal, gain more free time
  • Reduce stress

Losses to be avoided

  • Cancelling next year’s vacation
  • Moving to a smaller office

STEP THREE

List (a) “Possible obstacles” to obtaining the goal and, for each obstacle, (b) “Possible Solutions”.

One of your obstacles is “you”. No doubt there are things you need to learn, things you need to do more of or get better at, or things you need to stop doing. What are they? What obstacles have prevented you from achieving your goal in the past? And what are some possible solutions? (Your goal is not S.M.A.R.T. unless you list possible solutions because without solutions, you can’t move forward.)

Possible obstacles/Solutions [Examples]

  • Obstacle: Me–my lack of patience. Solutions: Read Dale Carnegie, other books, find a mentor who has overcome that obstacle
  • Obstacle: Not enough clients. Solutions: Study marketing, set up a blog, join networking group.
  • Obstacle: Not enough time: Solutions: Find a “time management” system; hire another paralegal.

This will help you identity actions you need to take on the way to achieving your goals and help you identity sub-goals and projects you need to tackle.

STEP FOUR

List specific action steps you need to do to move you forward towards achieving the goal. Schedule target dates for each of these steps and put these dates on your monthly calendar.

These four steps will help ensure that you have meaningful goals, specific action steps and target dates for their achievement.

STEP FIVE

This goal setting process should be reviewed and re-written each month, at your monthly planning session. Ideally, this will take place a day or two before the end of the previous month. “Always plan next month before next month begins.”

Each month, as you make progress towards your goals, circumstances will change and your plan will change. As you move forward, you will conduct a weekly review of your monthly plans and make adjustments to your daily activities. We’ll talk about that in our next post on this subject.

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Filed Under: Career satisfaction, Goal Setting, Marketing legal services, Personal development, Productivity Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

A marketing plan for lawyers–a lot simpler than you think

May 27, 2010 by
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Do you have a marketing plan for your law practice? I’ll bet you don’t. Most attorneys tell me they haven’t had the time to write one and they don’t know where to begin.

The good news is it’s a lot simpler than you think and you can get the most important part done in about an hour.

Most people think a marketing plan is a detailed, step-by-step blueprint for building their business or practice. Yes, plans like this are written every day, but a complex plan is neither necessary nor effective.

You can’t accurately predict what will happen six months or a year from now. There are too many variables. Effective marketing plans are written on the battle field, in real time. As circumstances change, the plan changes, and the plan you start with is almost never the plan that you end with.

Don’t get me wrong, a well planned life is a successful life, but most of the planning is done on a shorter time line–month to month and week to week. The planning process has the following elements:
  1. Long term vision
  2. Annual goals
  3. Monthly plans (and weekly reviews)
  4. Daily actions
You can do the first two in about an hour.

Start by writing a vision statement for the next five years (or ten). Where do you want to be? What do you want for your practice and personal life?

With respect to your practice, how much do you want to be earning? What do you want to be doing, in terms of practice areas, niche markets, and types of clients? Do you want a big, busy practice or something smaller but equally remunerative (e.g., fewer clients, less overhead)? Do you want partners or do you want to work for a firm? Maybe you’d like to be retired from practicing and doing something else. Or practicing part time so you have more time for travel and for your family or anything else. What do you want?

Think big! Turn on your dream machine and don’t limit yourself in any way. In five years, you can accomplish just about anything, so don’t hold back. You are the architect of your life, so make it a good one.

Take about thirty to forty-five minutes and start writing. A few paragraphs to one page is all you need. Write in the present tense, as though you are already living your vision. Some people like to describe their birthday, five years in the future: what they are doing that day, who they are with, what they have accomplished, what they are looking forward to.

Remember, there are no restrictions. Short of defying the laws of physics or being completely unrealistic, you can be, do, or have whatever you want. Don’t be logical about this. No, “yeah, buts. . .”, this is your dream for the future and you should make it as exciting and delicious as you want.

Once you have your vision statement, you know where you want to go. Everything you do hereafter will be designed to move you forward towards that vision.

The next step is annual goals. You can have goals for different aspects of your life–professional, spiritual, physical, and so forth, but within each category, one goal is usually best (and no more than three).

Read your vision statement and choose an annual goal that will move you forward towards that vision in a meaningful way. Write down that goal.

In about an hour, you will accomplished something that perhaps you have never done before. The most important part of any plan is to know the destination, and now you know!

Get out your calendar and find another hour some time before the end of this month. With your vision statement and annual goal(s) in hand, you’ll be able to effectively plan next month. I usually do this on a Sunday morning when it’s quiet.

I’ll talk about the monthly plans and daily actions in another post, but I want to leave you with a key to effective planning. If you do nothing else but embrace this concept, you will be incredibly effective in your growth and levels of achievement. What is the key? It’s this: “Always plan tomorrow before tomorrow begins. And always plan next month before next month begins.”

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Filed Under: Career satisfaction, Goal Setting, Marketing legal services, Personal development, Productivity Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

How full is your bucket?

May 27, 2008 by
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"How Full Is Your Bucket?" by Tom Rath and Donald O. Clifton is a little book filled with big wisdom. Here’s why you should read this immediately: 

  • It reveals simple but powerful strategies that can dramatically improve your relationships with clients, employees, friends, family, and others. These strategies can increase your income, improve your productivity, and even improve your health and extend your lifespan.
  • It is based on 50 years of research, not guesswork. The authors PROVE their premises.
  • You can read the book in an hour and begin using the principles immediately. In my opinion, you’ll see results in days, if not hours.

The book is based on the relatively new field of "Positive Psychology," which focuses on what is right with people rather than what is wrong.

The book and accompanying web site show you how to replace negativity and criticism with positive strategies to obtain desired results.

Good reading!

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Filed Under: Client relations, Increase your income, Personal development, Productivity, Salesmanship Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Is blogging a “massive mistake”?

April 28, 2008 by
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(Originally sent to my ezine list, The Prosperous Lawyer.)

You haven’t heard from me in a few weeks–because I haven’t written much lately. I’ve posted several articles on the blog , but I haven’t kept pace with my original "posting" schedule.

There’s a simple reason for that: I’ve been busy. Okay, that’s not completely true. I haven’t written much lately mainly because I didn’t feel like it.

Of course professionals have to do things we don’t feel like doing. We have responsibilities. People depend on us. And if we want to keep the income flowing, we have to work. But that’s not my job description anymore.

Nope. I started my other business because I wanted passive income and "time freedom," the ability to do what I want, when I want, and work only if I want to. I’ve accomplished that, and don’t rely on my blog for income (nor do I practice law any more), but I have been recommending to my readers that they set up a blog because of the many advantages they offer.

But my quasi-hiatus did get me thinking about the idea behind blogging, that is, even though there isn’t a lot of work to keeping a blog going, you really can’t stop. Not if you depend on it for your business or practice.

Then I got an email from someone for whom I have a lot of respect, Ken Evoy, a former physician turned online entrepreneur. He is extremely successful and well-regarded. Ken’s company specializes in helping people with little or no experience get a website and, more importantly, get free traffic from search engines, and they do it extraordinarily well. I was one of his original customers when he launched his SBI program years ago, and I have nothing but good things to say about Ken and SBI.

But his email troubled me. Probably because it touched on what I was already thinking.

Ken said that for most people (people like you and me) blogging is not the way to go. He says it’s a mistake, a "time-sapping strategic error." One reason (but not the only one) is that because of the way Google valuates the timeliness of posts, taking a break from blogging will cause your relevancy to drop, and the result is a drop in traffic. And search engine traffic is one of the key advantages of blogging.

Another reason is that because of the way blogs archive information, most visitors never see most of it. They read the most current post or two and never dig deeper.

I didn’t want to hear this. Although I don’t depend on my blog, I’ve posted a lot of content and I’d like to think people are reading it and benefiting from it. Wouldn’t you?

Ken’s going to ruffle a lot of feathers, especially considering the respect he has in the online community. But I read his email and the web page he’s posted explaining it, and I have to admit he does make a compelling case. He shows why a static web site, properly organized and optimized, will bring you more search engine traffic than a blog. What’s more, if you take a break from writing for two months, you won’t be penalized.

Ken says his service, SBI (SiteBuildIt) is a better choice than blogging because it is

  • Easier to set up
  • Easier to maintain
  • Less work (a lot less)
  • Less expensive
  • More effective at getting (and keeping) free
    search engine traffic

I am not an expert on the subject; not even close. No doubt many experts will weigh in. I’ll see what they say, and
suggest you do, too.

There’s no question Ken is biased. After all, he does sell SBI (and I am an enthusiastic affiliate), but based on what I know
about him, I think he believes every word he says. Read Ken’s argument and see what you think.

I’ve used SBI and recommended it for years. There’s no question that it has monumental benefits, especially for busy lawyers who can’t spend a lot of time on their web site. And SBI has blogging capability built it, for those who want the best of both worlds. So take a look and tell me what you think. I’ll post this on my blog and you can post your comments there.

P.S. Quick links:

 

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Filed Under: Blogging, Online Marketing, Productivity, Wealth

When you don’t know what to do, do something.

April 22, 2008 by
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There is a true story about a troup of young Hungarian soliders lost in the Alps during training. In abysmal weather, with no food or supplies, they were cut off from their colleagues. After two days of snow and sleet, they were frozen and weak from hunger. They had no idea how to get back to base. They lost the will to live.

Then a miracle happened. Searching for a cigarette in the lining of his tunic, one of the soldiers suddenly found an old map. The soldiers confidently used the map to march through the mountains back to safety.

It was only when they were warm and fed at base camp that they discovered it was a map of the Pyrenees, some 2,000 kilometers away.

This story has two valuable lessons:

  • It is better to act constructively than to have the right answer and not act.
  • Each of us has to find our own answer, or adapt someone else’s answer to our own circumstances. The soliders got home safely because they made sense of the map for themselves and related it to their immediate surroundings.

(From, "Living the 80/20 Way," by Richard Koch.)

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Filed Under: Productivity Tagged With:

Should your law firm have a marketing committee?

April 15, 2008 by
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Marketing professional services cannot be done by committee. It’s something professionals should do. That means you should market "you". Assistants can help with administrative tasks, scheduling, and so forth, but building a law practice means building relationships and that’s something you cannot delegate.

Besides, it’s not the firm that should be marketed. It’s you. Clients don’t typically say, "call my law firm" when they refer you; it’s "call my lawyer" every time. Okay, larger firms can engage in activities that brand the firm’s name and establish good will in their target markets, and a committee would be appropriate for that purpose, but it’s still the individual attorneys that bring in the clients.

On the other hand. . . there are ways a marketing committee can play a role, even in a small or mid-sized firm. A committee can help coordinate the marketing efforts of the individual attorneys, for example. Newsletters, seminars, speaking engagements, mailings, public relations and advertising could well be done more effectively, and at lower cost, when attorneys aren’t duplicating each other’s efforts.

Here are a few other ways a committee could serve and assist the individual attorneys:

  • Bringing in trainers and consultants to help the attorneys improve marketing skills
  • Providing technical assistance with graphics, printing, web sites, event booking
  • Clearance of ethical questions
  • Coordination of cross-selling efforts
  • Decisions about the firm’s design issues (letterhead, decorating)
  • Recognition of attorneys for meeting goals

A committee can’t do the marketing for you. But, like a good secretary, it can certainly make you look good.

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Filed Under: Law office management, Marketing legal services, Productivity Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The three things that matter most

March 24, 2008 by
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What are the three most important things you do in your career? Sure, you do a lot of things, but chances are, three of them are more important than the rest. We’ve talked about the 80/20 Principle before. These three things are the twenty-percent activities that deliver eighty percent of your results. They are worth identifying. If you can identity them, you can do more of them (and less of those things that aren’t of the three).

What’s more, if there are only three things, you can remember them. You don’t need a list. “These are the three areas I focus on,” you’ll say. “This is where I focus eighty percent of my time.” So what are they? If you could only do three things all day long, what would they be? Don’t think too much about this; you already know the answer.

When I was practicing (personal injury), I would have said that these are my three things:

  1. Marketing
  2. Settling Cases
  3. Managing staff

For me, litigation was not one of the three things that matter(ed) most. We did it, but the practice was a high-volume of smaller cases and litigation was not our primary focus. So, it was these three things that mattered most to my practice. If I was doing one of these three things, I was doing “twenty-percent activity”. Anything else was “eighty-percent activity” (which brings in only twenty percent of the results).

Let’s take things a step further, shall we? Once you have identified your “three things that matter most,” what about identifying the three things that matter most about each of those three things? This allows you to get more specific about how you are spending your time and how you are focusing your energy. You will perform “on purpose” instead of reacting to whatever presents itself. And, if you can recall the three things that matter most, you should also be able to recall the three things about each of those things, too. If they are truly important and you are doing them, they will be second nature to you.

In my case, I would have identified the three things about my three things, like this:

MARKETING

  • Ads in yellow pages
  • Network with referral sources
  • Client referral strategies

SETTLE CASES

  • Client interviews/evidence collection
  • Demand package
  • Negotiation

MANAGE STAFF

  • Interview/hire
  • Monitor work flow
  • Recognize and incentivize

What are your three things? And what are the three things about each of those three? Take the time to identity these crucial items and then focus eighty percent of your time and attention on them. You’ll get more done in less time and you’ll get more results. You’ll earn more and work less.

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Filed Under: Increase your income, Productivity Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

How to achieve any goal you set–guaranteed

March 4, 2008 by
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I just finished reading, "Double Your Income Doing What You Love," by Raymond Aaron, which describes a unique method of setting and achieving goals. One of the perennial issues in goal setting is whether we should set big goals, which inspire us to reach high but usually leave us disappointed, or small goals, which we almost always achieve, but don’t take us very far. Aaron presents a system that provides the perfect answer, one I have never seen before.

"Instead of recording a goal, you subdivide your goal into three levels of achievement," he says. The first level is what we are almost certain to do, not based on our hopes but on our actual track record. "It is not much more than a to-do item," he says. But just because you are almost certain to do it doesn’t mean you will and so it is still a goal. This first level can be called the "minimum."

The next level is your "target". This is a stretch beyond what you are confident you can do.

The highest level he calls "outrageous" and it is the most challenging of the three, practically impossible to achieve.

By setting three levels of the same goal, you will always achieve that goal. You are guaranteed to succeed at some level, and thus your self-esteem is enhanced (the rationale behind setting easy goals) while you are simultaneously inspired by your bigger target and outrageous goals. You’ll hit your target goals often enough, and sometimes hit (or make significant progress towards) your outrageous goals. The bottom line of this system is that you hit more goals more often.

Aaron also suggests using monthly goals as your primary time line, long enough to accomplish something meaningful but short enough to be held accountable. Monthly goals are tactical, the mechanics of reaching our long term (annual) strategic goals.

He also tells us that while we are responsible for our lives and, therefore, the accomplishment of our goals, this doesn’t mean we are the ones who have to do everything (or anything) towards their achievement. Aaron is a proponent of delegation, urging us to do only what we love. "When you set a goal, you likely wonder when you are ever going to find time to complete it. When I set a goal, I wonder who is going to do it. If it’s not one of my special talents, I delegate it so that it gets done."

Over the last twenty-four years, Aaron has mentored thousands to success with his goal setting methods, and, not surprisingly, suggests everyone will benefit from "a mentored life." "You do what makes sense to you. Therefore, on your own, you keep doing the same thing all the time, because it makes sense to you. To have a giant leap forward in your life, you need to do what does not make sense to you. Only a very wise mentor can alert you to such new and strange actions you could take to make a huge change in your life."

I recommend Aaron’s book. In fact, I guarantee you’ll get something out of it.

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Filed Under: Goal Setting, Mentors & Coaches, Personal development, Productivity Tagged With: , , ,

How would you advise this lawyer?

February 11, 2008 by
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An attorney who is struggling to build his practice asked for my help. Here’s a snapshot of what he told me:

  • He is also a CPA and former IRS agent.
  • He works three days a week as the controller for a major corporation, two days a week in his own practice.
  • He prepares 75 tax returns per year, and plans to advertise around tax time to get more (but has had limited success advertising in the past).
  • He has several PI and contract litigation cases.
  • He does unlawful detainer appearances for a paralegal firm.
  • He has tried direct mail (unsuccessfully) to build a bankruptcy practice.

Okay, now what would you tell him if he asked you for help? Would you tell him he’s spreading himself too thin and that he should choose one or two things and concentrate on those?

Of course. That’s exactly what I told him.

How can you possibly expect to have great success in anything when you do so many different things? Especially when you work at it only two days per week and compete with attorneys who do the same things full time?

I told him to first decide where he would like to be in five years, and then to look at what kind of work he enjoys. You can be successful doing just about anything so why not make it something you like? The chances are that what he enjoys and what he’s good at are the same thing, and that’s probably what he should do.

After speaking with him, my guess is that if he’s honest with himself, he would choose preparing tax returns. Now, I can think of three very good reasons why this is not the best choice:

1. Massive competition
2. Seasonality
3. He’s overqualified

But if that’s what he enjoys, that’s probably what he should do. His passion will help him overcome the challenges. He’ll develop a reputation for being the best at what he does and neutralize his competition. He’ll do corporate returns throughout the rest of the year, or build his practice so big that he doesn’t need to work the rest of the year.

If he’s happy and rich, does it really matter what his qualifications are?

There’s another point: why couldn’t he figure this out for himself? The answer is he could have, but when you are so caught up in making a living, sometimes you can’t think straight. It’s work, work, work, and there’s no time for reflection or planning. The wheel keep spinning and you can’t get off.

There’s an expression that comes to mind that applies not only in this situation but for all of us sometimes:

"Slow down to speed up."

What that means is we all need to periodically stop what we’re doing long enough to evaluate where we are and where we want to go. Will doing what we’re doing get us there? Is there a better plan?

Notice that you slow down "to" speed up. That means something. It means that if we’re not going in the right direction, if we have too much on our plate, our subconscious mind knows it and holds us back. Slowing down to re-evaluate allows us to get clear on what we’re doing, and it is that clarity that allows us to move more quickly towards what we really want.

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Filed Under: Career satisfaction, Marketing legal services, Productivity
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