A year ago, Hurricane Katrina reminded all of us solos of the somber side of solo practice; how everything we've worked to build can be wiped out in an instant. Sad to say, a year later, some solos are still struggling to get back on their feet, as reported in Uneasy Times for Lawyers in the Big Easy, National Law Journal (8/30/06). (h/t to Ernie the Attorney).
Continue Reading...Via Ernie the Attorney comes this link to a provocative You Tube ad by Florida divorce attorney Steve Miller (posted at Denise Howell's new fun blog). After insulting paralegals, overpriced downtown lawyers and court clerks, Miller invites clients who want to escape "the hellhole they call a marriage" to visit his website, pay up and "get on your way to getting rid of that vermin you call a spouse."
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Today was my daughters' first day of school, full of anticipation and excitement. As for me, I'll be resuming my longer work days now that they don't return home until after 4.
Many lawyers (with this notable exception) believe that the 1/3 contingency fee is reasonable and that any fee agreed to between a willing client and an attorney is also reasonable. But in this recent story, Attorney's 9/11 Fee Called "Shocking, Unconscionable" (law.com 8/28/06), lawyer Tom Troiano had a valid retainer agreement that provided for 1/3 contingency fee for settlement of his client's 9-11 claim. Yet many lawyers, including Ken Feinberg, Master of the 9/11 fund, have vocally criticized Troiano's fee as unreasonable.
Here are the details behind the story. When Laura Balemian's husband was killed in the World Trade Center attack, she called Tom Troiano, a lawyer and trusted family friend for assistance. Troiano claims he took charge of the family's numerous legal affairs, without seeking compensation. But he did have Balemian sign a retainer agreement on Oct. 15, 2001 with respect to representation of her claims in the 9-11 fund. Eventually, Troiano recovered over $6 million for Balemian, double the $3 million cap. And in February 2004, per the terms of the retainer, he collected his 1/3 share of the amount recovered.
Fast forward to 2006, in the probate proceeding over Balemian's husband's estate. A guardian appointed by the court challenged Troiano's fee as excessive and not in the best interests of Ms. Balemian's four children. In response, Troiano brought an action for declaratory judgment approving his fees.
Continue Reading...Sisters don't have to marry a pair of brothers to become sisters in law to each other. As this article, Sisters in law: Siblings Keep legal matters all in the family (Arizona Business Gazette 8/24/06), sisters Hope Kirsch and Lori Kirsch-Goodwin became sisters in law (or sisters at law) when they decided to hang out their own shingle together.
We're all familiar with law practices comprised of parent and son or daughters and there are other sibling firms as well, such as this one I mentioned years ago. Any other readers involved in a family practice (not counting spouses). Send your comments below and let us know whether it's something you would recommend.
I haven't yet read Seth Godin's new book, Small Is the New Big, though of course, I linked to Godin's article of the same name when it came out. Next week, Type Pad will release the August 22 chat with Godin via Podcast. If any readers participated, I'd love to hear the scoop in the comment section or by email.
If you want to sell a small business on using your small firm instead of a large, impersonal firm, I can think of no better marketing than this post from Ed Wesemann who describes, bluntly, what small clients really mean to big firms.
Many large firm lawyers think that if they hang a shingle. they'll have to throw away their biglaw specialities, like securities regulation or merger practice and trade it in for more general practice fare, like family law or criminal practice. But at least one solo attorney, Walter James, of the newly created Environmental Crimes Blog shows us that it doesn't have to be this way, with a post about how some of the best environmental work (traditionally regarded as the domain of biglaw) is being handled by solos and small firms.
The benefits of going with a small firm? Lots of expertise for a lower price.
So if you're toiling at a large firm, dreaming of the solo life, think of ways that you can take your $400/hour expertise (of which you may see 25 percent, if that much) and transplant it at your own law firm.
This isn't a post that directly relates to solo practice, though the lessons that it offers will apply. Instead, it's about the serendipitous way that your passions can lead you to a job that truly fits - which is something that many of us have in fact found in solo practice.
Consider this New York Times profile of Thomas Rogers, a former biglaw attorney who is the president of Tivo. The profile describes that when he was a kid, he was such a huge TV fan that his parents bought him a subscription to TV Guide. In addition to the TV listings, the section about the FCC caught his interest as well. Rogers went on to law school, but turned down an FCC position for biglaw practice. But TV stayed on his mind and helped him catch his first big break:
In early 1981, I read that Timothy Wirth of Colorado had been named head of the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications, Consumer Protection and Finance. I wrote him, and his staff invited me for an interview. I told a top aide the story about reading TV Guide and she said, "At least that's different." I became one of four lawyers on the staff.
From the Hill, Rogers went in house to a cable division of NBC and then on to Tivo, where he became President and CEO.
Sometimes, you need to leave the law to follow your passion. But perhaps, like Rogers, you can also find a way to marry what you love with your legal practice.
The problem with having less time to write blog posts also means that I have less time to read them. Which is a shame, because in just a few days off the aggregator, I miss so much, including the recent, terrific string of postings by Peter Olson of Solo in Chicago. One neat idea that he offered a few weeks back is to use CLE as a profit center
Olson writes:
[CLE] might be a profit center for you. I honestly don't know but it must not be that difficult to get certified by the Supreme Court to qualify. I just got a mailing for a family law seminar put on by former ISBA President Bob Downs, Joseph Gitlin and a handful of others coming up. Not to be too cynical, but why should any of the fairly prominant lawyers in various practice areas speak for any of the bar association CLEs at this point when they can just form a small business of their own and profit from it?
The reason that Olson's idea is so ingenious is that by offering CLE, you're essentially paid to market. You collect revenue from teaching the CLE courses, but you also get yourself in front of other lawyers who might refer cases to you and establish yourself as an expert in the field. Why lose revenue marketing when with something like CLE, you can get paid for it?
From Susan Cartier-Liebel's piece, For the Brave, There's Life Beyond Biglaw (law.com, August 10, 2006) comes this money quote:
If opening your own practice were portrayed as a MasterCard commercial, it would go something like this: Virtual Office: $150; Cell Phone: $49.99 a month; WiFi laptop: $799; taking your 5-year-old son to his first Mets opening day at Shea Stadium (without derailing the partnership track): Priceless.
What aspect of solo practice is priceless to you? Send me your comments below.
This month's issues of GP Solo Magazine has an article by Elio Martinez entitled Of Counsel: An Alternative to Solo and Firm Practice. The article tells a little bit about Martinez's of counsel arrangement (all of them differ, I think):
My of counsel arrangement is simple. I maintain a separate and independent practice while occupying an office at my friend's firm. I keep my own schedule, develop my own clients, and run my own firm. In exchange for the office space and a percentage of fees collected for my work on my friend's cases, I guarantee that I will work a certain number of hours per month on those cases. This arrangement is beneficial to us both: He has some of the burdens of the practice lifted from his shoulders by someone he knows and trusts, and I have guaranteed work and income every month, as well as an office where I can grow my practice. The of counsel arrangement also provides me the added benefit of always having someone with whom to discuss issues and ideas, as well as assurance that, in my absence, someone will be there to step in and handle emergencies on my cases.
Unfortunately (and as is the case with many GP Solo articles, which is why I don't reference them often), the article does not offer much detail on how to find an of counsel arrangement, nor does it link to any sample contracts for "of counsel" relationships (a frequent request to me from readers). But the article shows the advantages of an "of counsel" relationship, so it may be something you want to pursue.
I realize that my posts have been sparse over the past month. The slow postings are explained by a couple of factors: my day job as a practicing solo has been fairly busy lately, a project that I'm close to finishing that I believe will greatly benefit MyShingle readers and my divided loyalties now that I'm blogging with Bob Ambrogi at Legal Blog Watch (I'm also on a partial vacation at the beach right now)
So, even though I'm not able to write a stand alone post, let me refer you to recent Legal Blogwatch posts of interest to MyShingle readers. First, if you want to learn more about the importance of client service and how to integrate client service into your practice, take a look at this post, Serve Your Legal Career by Serving Your Clients. And for more on ways that finding a niche can help build your practice (which I've posted on previously here and here), see my post on Advice for Law Firms Who Want to Be Something to Everybody.
I'll be back with more regular postings by the end of the month for sure. In the meantime, I welcome guest posts from other solos about your experience, advice you want to share - or from other lawyers about your perception of solo and small firm lawyers. Just drop me an email at carolyn.elefant@gmail.com.
Today, MyShingle is thrilled to have the honor of being named as Typepad's Featured Blog of the Day for August 6, 2006. I'd like to personally welcome all new visitors from Typepad's Home Page and invite you to take a look around at my site. I realize that many of you may not have a direct interest in starting or running a law firm, but I hope that my site still has something to offer you, such as insight about how lawyers practice law, running a small business or inspiring you to overcome the odds in your own career. Also, be sure to visit the websites of the many, diverse solo attorneys listed on the front page to get a sense of what other lawyers are doing in their practice. Let me add, if you're not a lawyer, but you know someone who is, please pass this site along.
Finally, thanks so much to Typepad for sponsoring this Featured Blog of the Day Program. I've been introduced to so many wonderful blogs on topics that I'd have never known anything about, and I continue to track many of them long after they've exited the Features Page.
Jason Krause has this article, Making Rain on the Net in the August 2006 edition of the ABA Journal. Not until I read the article and saw that I'd been quoted did I remember being interviewed for it - I was on travel in Las Vegas at the time. The article is particularly interesting, because it covers the website and blog experience of a wide sampling of lawyers, from biglaw to solo.
There is one update from the article, however. Since my interview, my blogs (even the decidedly unmarket oriented MyShingle which hardly references my law firm) have landed me two more clients.
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