Online Guide

Posted on January 9, 2008 by Carolyn Elefant
  1. Creating a Law Practice
  2. Books
  3. Manuals & Forms

Creating a Law Practice

Do You Have the Head and Heart to Hang Out?

Plan Your Success

Now Where Do I Go --The Office: Malpractice Insurance, Office Locations, Supplies and Conflicts Issues

Malpractice Insurance Office Leases and Shared Space Home Office Start Up Costs and Formation Issues Office Tech

To Market, To Market...Websites, B-cards and Other Ways to Sell Your Shingle

Marketing Ideas Website Issues

Be Hands-On: Shaking Hands, Holding Hands, Avoiding Hand-Outs: Attracting, Selecting & Managing Clients

How to Get That "Jingle" in Your Shingle: Setting Fees, Collecting Bills

Learn As You Go: Ideas for Tending Yourself and Growing Your Practice

New Ideas & Trends for Shingles

Tech for Shingles

We can't duplicate the wealth of tech resources for solos and small firms already on line - articles and product reviews and discussion groups. So here's a quick list of sites where you can go to get your tech questions answered.

Books

On-line guides are great, but sometimes there's nothing like a hard copy to read before bed. And buying books through the links below (at Amazon.com) helps support My Shingle.com. Here's our book list for shingles beginning with the indispensable Foonberg tome. Later on, we hope to add a section for book reviews and discussions.

  • How to Start and Build a Law Practice:... Jay Foonberg (written with the kind of "can do" attitude that a true solo's gotta have, Foonberg's book will convince you that you can succeed at solo practice, even though not all of his ideas may work for you)
  • How to get and keep good clients Jay Foonberg
  • Flying Solo: A Survival Guide for the... Joel Bennett (editor)
  • Flying Solo - Jeffrey Lyons and Joel Bennet (2001 - paperback)
  • Hanging Out A Shingle: An Insiders' Guide to Starting a Law Firm - Weyher and Lyon
  • Teach Me to Solo: The Nuts and Bolts of Solo Practice, Hal Davis
  • Attorney & Law Firm Guide to the Business of Law: Planning and Operating for Survival and Growth, Ed Poll
  • Secrets of the Business of Law: Successful Practices for Increasing Profits - Harald Johnson (editor), Ed Poll
  • The Complete Guide to Marketing Your Law Practice, Hollis Hatfield Weishar and James Durham, Editor
  • Marketing for Attorneys and Law Firms William Winston (editor)
  • The Official Guide to Legal Specialties Lisa Abrams, NALP
  • The Complete Guide to Contract Lawyering Deborah Guyol, Deborah L. Arron
  • Transforming Practices: Finding Joy and Satisfaction in the Legal Life, Steven Keeva

Manuals & Forms

Manuals

The following are on-line manuals on how to start a law firm compiled by various state bar associations. Although state specific to some extent, all contain piles of information useful for starting a practice in any jurisdiction.

  1. Starting Small, Thinking Big: A Guide to Starting A Law Firm in DC (a fully on-line manual by the DC Bar's LPAP)
  2. Mississippi Bar Assocation's Handbook on Starting a Law Firm(by YLD - 100 page downloadable manual)
  3. Association of the Bar of NYC Pamphlet on Starting a Law Firm(on-line manual)
  4. How to Open a Small Law Office (on-line manual from North Carolina Bar Association's YLD - scroll to bottom of page)
  5. Client Trust Accounts for South Dakota Lawyers (downloadable 40 page manual with SD focus though case cites and references to trust account procedures in all states).
  6. How-To Kit: Open a Law Practice, Michigan Institute of Continuing Legal Education
  7. New Mexico Bar Association Solo Handbook (downloadable in PDF or Word, also has forms)
  8. MSBA: Sample Policy on Sexual Harrassment in the Legal Workplace (small firm version)

Amazing Forms!

Client retention, fee agreements, forms for office procedure and more -- you will find it all right HERE! If it's from another jurisdiction, adapt it to your own but check your jurisdiction's ethics rules on fee agreements, engagement/retainer letters and billing to make sure that your agreement complies.

  1. Georgia Bar LPM Forms Library (from client intake, fee agreements, engagement letters, etc...)
  2. Missouri Bar's Client Keeper Software (sample retainer agreements, client interview forms, etc...in downloadable Word format)
  3. New Hampshire Client Relations Handbook (NH Bar website) (Forms for Office Procedure, Engagement Letters, Fee Agreements, Client Communications)
  4. Model Fee Agreements (NH Bar website)
  5. Sample Fee Agreements and Engagement Letters North Carolina Bar Association
  6. Oklahoma Bar Association Sample forms (these forms are for opening cases in different areas - civil, criminal, probate)

Tags:
Trackbacks (0) Links to blogs that reference this article Trackback URL
Comments (0) Read through and enter the discussion with the form at the end