Unlike illusions by magicians, which are created to confuse, perplex and mislead an audience, this article refers to illusions as ways to provide potential and existing customers confidence in a small and solo law practitioners’ abilities. The author is not encouraging attorneys to be false in any way. Not only would that be foolish but it would also run afoul of the ethical standards of the bar.

Instead, this article will review systems and ideas which will actually make a smaller firm able to compete with larger law firms, and potentially outperform.  These processes embrace a simple concept which henceforth will be referred to simply as CARE: Consistency, Agility, Responsiveness, and Efficiency.

Unlike illusions by magicians, which are created to confuse, perplex and mislead an audience, this article refers to illusions as ways to provide potential and existing customers confidence in a small and solo law practitioners’ abilities.  The author is not encouraging attorneys to be false in any way.  Not only would that be foolish but it would also run afoul of the ethical standards of the bar.

To practice CARE, one must break down the meaning of each component and consider each component in light of the management of your law practice.  I break down CARE as follows:

C ONSISTENCY : Create a steady pace of improvement in your systems so that you can maintain best practices and make them habit forming. Great but INCONSISTENT law firms do not create trust.

A GILITY : Be quick to find opportunity and follow through immediately. In times of economic fluctuation, the most agile of companies are able to best compete and seize opportunity.

R ESPONSIVENESS : Be diligent in responding to clients, colleagues, employees, and vendors. Attorneys may get hired for experience and reputation but client surveys show that responsiveness is the key characteristic for why attorneys get fired.

E FFICIENCY : By making every case or internal process better as you move forward, a law firm is able to have more time to increase revenue and client development. Revenue gained with less time and effort is more valuable.

The remainder of this article will apply CARE to some specific areas of law office management where many attorneys often have difficultly. The principle of CARE, however, can and should be extended to all aspects of a law practice.

You Own a Small Business (not just a law firm)

Failure to understand the business side of your practice can result in a cycle of frustration and struggle without the opportunity for advancement. In the end, a law firm is just another form of business. Ventures built on great ideas that fail to generate revenue are merely hobbies. By applying CARE, an attorney can improve how the business functions which ultimately will affect the attorney’s quality of life and legal product. The following are tips on how to apply CARE to the critical business elements of the law firm ownership.

1) Invest Time on Your Business: As lawyers, we spend plenty of time working in the firm, but how much time do we spend working on the business? True, spending time to improve how your business functions reduces billable hours, but think of it more as an investment in your future. Improvements made today will bring greater success in the future. Improving your business means dedicated time away from legal work. Consider working with other attorneys to hold you accountable to making business improvements, holding retreats with staff and calendaring specific times during the course of the year to review business practices and potential improvements.

2) Balance Legal Education with Business Education: When providing assistance to other attorneys with struggling practices, the author will frequently ask the attorney how many hours they spend on continuing legal education (CLE) versus education on how to run a business. Almost invariably, the lawyers who struggle spend most of their time on CLEs and almost no time on business education. The latter includes understanding issues like cash flow, human resources, marketing, technology, and business process improvement.

3) Understand Marketing vs. Sales: Marketing is an outbound message with little control on the inflowing business opportunities. Sales is the process of closing those opportunities. To illustrate this point, a website is an effective marketing tool, but it generally does not result in direct revenue until a sales process is initiated to engage the website viewer. Websites are the yellow pages of the 21st Century, as almost all firms have a website that provides basic information about the law firm. One possible method for incorporating a sales aspect into your website marketing campaign is to use tools to track users, getting permission to contact them via the most direct path, and then following through with those leads in the most direct way possible (e.g., phone, e-mail, or in-person visit).

4) Review the seasonal aspects of the business in terms of revenues and costs: Many businesses will have sales based upon their seasonal revenue expectations. The business of law, like almost all businesses, is highly seasonal and careful review of revenue would demonstrate increases in certain types of revenue depending on the time of year. Effective law office management would include making the correct staffing decisions, initiating marketing campaigns, and even discounting rates depending on the flow of legal revenue.

Case Management (Cases are a lawyer’s inventory and you must keep it moving)

Application of CARE : There is no magic formula or tool to ensure effective case management. Law School does not properly prepare any attorney for the actual management of a case. This must be learned through the sweat that comes from effort and, unfortunately, the occasional failure. With proper case management, failures that are fatal to the interest of your client can be avoided.

Too often lawyers focus on getting new cases but then fail to press cases forward to completion with necessary urgency. By pushing cases through quickly and diligently, you will have greater client satisfaction, less stress, greater referrals and increased cash flow. Cases which sit continue to cost your firm in overhead, non-billable time and potential liability.

1) Require Case Opening Procedures: The starting point of any case is the opening of a file. Never take a consultation without opening a file so you can maintain notes and track the advice you provide. Frequently, attorneys will lose notes on initial consultations and then be told that the client they saw, but do not remember, misinterpreted the advice much later. A clear case opening procedure that allows for tracking will provide security against such a scenario. In opening a case, the following is a minimal list of steps:

• Execute an engagement agreement.
• Collect critical data and return all unnecessary original documents.
• Create an initial intake memo that provides summary of issues.
• Send a summary of your process and any specific issue to your client to ensure they are aware of any responsibilities and have clear expectations.
• Enter specific deadlines into your calendar.

2) Create Internal Notation Systems: Although some case management programs offer extensive logs of case action, it is simple to create a manual version of the same document. Whether this is stored as an electronic document along with the other case documentation is up to the attorney. However, a simple manual log will often be more user friendly, which will result in more accurate and complete notes.

3) Integrate Financial Controls: Have you ever been in such a rush to file a case or meet a deadline that you or a staff member forgot to bill for the service for weeks or even completely? Financial controls are as much a part of meeting client expectations as quality legal product. Here are some basic rules to follow:

• Invoice immediately and regularly
• Ask client to immediately provide funds for filing fees or have them provide the filing fees directly to the government
• Work with your bank so you can accept credit cards
• Confirm with the bank that funds exist for cases before filing

4) Require Case Closing Procedures: Much like how a case must start with an opening procedure, a case must also be closed with a clear set of closing procedures. When closing a case, do the following:

• Inform your client that the matter is now closed.
• Return any original documentation to the client and specifically mention any original documents in the cover letter to ensure that the employee cannot accuse you of withholding an original document.
• Inform your client that the file will be held in storage, but within a designated period of time will be destroyed.
• Thank the client and think of ways to leverage them for referrals or testimonials.

Learning From Your Past (Failures as well as Successes)

Application of CARE : Thomas Edison had tremendous difficulty in his early attempts to come up with the right material for the filament in his light bulb. Over 1,000 materials were tried and all had failed. A colleague asked him if he felt his time had been wasted, since he had discovered nothing. Edison retorted briskly that it was hardly failure as he had "discovered over a thousand things that don't work."

As professionals we frequently will focus on our successes but ignore the valuable lessons from our failure. In addition, we will remember our victories early in our career but fail to leverage them and record them so we can use those lessons years later. The application of CARE can be done very easily by capturing institutional knowledge.

1) Control Institutional Knowledge: Whether you are a solo practitioner or manage a large staff, a great deal of institutional knowledge is lost without careful management and control. When starting a law practice, it is helpful to create a “go-to guide” for everyone to reference. Attorneys who practice on their own can store templates and samples letters. To leverage the power of such a guide, a firm can use a shared document or an on-line “Wiki” to collaborate on office policies and procedures. When working with staff, make sure that there are regular meetings so that changes in the law can be discussed and implemented throughout your organization. Without control of institutional knowledge, a law firm will constantly be reinventing the wheel and will most likely reinvent it differently each time.

2) Create a work group or advisory board: If in a small firm or solo practice, consider creating a lunch group made up of colleagues you respect who can gather monthly to discuss current practice issues and changes in the law. Considering the vast amount of information which passes through the bar list serves, sectional newsletters and the Internet in general, missing a few days work can result in missing critical information such as changes in forms, mailing locations and opinion letters. A brown bag lunch every month, arranged with a rotating facilitator to keep the meetings productive, will make up the gaps in your knowledge. Issues can also involve ethical problems, business administration, vendors, and resources. This meeting can help the solo and small firm practitioner become competitive with larger firms in terms of information gathering and procedural sophistication.

Case Acceptance and Client Control (not all revenue is good revenue)

Application of CARE : Realize that potential clients need to be screened at the beginning of a case to determine if you want to engage them at all. After engagement, clients should be controlled throughout a legal matter and if they become unworkable, an attorney should make the brave decision to terminate the relationship. While the immediate effect on revenue is difficult, smart client management will ultimately provide opportunity to find better clients and sources of revenue.

1) Financial Controls: Failure to maintain financial control of a business is often the start of ethical difficulty. Review of bar discipline notices reveal that attorneys are frequently admonished for failure to control client trust accounts. As attorneys, we receive only minimal training on financial control. Basic accounting principles such as segregation of duties, dedication to invoicing, payment of accounts receivable and cash flow analysis are neglected or not even attempted by many attorneys. Work with an accountant on where your financial processes can be reviewed. Law firms have few issues that are different from any other business. A good accountant can clean up your financial records, which can result in information that will increase revenue while simultaneously reducing costs.

2) Ethical Ceilings in Case Acceptance: It is important that while in the day-to-day practice of law, the attorneys know their limitations. As a business owner, there are rarely any guarantees of future income. The result is that many attorneys will take any case they can when they can. Frequently the cases are simply too numerous to maintain control over, or fall outside the attorney’s experience level. To avoid acquiring an overwhelming caseload, have a rough idea of the number of cases that you can handle at any given time. Do not be afraid to tell an uncooperative client that you must withdraw or to refer a matter to another trusted law firm. To avoid overwhelming yourself with complex matters, consider using mentors or finding another attorney who can co-counsel you on matters. By understanding your limitations, you avoid making fatal errors, which can be disastrous to your practice and reputation. It is never acceptable for an attorney to use case overload as an excuse.

Conclusion (and a note from Mahatma Gandhi)

Mahatma Gandhi was not only an inspirational leader; he was also an attorney. He is famous for saying "A customer is the most important visitor on our premises. He is not dependent on us. We are dependent on him. He is not an interruption in our work. He is the purpose of it. He is not an outsider in our business. He is part of it. We are not doing him a favor by serving him. He is doing us a favor by giving us an opportunity to do so."

CARE is just a mechanism to evaluate how your practice develops. Exercise CARE and your law practice will grow not just in revenue but increases in the true metrics of wealth: peace of mind, pride in work and reputation.