Resources

Red Cave Law Firm Consulting's Technology Blog Series (from CEO Jared D. Correia, Esq.)

2023 Quarter 2

September 29, 2023: Find Your Repurpose: How to Effectively Leverage Your Content

If it’s nice, do it twice.  Or, three or four times, for that matter.

Most attorneys I talk to feel like they need to choose between content types for their marketing.  For example, some lawyers tell me: I need to start a blog, or I should really do a series of videos.  But, why not do both?  Okay, let’s take an example: If you want to start a blog, why not do a series of short videos addressing common client questions, and transcribe those -- voila: you’ve got blog posts!  Or, maybe you want to start a podcast -- also record video for those episodes, snip small segments and plop some captions in there: like magic, you’ve also just created video content to pair with (and copromote) your audio content.  (You can also transcribe those podcast episodes to produce blog posts, too.)

So, here’s the real deal: Every time you generate a new piece of content, multiply it.  Think about how you can repurpose everything you do, and content marketing seems a whole lot less daunting.

September 22, 2023: Grand Slam: 4 Workflows You Need In Your Law Practice

Building and managing processes is the key to managing a successful business.  That includes law firm businesses, by the way.  Even if attorneys have been reticent to adopt processes into their business models.

Processes are rooted in workflows – which are just aggregations of tasks.  Tasks within a workflow each need to be assigned to at least one individual.  Entire workflows can be managed via software tools, like productivity software, task management software and/or law practice management software – which means that lawyers don’t have to be overbearing micromanagers any longer.  Checking on the status of a case is as simple as logging in, and seeing which tasks are due -- which have been done, and which have not.

Law firms that use workflows tend to be more efficient, make fewer mistakes and offer their clients a more consistent customer experience.

But, what sort of workflows do you need?  At least these four types:

(1) Administrative Workflows: A successful (and, by that I mean: efficient and profitable) law firm is one in which attorneys can delegate work effectively, and practice at the top of their law licenses – because you can’t pilot the plane, and pass out the pretzels at the same time.  But, for administrative staff, workflows ensure that everybody is on the same page, and can quickly access specific task sets, allowing them to get back to (potentially billable) substantive work, faster.

(2) Substantive Workflows: These are case workflows.  While every law firm thinks their work product on each case is a special little snowflake, there are similarities among case types.  And, it’s likely that, if you sat down and thought about it, you could probably generate anywhere from 5-10 tasks for each case type, that you need to do every. single. time.  And, that’s the root of your case management process.  Installing these means that you and your team will make fewer errors, and that your customers will have a common and streamlined experience with your firm.

(3) Intake Workflow: After the COVID pandemic hit, law firms became hyper-aware of the fact that they were lacking in automated and/or virtual intake processes, as the traditional, in-person systems they relied on became suddenly unavailable.  For modern law firms, then, it’s essential to develop a ‘client journey’, or a map of how a lead becomes a client, and then automate that, to the extent possible, using technology applications.

(4) Closing Workflow: When a case completes, most law firms don’t do much of anything; but, there should also be a case-closing workflow in your practice.  Rather than simply archiving your file (electronically or otherwise), and calling it a day – truly close out the file.  If you’re a personal injury attorney, make those disbursements.  If you’re a real estate attorney, get those mortgage discharges.  And, for each and every one of your closed cases, transfer an electronic version of the client file, or make it accessible to the client + add them to an email list of former clients for remarketing purposes.

September 20, 2023: Budget Unconscious: Reducing Your Spending is Not the Only Way to Increase Your Profit Margin

My Dad, like all dads, had some choice phrases to impart.  One was that I shouldn’t step over a dime, to pick up a penny.  (Not sure why I would do that, but . . .)  And, that you have to spend money to make money.  It’s actually pretty sage business advice – especially for budget-conscious lawyers.

You see, there are a lot of solo and small firm lawyers out there, who are heavily-focused on budget management, and cutting costs down to the bone.  It’s the leanest and meanest of lean and mean methodologies.  But, getting lean is more about becoming more efficient, rather than trying to spend as little money as possible, to run your law firm.

The reason why lots of attorneys focus on reducing the law firm budget is so that they can increase their profit margin.  But, focusing solely on that side of the equation causes many lawyers to ignore the other side of the coin, as it were, when it comes to profit margin.  That is, making more money (!), against a stable budget, is a great way to improve your profit margin.

The good news is that there are a whole host of ways to make more money; and, I feel like that’s gotta be far more exciting than slashing and burning your budget to the ground, until you’re working by candlelight.

So, consider raising your rates.  Or, getting more efficient, including by adding new technology.  Or, hire someone, including another attorney – but, ensure that that person is a profit center for the law firm.

September 14, 2023: Triple Threat: 3 Ways to Increase Your Personal Efficiency

Despite what you hear, time never appears to be on your side.

And certainly, everyone is looking to maximize their time.  In terms of business management, that means that you’re always looking to increase the volume of cases you can take on, which you can do by increasing your utilization rate.  But, this all starts with achieving a level of personal efficiency, because: if you can’t be efficient yourself, it’s very difficult to ask others, including your staff and associates, to be more efficient than you are – you’ve got to be the leader, in that context.

So, if you’re struggling in becoming more efficient, here are three tips you can take to the bank:

(1) Wrestling with email is a significant time waster for most lawyers.  Lots of attorneys have thousands of emails in their inbox, which is impossible to manage.  And, it makes it seem like Inbox Zero is light years away.  But, even the gnarliest of email inboxes can be cleaned out with a systematic approach that turns unanswered emails into tasks, or allows you to quickly delete or respond to those emails that do not require a long tail.  Using Getting Things Done (GTD) for GMail or Outlook may be a viable option for you.

(2) Generally speaking, people try to multitask in distracting environments – especially during the continuing pandemic.  But, multitasking is not a real thing.  You can only focus on one task at a time.  And, if you can eliminate (or, at least, reduce) distractions, you can focus on that single task more effectively.  So, if every day (or at least most days) you can find a block of two hours, to work steadily on individual tasks, uninterrupted, in a distraction-free environment, you’ll likely be shocked at how much you can get done during these ‘power hours’ – especially if that’s a significant departure from the way you normally operate.

(3) You know all those notifications you get: the pings, bings and popups that make up your business life.  Well, turn them off.  Seriously, they feed urgency addition, and cause you to lose focus.  And, it’s worse if you act on a notification: click on one, and you’re off-task for as many as 18 minutes.

September 08, 2023: Vested Interest: How to Get Staff Buy-In

Good help is hard to find -- and keep.  It’s that latter part that you tend to hear less about, and often that latter part that managing attorneys tend to focus on less.  In many ways, lawyers treat their employees the same way that they treat their clients.  They work very hard to acquire them,  and then roundly ignore them, as communication slows to a drip.  Neither situation is good, as both clients and staff become disgruntled over time.

And, this isn’t any way to get buy-in from your staff. 

So, if you want hard-working, modern employees to join, and choose to stay with, your team, you’ll likely need to modernize your staff management tactics.

Here are some ways to do that:

-Focus on professional development.  Law firm employees, like most other employees, are heavily interested in developing professional skills.  Yet, most law firm business owners tend to focus their professional development budget on themselves, or on associates, instead of administrative staff.  But, everybody in your business deserves a chance to further their careers.  And, while the common belief among attorneys is that they’re just training their current staff to become more marketable, and grow into a better worker for their next job, the fact of the matter is that, if you’re the kind of boss that offers professional development opportunities, those same employees are more likely to stay with you -- for more of the same.  Trainings, certificate programs, courses – it’s all in play, and it all has extreme value for modern employees.

-Build systems.  A common staff complaint from law firm employees is some variation of: ‘I feel like we’re always just putting out fires’ or ‘We’re so disorganized, and no one seems to know what they’re doing’.  No one wants to work in an environment like that – especially law firm staff, who are largely powerless to change the management philosophy of the principle of the law firm.  So, it’s on the managing attorney to build a structure for effective work.  And, that starts with ‘workflows’ = repetitive case-related tasks that are time-sensitive and assigned to specific individuals.  Watch morale improve with each workflow you build.  Workflows also have the byproduct of reducing micromanaging by attorneys (attorneys are horrible micromanagers, because they’re always worried about someone making a mistake that will lead to an ethics complaint), because lawyers can check in on case status using the software that manages the law firm’s workflows – instead of hovering over the backs of their employees’ shoulders.

-Be transparent.  This is probably the most important aspect of effective staff management: Just being open and honest.  Law firm staff are generally left in the dark about business operations; sometimes that’s intentional, sometimes that’s because the managing attorneys are themselves in the dark about business management – but, either way, committing to be accessible to staff is a good forcing function to get managing attorneys to pay better attention to the health of the business.  Transparent law firm owners and managing partners will share the financial health of the law firm, develop and collaborate around defined KPIs, solicit feedback and involve staff in major decisions, like choosing new software.

August 30, 2023: Circle of Friends: How to Access Busy Mentors

It’s difficult for new attorneys, or attorneys starting a new law firm, to find consistent mentorship.  The fact of the matter is that the best mentors are the best mentors because they’re busy and successful.  So, seeking out only one mentor, is not necessarily a great strategy, when the rubber comes to meet the road.

But, there is a better way to find mentors, and it comes with diversification.

Instead of trying to find one mentor, that you can access consistently, instead focus on finding a ‘circle of mentors’ = a group of experienced professionals who can assist you.  That way, you won’t have to lean heavily on just one person, and potentially place them under undue pressure to answer for all your needs.

The other, significant advantage that creating a circle of mentors allows, is for a new attorney to focus on mentors with certain skill sets.  So, for example: Perhaps one of your mentors is a small firm attorney; and, maybe another is a big firm attorney.  It could be that one of your mentors is really tech-savvy, and another is great at marketing.  Someone may have a ton of experience in a niche practice, or works with clients in a specific geographic area.

Working with 6 or more mentors may sound like a lot to manage; but, segmenting your approach to finding help from more experienced attorneys can work for everyone.

August 27, 2023: Scorecard: How to Track Associate Performance

It’s always a hard thing to measure value, for, like, anything.

And, it’s even tougher when you’re trying to value people, including (and maybe especially) in the context of employment.

Lots of managing attorneys ask me how to evaluate associate performance; and, honestly: most law firms have no metrics whatsoever, outside of gut feeling – which is not much different from the way law firm owners manage generally.

So, how can you drill down, and get a better sense of how your associates are actually performing?

There’s at least a few things you can add to your law firm’s processes that you’re probably not doing now:

-Have your associates track all of their time; like, all of it.  In order to determine how efficient your associates are, you need to know how they spend their time.  This will allow you to generate the all-important metric = utilization rate.  Utilization rate is used to determine how much of a given attorney’s workday represents billable hours.  Law firms that have a higher utilization rate are more efficient; and, law firms that are more efficient, make more money.

-Most managing attorneys push back, however, on using solely an efficiency metric to judge associates, because they (understandably) don’t just want fast work – they also want good work.  But it’s hard to establish a framework for work quality.  One option is to assess random assignments, and provide a grade or score, of some kind.  80 out of 100, 9 of 10, whatever it is.  This is a little bit of a lift for the managing attorney; but, most managing attorneys are probably doing this anyway, keeping a mental checklist – even if they’re not sharing it with their associates, or using it for performance rating in a formal way.

-Theoretically, the law firm clients could directly weigh in, in terms of their experiences with particular associates, by submitting reviews or completing surveys, even a single-question survey, to generate another important KPI = net promoter score (NPS).  This can be done after the matter closes.

And, just like that: you’ve got three independent metrics to identify value in terms of associate performance.

August 17, 2023: Closing Time: Lawyers Are Great at Closing Business, But Need to Get There Faster

Most attorneys are phenomenal when it comes to closing business.  If coffee is for closers, they’re awash in the stuff.

And, most attorneys will tell you that: they know it, they acknowledge it, they own it.  Most of the lawyers I talk to will tell me that, ‘If I can get someone on the phone, I can close them’.  I would bet that most lawyers close leads into the high 70s, if I had to sign a percentage to it.  That’s pretty damn good.

But, that ‘if’ is a big one; and, the place where most law firms stumble is getting leads to the consultation/closing meeting.

Law firms don’t pick up the phone regularly; and, they don’t respond to voicemails.  Same goes for contact form and intake form submissions.  Consumers are impatient.  So, if a law firm is not immediately responsive, they’re already on to the next option.

So, the problem is, really, that lawyers never get to the closing meeting, because they fail to engage leads.

Professional athletes often take the offseason to improve on things they’re not particularly good at.  If a basketball player is already great at shooting three-pointers, maybe he spends the offseason working on driving to the hoop.

So, if you’re a lawyer, who’s already good at closing clients, spend some time thinking about how to revise your intake process, so you can better engage those potential clients, and get more of them to those closing meetings.

August 10, 2023: Pile Up: What Are You Going To Do With All Those Old Files?

Law firms generally have lots of trouble moving into new software programs.  And, there are, for sure, a lot of reasons for that.  Moving on from the status quo is hard, on its own.  Plus, mindset change is a difficult thing.  And, let’s not even talk about getting buy-in from staff.  Those are all pretty high hurdles.

But, you wanna know what the primary driver is, for law firms shying away from new technology – the thing that shuts down those conversations before they even start?  It’s the massive file backlog most law firms maintain.

When law firm managers consider making a move from legacy software to a new system, the hill they build for themselves (and often end up dying on) is the goal to scan or transfer all of their old data into the new system, before they start using it.  Now, ensuring that all of a law firm’s historical data (some law firms have lengthy histories), ends up in a new software system, represents a big project – and, for some law firms, it becomes impossible, because they can’t exert the energy and effort it takes to accomplish the task.  And, this is very much a lawyer thing, landing squarely in the wheelhouse of that spectrum between ‘I’ll do it myself’ and rampant perfectionism.

But, this operating procedure ignores a lot of the available technology and best practices that can be leveraged by a modern practice.  For one thing, law firms don’t need to capture all of their historical data; in most cases, law firms can confidentially destroy case files 6 years after the close of those files.  Also, online storage is so cheap, that if a law firm has paper files, it makes sense to scan and store them somewhere, including on an encrytpted harddrive, unconnected to the internet – but, that doesn’t have to be something that happens right away, or as a precursor to using new tech.  The point being that, the availability of inexpensive cloud storage means that, if a law firm wants to keep all of its case data, literally forever, it can – that law firm doesn’t have to, though.  And, that data does not need to be moved to a new software system, like ever.  Therefore, it’s clear that law firm managers have additional options in this scenario that they’re not considering.

So, don’t let this single consideration hold you back from adopting the right technology for your modern law firm.  Select a date you want to start using your new system, and just do it.  Then, maintain the legacy system, as needed, until you figure out what you want to do with all your old data.

Time is on your side.

August 5, 2023: Give 'Em the Slip: It's Time to Move Off of Old School Time Slips

Even at this late date, there are a number of law firms that continue to rely on paper-based time slips to track time.

If you’re one of those law firms, here’s why that’s bad: A paper slip can be easily lost or destroyed.  Using paper slips requires a second input, into another system, or separate document, either of which operations invites the potential for error.  It’s also highly inefficient: rather than adding time directly to a system that can produce invoices, there are multiple people and steps involved, which adds time unnecessarily to your already busy practice life.

There is, of course, a better way, which is to adopt an electronic-based, single-entry system for timekeeping.  The question, of course, is: which system?

Well, there are a number of options, and likely any would be better than a paper-based model.  Both standalone time & billing software and law practice management/case management software feature manual timekeepers, ie – you click a button and start and stop a timer  (Double billing is prevented, because starting a second timer stops the last one – you can come back to it, though.)  If you don’t use a legal-specific software, most accounting softwares feature time trackers.  There are also ‘passive’ time trackers, that log your time spent on devices (these are cloud-based applications, that can track across your various devices); these softwares can be standalone tools, or may be integrated with other products.  There are also available apps for capturing time entries for emails or document drafting.  The upshot is: if you’ve got a need for time tracking, there’s a technology tool with an answer specific to you need.

And, if you’re aggregating time within a system through which you invoice, it’s easy to generate bills filtered for time periods, and to send bills in large batches, using basic document assembly features.  You’ll also have a multitude of options for invoicing, including automating payments.

Now, this does require a mindset change for many attorneys, who, in a revised time and billing model, will enter time directly, rather than passing that obligation along to a staffperson.  But, with automations available, that’s a whole lot easier than it might sound.

If you’re still using paper-based time and billing mechanisms, but are willing to convert to software tools, the only real question is what you’ll do with all that extra time and money?

July 24, 2023: Trust Fall: Law Firms Should Farm Out More Functions

The best and highest use of an attorney’s time is focused on one of two things: (1) billing at the highest possible rate; (2) closing new business that can be billed at the highest possible rate.  I call that ‘practicing at the top of your law license’.  And, pretty much everything else is window dressing, when it comes right down to it.

Of course, adopting this approach usually requires a change in process management for faw firms.  To accomplish those two main tasks, lawyers need to delegate as many administrative and substantive tasks as they can.

And yet, this remains a difficult thing for law firms to do.  And, it often starts with individual lawyers.  Attorneys, highly competent and resourceful, usually feel like they can do everything better than anyone else can.  It might be true; but, that’s no way to run a business.

So, start by breaking down the tasks and roles you like to do least, and farm those out.

Don’t like customer service?  Hire someone (or some vendor) to answer your phones, and followup with clients.

Don’t like finances?  Hire a bookkeeper, or a bookkeeping firm.

Don’t like the logistics of managing a team?  Hire an HR director.

When you’re chief cook and bottle washer, you limit the growth potential of your law firm.

July 21, 2023: WIP It Good: What Can Work in Progress Tell You About the Future of Your Law Firm?

‘Work in Progress’ (often abbreviated to WIP) is a representation of work outstanding for law firm clients.  While most lawyers just let it ride, and take it for granted that the work just keeps coming in, and keeps getting done – WIP has some predictive powers that law firms are largely ignoring.

Your WIP gives you an idea of what your pipeline value is, in aggregate.  In other words, you should be able to pinpoint how much money you’ll make, if you finish everything that’s currently on your plate.  Better yet, many modern softwares (including law practice management softwares) will calculate that number for you automatically, so you don’t have to jump through any mathematical hoops.

Now, you can get fancier than that, to boot.  Because, if you know how long it generally takes you to close cases, and the frequency of payments for those cases, you can generally pinpoint (pretty precisely) when you’ll get paid, and how much.

Simple by reviewing your WIP on a recurring basis, you can predict your revenue for the near future.

That’s a pretty powerful tool, especially given how attorneys approach this problem now: by panicking when business seems slow, and crossing their fingers that it picks up again.

Hope is not a strategy.

Better to know, for sure.

July 09, 2023: Share and Share Alike: How Modern Document Storage Systems Increase Law Firm Security

Email is good for email; but, when law firms start to try to expand the uses of email into broader technology functions – that’s where they run into trouble.

Like when attorneys try to convert their productivity software into case management software.  (In case you haven’t tried it, that doesn’t work because productivity software is decidedly not a relational database.)

Emailing sensitive documents can be a problem, too.  When you email something, it passes through a number of different servers before it reaches its final destination.  Some of those servers are likely to be unencrypted, which means that, to ensure document security, you’ll need to encrypt the file itself, or your email system.  That’s a whole other step, and maybe an entirely new software to buy.  It’s also largely avoidable.

With modern document repositories (like Microsoft OneDrive and Google Drive) and law practice management softwares (like Clio and MyCase), those systems offer the ability for users to invite customers, clients and colleagues to access documents within those systems, by creating a password or passcode.  Thus, the person invited to access a document is doing so on the user’s system, meaning that that document does not go anywhere = the data doesn’t travel, but remains in the encrypted container at which the user stores it.  This is a crucial differentiation from the email method.  In this case, the user continuously controls the location of the document, and the document remains encrypted.

This is yet another reason to move to a paperless office environment, and yet another reason to move in the direction of cloud-based software.

July 02, 2023: Cadence: Better Law Firm Management Through Repetition

Routine is so . . . ‘routine’?

The notion of slipping into a routine has lots of negative connotations: it’s boring, it’s stultifying, it lacks creativity.  Oftentimes, routine and ‘rut’ are used interchangeably.

A routine is something to climb out of, not to get into.

But, if you run a business, especially a law firm . . . a good routine may be all you need.

Stagnation is a problem with law firms; but, that’s largely because they stick to a systemless model, that ends up being the antithesis of routine.  And, honestly: most lawyers don’t want to set up systems, because they’re worried about being bored.  They like the challenge, the intellectual stimulation, of untangling thorny legal issues.  Putting systems into place seems so  . . . ‘routine?’

But, this isn’t an either/or proposition.

You can still work on the cases that you love; and, setting up systems actually allows you to spend more time on substantive work, since your underlying office processes will run more smoothly.

What kind of systems should you consider?

-Creating an intake system, with robust automation.

-Adding a billing program that nets you more consistent revenue.

-Building case workflows that allow you to manage deadlines and outputs, so you can develop compelling strategies.