Always Be Teaching

Lee Rosen, in his insightful blog Divorce Discourse, had a couple of great posts a while back (here and here) about the importance of cultivating a culture in a law office in which everyone teaches others how to do what they do, and everyone learns what others are doing. Every employee, from partner down to receptionist, should be both teacher and student. This appeals to me on many levels:

First, because it means that everyone understands the value of another’s job, which fosters mutual respect.

Second, because we hone and finetune our own knowledge and expertise as we think about how to share it with others.

Third, because this culture of teaching helps instill shared values about excellent service to clients, teamwork and courtesy.

And finally, it appeals to me because it means that no one is indispensable or irreplaceable, and that is a good thing. When some young staff member goes off to law school, someone else knows the status of her projects and can keep them moving. Perhaps anyone in the office is equipped to help a new client with an info packet, and filling out paperwork. And everyone knows how to make a photocopy in a pinch.

When I worked in BigLaw, I loved to mentor junior staff. I wanted to teach them what I knew about procedure; I wanted to impart knowledge about how to manage a case. I wanted to share best practices on how to approach projects. And I frequently found myself learning from them how to do something more efficiently! This happened in particular when younger, tech savvy staff quickly grasped and then taught me how to streamline a database search, or had new ideas about organization.

And I appreciated the time many lawyers took to mentor me about their philosophy of a case or a motion or a discovery task, and showed me exactly how they wanted something done.

Now as a virtual and freelance paralegal, I am constantly learning from clients their preferred procedures, and their understanding of and goals for their cases. And I sometimes find myself in a position of teaching them about a new technology too.

And while opportunities to share my knowledge with fellow legal support staff don't crop up every day as they did when I worked in a law office, I still relish the chance to teach and to learn from others. Active participation in my local paralegal association is one way to do this. Networking with fellow virtual paralegals and California LDAs is another. Also, I think this is one of the reasons I enjoy preparing my newsletter so much. (Sign up at the right!) I love being the curator of a resource which I hope provides useful tips and resources to colleagues. And getting emails from readers sharing their own tips and resources is an even greater kick.

Wherever we work and whatever our roll, this is an inspiring message: always be learning, but also, always be teaching.

Guest Post: 6 Ways Reading Paralegal Blogs Can Make You a Better Paralegal

Paralegals work in an environment that is constantly changing and knowledge about technology innovations, new areas of opportunity, recent cases, and paralegal industry news can help paralegals stay ahead. Blogs written by experienced paralegals can be an excellent source of useful information that can help you be more effective at your job. Here are a few reasons why reading paralegal blogs can improve your paralegal career.

Learn what is going on inside other law firms

Whether you’re looking for your first gig, a new opportunity, or career development, reading a variety of paralegal blogs can give you an inside scoop on what is going on at law firms. You can learn what skills are in high demand at law firms or what trends are changing the environment or the role of paralegals.

Stay informed with changes in the industry

The latest cases, innovative ways to use technology, or industry news are often covered by the top paralegal blogs.

Learn career enhancing tips

Paralegal blogs can share useful tips on how to become more effective and more productive. For example Practical Paralegalism has the Top 10 Tips for Brand New Paralegals.

Learn from the experiences of other paralegals

Nobody can know the ins and outs of every situation, so what could be better than to become familiar with the many experiences of many different legal professionals? Some paralegal blogs also feature interviews of experienced and successful paralegals. You can find some great paralegal interviews at The Paralegal Mentor.

Get the insights you need to move up the ladder

The ability to show deep knowledge about the inner workings of the industry will put you  ahead of others when it comes time for a promotion or a move to a bigger and better law firm.

Expand your professional network

Paralegal blogs will expand your network of professionals who you can turn to for free consultation and career advice. You can often connect with paralegal bloggers on Twitter or LinkedIn.

This article is a guest post by Charles Sipe from Criminal Justice Degree Schools, a site providing information on paralegal degrees and schools. 

Charles offers some great reasons to read paralegal blogs! I was also interested to learn that Charles lives in Seattle, where I spent ten happy years, and I've enjoyed "chatting" with him via email as we prepared this guest post!

Friday Six Word Memoir

You know what I haven't done in a really really long time? No, taking a vacation to Italy is not what I had in mind, although that's true too!

It's writing a Six Word Memoir. In fact, I haven't done one in so long, that more recent readers probably don't even know that it's one of my things.

See this for the origins of this folderol eccentric exercise.

I've found myself too busy this week! Too busy to blog. Too busy to tweet (much). Too busy to read what's in my beloved RSS feed (much). Almost too busy to answer emails. Definitely too busy to attend my usual Wednesday evening wine tasting event - now that's drastic!

It's true. I have a lot of plates spinning as I'm working hard to market and build a stronger business for 2011 plus take care of existing clients plus take care of administrative stuff (can anyone spell Tax Time?).

I'm writing a lot. (A lot.) I'm writing upcoming Newsletter articles (next issue comes out next week - sign up at the right!). I'm writing a white paper. I'm re-purposing previous articles for my website. I'm completely revamping and redesigning my website! (Stay tuned! Stay tuned for a change for this blog too!) Not to mention the client/potential client thing, clients being the point of the whole kit 'n kaboodle after all.

My head is spinning.

So here is the next in my occasional series of Six Word Memoirs - a memoir to encapsulate my week:

No rest for the good, either!

"I can't slow down, I can't hold back, although you know I wish I could . . ." (Cage the Elephant - gotta love that song!)

What about you? Got your own Six Word Memoir? Feel free to leave it in the comments!

Who you gonna call?

When I worked in BigLaw, there were plenty of opportunities to exchange ideas and commiserate with co-workers. The office was veritably pulsing with fellow paralegals, IT folks, litigation support people, legal secretaries and document clerks who were all involved somehow in the endeavor of providing excellent service to firm clients. Everyone had a role to play in getting the firm’s work done, and everyone in his or her own way was dedicated to accomplishing that.

I had people everywhere I could seek help from, brainstorm with, complain to (not that I would ever do that!), and get encouragement from. And co-workers would come to me for the same reasons. There was (usually) a spirit of teamwork and cooperation.

Or at the very least, a coffee run co-conspirator or after work drinking buddy.

Ah, but I work in BigLaw no longer! I am flying solo . . . master (mistress??) of my own fate . . . a solitary soul slaving in solitude, so to speak!

If you’re a biz owner, a “solopreneur” as the current buzzword goes, where do you go to get ideas?

Who do you turn to when you need to ask a question, or to get advice, or to vent, or to enjoy a simple cuppa coffee forgodssake?

Who you gonna call?????

Well it turns out, much to my delight, there actually are folks!

First, there are colleagues in my paralegal association. As I go to meetings – whether it's the entire membership, the litigation section, or the occasional board meeting, I've begun to form friendships. Most of these colleagues work in law firms; some work as freelance paralegals as I do; a few are unemployed and looking for work. I can empathize with all these situations, and we support each other.

Next there are colleagues, both paralegals and attorneys, whom I’ve begun to make friends with through my involvement in other associations, such as the county bar association and my Women in Law group. We can swap stories, swap tips about legal vendors, or occasionally even reminisce about our former life in BigLaw!

I have developed a network of local fellow biz owners who are great friends, and who also brainstorm with me about building my business. (Turns out they’re superb drinking buddies too!)

But what I didn't anticipate when I began my virtual paralegal business was how many friends I’d meet online through Twitter, LinkedIn and blogs!

• There is a small group of fellow virtual paralegals I've phone-conferenced with, and who are proving to be a supportive group to exchange ideas with.
• There is a group of fellow freelancers, in a wide variety of fields, that I have weekly chats with about marketing and other business matters.
• There are interesting and talented legal professionals who share or post material that I find useful and that I learn from.
• There is a virtual assistant and tech guru extraordinaire I met on Twitter, who is now helping me revamp my website. (Thanks @TMarieHilton!)

What I’ve learned is that participating in professional organizations, building friendships with fellow biz owners, and being active on social media sites are even more important for me as a self-employed virtual paralegal than they were when I was an employee. Now that I can’t just walk down the hallway to find a co-worker to consult with, it has become doubly important to make sure I’m active in my paralegal & bar associations, and that I'm showing up online to exchange information and good will with folks.

Plus, I've gotta get my coffee run co-conspirators and drinking buddies from somewhere!

What about you? Who are you gonna call?

Stuff I Miss About BigLaw . . . and Stuff I Don't! (Plus, a Bonus)

No really! Quit laughing! There are things I miss about my life in BigLaw! Such as:

1.  I miss having all my MCLEs and training programs paid for by someone else.
2.  I miss having a team of staff to manage.
3.  I miss the opportunities to teach training programs.
4.  I miss the afternoon latte breaks. Note: there is no Peet's Coffee in walking distance of my home office :(
5.  I miss specific people. Attorneys I liked working with. Fellow staffers who were helpful, knowledgeable and a kick in the ass.
6.  I miss the Word Processing Department! (But now I’m oh-so-skilled at formatting those documents myself!)

Stuff I'm not missing even a little about my former life in BigLaw:

1.  I don't miss getting yelled at by attorneys. (Not that that ever happened . . . )

2.  I don’t miss the all-nighters. Thank god my current boss doesn't allow those. :P
3.  I don’t miss the commute. Not. One. Bit.
4.  I don’t miss the billable hour minimum.
5.  I don’t miss the terrible vending machine food in the lunch room.
6.  I don’t miss being stuck with the terrible vending machine food when I’m too busy to find something better to eat.

And as an added bonus, things I love about being a virtual paralegal:

1.  I love the variety of projects I work on – an even greater variety of work than I experienced in any one law firm.
2.  I love learning about the varied cases of my clients in different practice areas.
3.  I love not commuting! (See #3 above.)
4.  I love the flexibility to exercise and run errands in the middle of the day if I want to.
5.  I love the tremendous sense of ownership I have over every aspect of my work, now that I’m a business owner.
6.  I love the technology I utilize to work remotely.
7.  I love the ability to say NO, when no is the best thing for me or for my business.

8.  I love some of the things marketing a business compels me to do. Such as professional networking events, writing my newsletter, Twitter and blog reading as industry research.
9.  See how long this list is?

Things I love not so much about being a virtual paralegal:

1.  I don’t love the inconsistent cash flow.
2.  I don’t love all the annoying administrative details - business taxes, licenses, accounting.
3.  I don’t love some of the things marketing a business compels me to do. Such as cold – or even warm – calling, marketing ROI analysis, tooting my own horn.
4.  See how short this list is?

What do you love/love not so much about your work?

Method to My Madness: Getting More Done

Running my own business requires a different mindset about time management than that which served me as a law firm employee. I have many more tasks requiring my attention, and a different set of priorities. This has necessitated a "re-think" about the organization of my time.

As a paralegal in a law firm, my to-do list flowed from my case deadlines, and assignments from attorneys. After all, most case deadlines are pretty non-negotiable! That motion must get filed by this time on this date, and I must move heaven and earth to make that happen. And when a partner calls wanting something done, the only appropriate response is, “On it!”

Now as a virtual and freelance paralegal, I still have deadlines for case work assigned by my attorney clients. But on top of that, I also have a host of business related tasks I must perform. No matter how much client work I have in the pipeline (and I want to have a lot!), I ignore these other tasks at my peril, because my flow of future client work depends on them.

When I first started this business, I naturally used my old method of a long, daily list of to-dos, largely driven by external deadlines. But when I began adding those business and marketing related projects into this list, two things happened.

First, the list got overwhelmingly long!

But second and perhaps more problematic, because the business related tasks didn’t usually have the hard deadlines that the client projects did, they got shoved to the side. Or they led to a lot of disorganized and confusing “project jumping.” My sense of the priority of these business tasks was so subjective and fear driven, that I found myself switching from one thing to another to the point that little got done.

I needed a better way.

I've posted before about my realization that I need a strategy for prioritizing my to-dos. As my thinking has evolved – or perhaps as my frustration level has become unbearable – I’ve also realized I need a structure. Something to keep the daily list below 25 items. Or even if I'm using the post-it method (which is that your daily list has to fit on a post-it - see here), I need something to prevent those items that never make it onto the post-it from completely falling through the cracks.

So now I’m trying the “days of the week” method. In other words, categories of projects are assigned to different days of the week.

Now, some tasks need to be done every day. Like client work – I do whatever it takes to get it done, get it done well, and get it done on time. Also exercise – I really try to do this every day. Also Twitter, reading and commenting on blogs, and other social media activities – I spend time on them most days, although not the same amount of time each day. (Why waste time on this? See here and here.)

Another item I can’t assign a day to is in-person networking events. I see big benefits from these for my business, so I attend them whenever they occur and schedule everything else around them.

But the bigger biz-related projects? I’ve assigned them days. For example, I reserve the same day each week for working on my Newsletter. (Not a subscriber? See the sidebar!) I reserve a different day each week for article writing. And yet another day for my website. Etc.

What’s helpful about this is it thwarts my temptation to switch projects every time I get an idea. Say I get an incredibly great idea about organizing an article I’m writing. Typically I would start worrying about the article, and maybe I would even stop what I’m doing to work on it. But this way, I jot the idea down, tell myself I’ll flesh it out on my article writing day, and then continue what I was doing. Or suppose I get a sudden surge of panic that my newsletter isn't ready and it has to go out next week - OMG! I tell myself to relax, that I’ll finish it on my upcoming newsletter day. And I go on with what I’m doing.

Another benefit is that I can actually assure I will get to my accounting, and other administrative stuff! After all, I’ve reserved Mondays for that! It makes it much harder to come up with a convenient excuse to avoid working on that stuff I don't enjoy but need to to!

This method is working for me at the moment, and I find I’m managing to move more projects forward. How about you – what do you do about managing your to-do list?

The Law School Controversy Be Damned, Congratulations to New Lawyers!

Some readers might be aware that there have been a lot of blog posts and tweets flying about the blawosphere and twitterverse recently about the wisdom of pursuing a law degree. The argument goes that law school is expensive, the resultant school loan debt is enormous, and there are no jobs! This topic has been batted about for some time now, but the most recent furor was instigated by last weekend’s New York Times piece called Is Law School a Losing Game?

Now, I’m not about to weigh in here on the relative pros and cons of a law school degree. I never wanted to go to law school myself, but I’m certainly glad that many did, or I would never have had a career in the field, and I wouldn't have such great attorney clients now.

No, I’m writing to celebrate those recent grads I know who did decide law school was for them, who passed the bar, and who now are eager to do something worthwhile with their careers.

Last night I attended the Sonoma County Bar Association’s New Admittees’ Reception. Present to be honored were about ten recent admittees to the California Bar. I managed to meet most of them. They attended a variety of (mostly) California law schools, and their ages varied, (in fact, one graduated from Stanford 34 years ago, and practiced for many years in other states), and some have landed jobs and others have not.

But as I mingled around and spoke with them, I was impressed and heartened by two things: First, each of the new lawyers I spoke with is proud of his or her achievement and excited about the law. And second, although there are regions of the state with bigger law firms, presumably higher salaries, and possibly greater job prospects, these folks choose to live and practice here, in slower-paced, somewhat rural Sonoma County.

As blogger and JD candidate Jack Wittington has pointed out, not every law school student is just in it for money, fame and fortune. Many choose this career because they believe they can help others doing it. The brand new lawyers I met last evening all certainly fit into that category, and my figurative hat is off to them!

So congratulations, I say, to new lawyers here in Sonoma County, in California, and everywhere!