National Association of Freelance Legal Professionals

NAFLP enters the New Year with new energy and a new leader

2011-01-04T12:15:00.000-08:00

As we wrap up the year 2010 and look into a new year, I want to take this opportunity to thank you for all of your support and interest in the National Association of Freelance Legal Professionals.

Amanda Mineer and I began a bold adventure to create a community of legal freelancers across the country and to begin the process of creating comprehensive resources for that community.

The first steps towards our goal for NAFLP have been taken, and we realized that it is now time to turn over the leadership reins of NAFLP to someone more experienced in developing the resources and organizational structure that Amanda and I had envisioned.

After searching for just the right person, we have selected Chere Estrin, founder of The Organization of Legal Professionals (OLP), Estrin Education, Inc. (an online training organization for legal professionals), KNOW magazine for paralegals, and SUE magazine for women litigators, to take NAFLP into a bright, continuing future.

Chere has taken over the responsibility of running NAFLP as of January 1, 2011.

Your NAFLP membership benefits will continue and new benefits will shortly be added under this new leadership so look forward to notices of these exciting new developments early in the year.

I will continue on with NAFLP as an advisor and look forward to seeing your further successes as freelance legal professionals.

Sincerely,

Melody A. Kramer, Co-Founder
National Association of Freelance Legal Professionals

Business opportunity - recruiting for NAFLP

2010-10-04T09:14:00.000-07:00

We have an important recruitment announcement for NAFLP.

Amanda Mineer and I had a vision of providing an organization to support, educate, and benefit freelance legal professionals around the country, and to educate the legal profession about the benefits of the freelance legal market. To bring that dream to reality, we founded the National Association of Freelance Legal Professionals (NAFLP) and launched a blog and website in early 2008. Our vision and work have taken this project from mere vision to reality. Thank you for your participation in that process.

Much has been accomplished thus far, but there is also much more to be done. However, it is time for someone else to take over the mantle of leadership and build on what has already been created.

To that end, we are actively recruiting for someone to take over NAFLP starting January 1, 2011. We are looking for someone who is passionate about helping legal freelancers build and run successful businesses, and interested in taking NAFLP to the next level of development and member services. Active members of NAFLP will be given first consideration, but anyone interested is invited to respond.

NAFLP already has a website, downloadable educational materials, member and mailing lists of over 3,000, social media exposure, affiliate agreements, written materials regarding legal freelancing, and more. The right candidate will be willing and able to take this foundation and build for the future.

The proposal deadline is October 25, 2010 5:00p.m. Pacific. Requirements are posted below.

Again, thank you for being a part of NAFLP's development thus far, and we look forward to a smooth transition to its next stage of development. Feel free to pass on this recruitment notice to anyone you think may be interested in this opportunity.

Proposal deadline: October 25, 2010 5:00p.m. Pacific
Submit email proposals to: melody@naflp.org
Submit hard-copy proposals to:
Melody A. Kramer
National Association of Freelance Legal Professionals
9930 Mesa Rim Road, Suite 1600
San Diego, CA 92121

Requirements:
The successful proposal will include at least the following: name and contact information, brief statement of what your vision would be for NAFLP in 2011 and beyond, what connection you already have (if any) with the legal freelancing market, education, experience or expertise that would you make you particularly suited to taking over NAFLP, and your proposed terms for taking over NAFLP.

What freelancers need to understand about Legos

2010-09-22T13:56:00.000-07:00

When I was a child, my brother and I spent countless hours building with Lego blocks. For the uninitiated (if there are any left in the world), Lego blocks are plastic building blocks about 1” x ½” or smaller that can be connected together to build things. We had a simple collection of Lego blocks with which we built whatever we dreamed up on any given day. Castles, forts, houses, cars, airplanes, robots, and more. If we could dream it, we could create it. We were limited only by our imagination, and, eventually, the number of blocks we had at our disposal.

When I moved to San Diego, I experienced a new level of the creative power of Legos on a visit to Legoland, a theme park with rides and attractions, all featuring the ageless Lego blocks. The sculptures and landscapes constructed out of hundreds of thousands of Lego blocks boggle the mind! Here is a picture of a massive dragon dwarfing the child standing next to it. Here is a picture of a replica of the Excalibur Hotel in Las Vegas, complete with cars, fountains, and tourists. These and hundreds more are all made out of those same individual Lego blocks I played with as a child.

So what do Legos have to do with freelancers? A lot, actually. Individual Lego blocks are colorful, useful, hardy, and practically indestructible. However, they have little use or longevity by themselves. By themselves, they are little different from any other piece of plastic and will, sooner or later, get sucked up by a vacuum cleaner and end up in a landfill. Together with other blocks, however, they can build the most amazing things, then be disconnected and be built into other amazing things. The possibilities are endless.

Freelancers are like Lego blocks. Individually they sit around the country, periodically used in projects (by law firms), but far too much of the time collecting dust on a shelf. It is hard to see that freelancers are even there. By themselves, they are small and don’t attract much attention. If a law firm is looking, even if they want to use a freelancer, they may not be able to find one.

Freelancers, it’s time to do some building. Unite together in a force that will be seen and cannot be ignored by the legal profession. NAFLP needs your participation to thrive and grow. Only you can make it happen.

Flying High - a military spouse and freelance paralegal shares her story

2010-06-21T13:54:00.001-07:00

Guest blog post by NAFLP member Kris L. Canaday

As I stare out the airplane window, my mind runs through all the things to be done. It’s a quick trip. Find a house and head back across the country to finish packing. I have so many things still to do – I haven’t even touched the kitchen and I still need to schedule the utilities. Oh yeah, I also need to finish that paternity action when we land.

I am a military spouse. I am also a freelance paralegal. Why? So I don’t have to give up my career every time we transfer. Lately, that seems to be regularly. We’re leaving Washington after less than two years and just learned that we may only be in Louisiana for one year instead of three. I don’t think I’m going to unpack much more than my kitchen and office this time around. . . .

READ MORE at the new NAFLP blog

Introduction to Taxes for Freelancers

2010-06-10T11:57:00.000-07:00

Guest blog, courtesy of NAFLP member attorney Vincent Kan*

Introduction

Freelancing provides many great benefits - the pride and satisfaction of owning your own business, flexibility in how you accomplish your work, improved work-life balance, amongst others. However, with all the benefits comes all of the burdens of ownership including paying income and employment taxes. Understanding these obligations is important to ensure taxes are paid on time and without stiff penalties from the Internal Revenue Service. For the purposes of this article, I will assume that you are either a sole proprietor or the only member of an LLC which has not made a Form 8832 election to be treated as a corporation (and is also treated as a sole proprietor). Freelancers operating in the corporate form (with or without an S election) face additional reporting requirements and restrictions at the entity level.

Employer Identification Number

Most businesses are required to have an Employer Identification Number (EIN) from the Internal Revenue Service in order to process their ongoing tax obligations. Sole proprietors can use their social security number(SSN) in lieu of an EIN if they do not have employees or file excise, employment, alcohol, tobacco, or firearms returns. Despite this, freelancers may still want to get an EIN for their work as many businesses who pay you are required to get your either your SSN or EIN (through Form W-9) in order to meet their own information reporting requirements to the IRS (usually Form 1099-MISC). Having an EIN both future-proofs your business in the event you do need to hire employees of your own to help manage your work and minimizes the risk of identity theft through disclosure of your SSN to your vendors.

Income Tax

Like your former employer, you as a freelancer are subject to income tax on your freelance work’s gross income minus deductions and credits. As the vast majority of freelancers will be on the calendar-year cash method, this means that . . .

CLICK HERE to read the rest of this article on the new NAFLP site

Call for comments about the ABA's legal processing outsourcing study

2010-06-01T13:23:00.000-07:00

On May 7, 2010, NAFLP and Lisa Solomon of Legal Research and Writing Pro, responded to the ABA Commission on Ethics 20/20 Call for Comments regarding Legal Process Outsourcing (Domestic and International). The full response can be found here.

Of particular interest, however, is that the ABA's call for comments contains three pages of questions, none of which addresses freelance lawyers. Furthermore, there is not a single question directed to contract lawyers, those who work for legal employment agencies and legal process outsourcing companies.

I pulled up the ABA's mission statement again this morning which reads as follows:

To serve equally our members, our profession, and the public by defending liberty and delivering justice as the national representative of the legal profession.

Call my cynical if you like, but an investigation into legal outsourcing that does not even mention those lawyers who provide freelance legal services to law firms domestically, or the masses of contract lawyers that fuel fee generation for large law firms via massive document review projects, is without excuse.

Freelance lawyers, contract lawyers, stand up and tell your story. NAFLP and freelance lawyer Lisa Solomon have told them. Kimberly Alderman at "Lawyer On! The Freelance Attorney Blog" has told them ("The ABA (Unintentionally) Recognizes Freelance Lawyers as Freedom Fighters"). The Posse List, I understand, is preparing to address the issue. Now it is your turn. Tell the ABA who you are, what you do, and that if they want to act as the "national representative of the legal profession," they better take note of the entire legal profession.

Post your comments here and cc Senior Research Paralegal Natalia Vera at veran@staff.abanet.org. ABA, your comments and explanations are welcome also.

Look at me, I'm fancy! (How to add a JD Supra feed to your WordPress blog)

2010-05-02T16:24:00.000-07:00

Republished with permission from Lawyer On! The Contract Attorney's Blog by Kimberly Alderman, Lawyerbird Legal Research & Writing

So I saw a fancy dandy JD Supra feed of recent docs on the fabulous Rick Horowitz’s Probable Cause Blog, and I just had to have one for my freelancing website. Turned out pretty nice, right?

I already had an account with JD Supra, and a dozen or so docs up, but I uploaded some new ones (redacted, of course) just from the past couple of days. After that, I struggled to find where to get the widget code, . . .

(Read the remainder of this article on the new NAFLP website)

How Being a Freelance Legal Professional Came to Be

2010-04-28T12:37:00.000-07:00

Guest blog post, courtesy of NAFLP member Stephanie R. Ellis, J.D.

First, I have to say that I never knew the level of satisfaction involved in working for yourself. I was not one of those people with a deep desire to be an entrepreneur. When I was in law school, I dreamed of getting hired by a decent law firm and doing what was asked of me. I always wanted to succeed at whatever was before me and grow from there. However, things do not always go as planned.

After law school, I started working. Fast-forward three years and here I am. I have been fortunate to have very good work experience, but in the last couple of years, I did not feel like my skills and talents were being utilized to the level I knew I was capable of. Although, I made lasting professional connections, I did not have the challenge I longed for. Consequently, a door opened to step out on my own ...

CLICK HERE to read the rest of this post on the new NAFLP site

17 places to list your business online

2010-04-20T13:50:00.000-07:00

Guest blog post, courtesy of Frank Cowell, Elevator Marketing Store

When it comes to increasing inquiries and traffic to your business, the more visitors to your website, the better. Of course, targeted traffic is best and you don't want to drive people to your website in unrelated ways.

That's why we've compiled a list of 17 places that you can list your business online. While there is no charge to list your website, be prepared to spend some time getting through all 17. However, if done correctly, it can pay off. In addition to the no-cost listings, many of these websites offer paid options that provide you with "enhanced" listings.

Once you establish your listings, you'll want to pay attention to them on a monthly basis to make sure the information stays up-to-date and that you are monitoring any feedback or reviews from customers. Praise the good and immediately address the bad to show that you are a business that cares about its reputation. And, remember, the more tools you use in your marketing, the more your "phones will ring and the doors will swing!"

Yelp - "Word of mouth amplified". This is a favorite. Once set up we encourage you to maintain updates. Your customers will review and post their experiences... for the whole world to see. Talk about accountability!

Facebook - More of a social networking site, we added Facebook because of your ability to 'be found.' While most people don't specifically use Facebook as a resource finder, listing your business with a 'fan page' can help people 'stumble upon' you!

LinkedIn - Another social networking site, primarily for individual professionals. This site offers great opportunities to connect and a ton of resources.

Backpage - A lot like Craig's List in that it's kind of a classified ads website. Here, you can post basic ads with options for inexpensive, automated reposting. Very user friendly, super quick and highly recommended.

See all 17 on the Elevator Marketing Store website...

ABA solicits comments about legal outsourcing, but fails to mention legal freelancers

2010-04-14T06:19:00.000-07:00

The ABA Commission on Ethics 20/20 has made a call for comments regarding Legal Process Outsourcing (Domestic and International).

The ABA Commission on Ethics 20/20 is studying the ethical and professional regulatory implications of legal process outsourcing in a domestic and international context. The Commission is reviewing the ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct, existing ethics opinions and other literature and studies about this topic. The Commission is also interested in gathering information about domestic and international legal process outsourcing from lawyers, law firms, clients and outsourcing providers, and developed the following questions to do so.
We look forward to hearing from you. Please do not feel constrained to limit your responses to the information sought by these questions. We are interested in receiving whatever information you feel is relevant.

The 3-page list of questions includes questions for lawyers, law firms, and clients who have outsourced legal work, as well as a series of questions for "providers of legal process outsourcing services." There is no mention of independent legal freelancers.

NAFLP will be ensuring that its membership's voice also gets heard and will be submitting comments to the ABA by their deadline of May 7, 2010. We would greatly appreciate input from our legal freelancers that we can include in our comments. Please email us at melody@naflp.org with the subject line "ABA COMMENTS."

The difference between a freelancing career and being a temporary worker

2010-02-14T08:15:00.000-08:00

NAFLP member Stacy Lilly passed on the following article from the Wall Street Journal - "How to Succeed in the Age of Going Solo" regarding the dramatic increase in self-employed workers over the past decade and how to distinguish yourself from other consultants.

The entire article, by Richard Greenwald, is a good read, especially as you are reevaluating your business plans and goals for the year. Here are a few highlights -

"The consultants and freelancers who are most successful offer a technical skill or expertise that is too expensive or infrequently used for companies to keep in-house. . . . "[F]inding the next assignment cannot be done at the expense of retaining and enhancing these skills. Cutting-edge expertise is vital to long-term professional health."

He also recommends joining a network, having your own space for conducting work, and thinking like an entrepreneur. Read the whole article here.

Legal outsourcing - the big picture

2010-01-16T07:37:00.001-08:00

Two years ago Amanda Mineer and I began building this community of individual legal professionals who had chosen or found themselves working outside of traditional “jobs.” These people, we didn’t know how many, had no idea that they were not alone. They had no idea how many other people across the country worked the same way they did, in the ambiguous world of ghost writing and law firm support. They had no idea that their struggles to learn how to run a business, market their services, and plan their taxes, were shared experiences with others. They had no idea that it was okay to choose to be an entrepreneur and a legal professional, in fact, it was the gutsy way to approach their careers.

We started this project with a simple, free blog. We wrote, people throughout the United States and the world read, commented, and contacted us. Lisa Solomon, veteran freelance attorney from New York, contacted us first and said “let’s work together” and we have. Joseph Miller, a lone, positive blogging voice (JDWired) on the contract attorney front at that time, offered his support and renewed his voice in support of freelancers and contract attorneys. Many, many others have shared their encouragement and support. NAFLP began offering teleclasses, recommending books, having monthly TeleCoffees, arranging for free tax planning sessions with CPA Jere Batten, reduced cost websites and marketing materials through Elevator Marketing, an online database of legal freelancers through FreelanceLaw.com, and one-on-one coaching sessions. We have created online forums, Facebook and LinkedIn groups, spoken at law schools and made presentations for bar associations. More freelancers have stepped up to support these efforts. Aimee Powers, a freelance paralegal in San Diego, has assisted with NAFLP clerical functions. Kris Canaday, a freelance paralegal from Washington state, has begun moderating monthly TeleClasses on topics of interest to NAFLP members. Stacy Lilly, a freelance attorney from Pennsylvania, passes on project leads she finds on the internet. Donna Seyle, a freelance attorney in California, has been writing wonderful blog articles educating attorneys about how to use freelancers. Lisa Solomon continues to provide coaching and educational products to legal freelancers, helping them build their businesses. These are but a few examples.

Legal outsourcing, scarcely discussed several years ago, has now come to the forefront of discussion in the legal community. Why? Because lots and lots of legal professionals have engaged in the discussion and done their part to assist others. Did Amanda and I make this change via creation of NAFLP? We would never be so presumptuous as to claim that type of credit. We were a piece of a project larger than ourselves and by taking one step at a time to encourage and support others, we have been part of a dramatic and evolving change in the entire legal profession.

As freelancers and entrepreneurs it is so easy to get wrapped up in your daily work and the simple task of earning a living. It is hard work, time-consuming, and sometimes overwhelming. However, spending just an hour or two of your week engaging in the big picture can make a tremendous difference.

Here are some goals for you as a legal freelancer in the new year:

1. Educate at least ten new lawyers about the benefits of legal outsourcing by sharing what you do. You can do this at networking events, through marketing brochures, at speaking events, blogging, whatever suits your personality. This may lead directly to new clients for you, but it will also lead to more work opportunities for all freelancers.

2. Encourage a fellow freelancer at least once a month. Freelancing can sometimes be lonely and thankless. Make it a point to reach out directly to at least one fellow freelancer a month (you can find them everywhere now) by phone, email, mention in your blog, or in person. Let them know you support their courage to freelance and ask if you can do anything to help them. You will be amazed at the impact this will have, even on you.

3. Engage in the larger legal community. So often it seems that legal organizations and periodicals cater to only large firms, and that only large firm attorneys serve on boards and committees. Change that. Offer your services. Add your voice to the larger legal policy discussions. Interpreters, translators, paralegals, court reporters, the same applies to you. Get out there and be involved with the professional organizations in your area.

4. Expand your network to the larger outsourcing community. It isn’t just lawyers and paralegals that are going freelance. Interpreters, translators, and court reporters have been doing it for years, and many other professionals are doing the same. You have common interests with them. Check out the Freelancers Union, International Association of Outsourcing Professionals, FreelanceSwitch.com, FreelanceCamp.org, and other organizations. See how you can help. Freelance lawyers, consider developing affordable options for providing legal services to freelancers directly.

Educate, encourage, engage, and expand – and keep us posted on your efforts. Who knows what wonderful things 2010 can hold for all of us!

Law firms are desperate to keep their clients – legal freelancers can help them out

2009-11-21T07:48:00.000-08:00

It has been less than a year since the legal industries pundits were claiming that hourly rates for lawyers would not decline despite the recession and that the traditional billable hour fee structure was not going to change. See our January 28, 2009 “Quality vs. Quantity – the billable hour mousetrap” blog article.

What a difference a few months makes. The ABA Journal and the Legal Business Development blog are reporting a startling development – large law firms offering loss leader pricing for services. Examples are offers of handling discovery for free, offers to cut hourly rates in half for the first phase of litigation, and doing motion work for 30% of usual rates.

I agree with one of the participant’s in the Legal Business Development blog’s survey about these practices –

[In one recent competition] another law firm bid a price which quite frankly we
thought was not sustainable. And there are really only two or three answers as
to why they did that. One is a loss leader. The second is sheer stupidity. And
the third is a willingness to take an extraordinary risk.

Large law firms are struggling with the entire concept of adapting their fees in an environment where clients have gained the upper hand in determining whether their legal budgets go. They aren’t used to operating without significant streams of revenue.

The good news for legal freelancers is that you are perfectly positioned to help out these law firms. Your rates were always lower than employees because of reduced overhead, and you never insisted on wearing $700 suits and driving Ferraris. You simply wanted to practice your profession on your own terms at a rate commensurate with your expertise.

Here is your sales pitch. First, you offer high quality services at a price that they can mark up and still be a reasonable rate for their clients. Second, unlike emerging legal process outsourcing (LPO) companies in India or other places around the globe, you are local and they can personally meet with you and assess your competence. Any client should be a little queasy about their law firm outsourcing important legal work outside of the United States to persons unknown.

[read the remainder of this article at the new NAFLP website]

Business success is not accidental

2009-11-13T09:08:00.000-08:00

A recent Fortune magazine article “What It Takes To Be Great” explains what should be obvious to us all. It is not innate, natural-born talent that will determine your success as a legal freelancer; success is achieved though deliberate practice and hard work.

As we come to the end of 2009, it is only natural to be reviewing the developments of the year, the successes and failures, the overall progress towards our goals. Sometimes depression sets in if we have not accomplished what we thought we might have, not acquired as many new clients as we had hoped, not brought in as much money as we had planned. “Do I need to give up on this dream of self-employed independence?” you may think. “Maybe I don’t have the talents to do this.” As research as shown, however, “talent” has nothing to do with it.

The critical reality is that we are not hostage to some naturally granted level of talent. We can make ourselves what we will. Strangely, that idea is not popular. People hate abandoning the notion that they would coast to fame and riches if they found their talent. But that view is tragically constraining, because when they hit life's inevitable bumps in the road, they conclude that they just aren't gifted and give up.
Maybe we can't expect most people to achieve greatness. It's just too demanding. But the striking, liberating news is that greatness isn't reserved for a preordained few. It is available to you and to everyone.

“What It Takes To Be Great”

I won’t kid you, succeeding as a freelance legal professional and owning your own business is not a simple, easy process. It is not a get-rich-quick scheme. It requires deliberate, hard work. The good news is that the rewards of acquiring your own success far outweigh the “inevitable bumps” in the road of business development.

[read the full blog post at NAFLP's new website - http://www.naflp.org/]

Clients are demanding alternative fee arrangements from their law firms – freelancers can help

2009-09-02T15:07:00.000-07:00

Dramatic changes in the relationships between law firms and their clients offer the “perfect storm” of opportunity for legal freelancers.

The Wall Street Journal has cited Pfizer, Cisco, and American Express as just a few companies intent on reducing the amount of legal fees it pays to its outside law firms. “’Billable Hour’ Under Attack,” August 24, 2009, Nathan Koppel and Ashby Jones.

Rio Tinto, a leading international mining group, is reportedly bypassing its external counsel and working directly with a legal outsourcing company to outsource some of its legal work, saving $1M in legal fees by paying lower rates than its main external counsel Linklaters and Baker & McKenzie. “Outsourcing is taking hold,” Financial Post, August 26, 2009.

In order to stay competitive and keep their clients, U.S. law firms are being forced to reevaluate their staffing arrangements, and onshore outsourcing should be the first place they look. U.S. legal freelancers can provide the same quality work product that the client expects (and often an even higher quality product), at a much lower cost than a salaried associate. Reducing overhead costs without sacrificing service quality will allow a reduction in billable hourly rates to the client, without reducing profits to law firms.

May I say "I told you so?" The following is a quote from this NAFLP blog - ”Quality vs. Quantity – the billable hour mousetrap,” published January 28, 2009.

Corporate clients – the “surging demand for high-end legal services” is you, accepting the definition of “high-end” as being on the AmLaw 100 list. The “unrelenting annual rate hikes” is the price you are paying for accepting this criteria and rate hikes will keep increasing at these firms until you, the client, say "no." You are choosing “pedigree” and "prestige" over “quality” in legal services and have only yourself to blame for the outrageous legal bills on your desk.

Apparently a number of corporate clients came to the same realization. U.S. legal freelancers can provide the same quality work product that the client expects (and often an even higher quality product), at a much lower cost than a salaried associate. Reducing overhead costs without sacrificing service quality will allow a reduction in billable hourly rates to the client, without reducing profits to law firms. The legal industry is long overdue for changes.

Freelancers, go out there and make change work for you!

Tools and Resources for Freelancers

2009-09-01T07:23:00.000-07:00

In August we conducted a Telecoffee where members shared great tools and resources for the Freelancer. Here is a list of resources you might want to look into. Please feel free to add great tools and resources in the comments section.

(see the full blog article at the new NAFLP website)

Why you should be your own CEO

2009-08-09T14:01:00.000-07:00

It seems that corporate America continues to be run by people who are just as sexist and out-of-touch as those who argued that women should not be allowed to vote, who seem to think that women cannot both raise children and be successful in business.

As reported in the Wall Street Journal, in a June 28th speech at the Society for Human Resource Management’s annual conference, former General Electric Co. Chief Executive Jack Welch asserted that women had to choose between taking time off to raise children and reaching the corner office. . . .

[go to the new NAFLP site for the full article]

Upcoming Event - Five Foundations of Time Mastery for Lawyers

2009-05-18T06:26:00.000-07:00

The following event is coming up this week from our affiliate, Lisa Solomon of Legal Research and Writing Pro, and speaker Julie A. Fleming, J.D. -

Five Foundations of Time Mastery for Lawyers
Thursday, May 21 at 3 p.m. Eastern (noon Pacific)

If you’re like most lawyers, your “to do” list is overflowing, and you probably feel that you’re facing an uphill battle just to get the “must do” items completed—never mind the fresh ideas you’d like to implement for better client service, business development, or just taking a few moments to enjoy lunch. Join Julie A. Fleming, J.D. to learn how to get a handle on your time, once and for all. You’ll discover:

* How to revise your to-do list so you’ll accomplish what matters most without fail every day
* Why you must focus on non-urgent tasks to maximize your effectiveness
* How to handle e-mail effectively
* Why multi-tasking actually costs you time and undermines your work product
* The six steps for effective delegation and the five most common delegation mistakes

Presenter Julie A. Fleming, J.D., A.C.C. is the founder of Life at the Bar LLC. Julie practiced law (specializing in patent litigation) for over a decade in firms ranging from two to more than 2,000 lawyers, before founding Life at the Bar LLC in 2005. She provides attorney development coaching and consulting (focusing on topics such as rainmaking, professional development, career strategy, leadership development, and work/life integration) and is a frequent speaker for law firms, bar associations, and law schools. Julie also publishes the weekly email newsletter Leadership Matters for Lawyers.

Registration for this program includes the live teleseminar, plus access to downloadable audio and video recordings.

The cost for this program is $97. NAFLP members receive 25% off ALL Legal Research & Writing Pro programs and products. Enter promotion code NAFLP during checkout.

To register, visit Legal Research and Writing Pro and add a Silver Membership to your cart.

Job opportunities for legal freelancers increase as the insanity of large law firm model continues to be revealed

2009-05-15T05:38:00.000-07:00

The current economic downturn has served to disclose more and more examples of why the large law firm practice model should be discarded, in lieu of smaller, more nimble, legal freelancers and law firms. While the business world struggles to adapt to lower profits and making tougher financial decisions, law firms still seem slow to understand. Here are a few examples.

The dissolving 106-year-old law firm of WolfBlock, LLC is reported as using a line of credit at the beginning of the year to pay bonuses for the previous year. “’When they felt the real earnings were inadequate, they just borrowed to pay themselves what they thought they were worth,’" former chairman Robert Segal is quoted in the ABA Journal.

Stroock, Stroock & Levan is offering to pay new law school graduates to whom they had extended job offers previously $50,000 to delay starting work from the fall until January 2010, or $75,000 to find other employment. (link).

Morrison & Foerster is offering to pay $5,000 per month plus the cost of medical benefits to 2009 law grads who will defer their start date to January 2011. (link)

Summer associates paid around $3000/week, were just a year ago complaining about “skimpy” lunch stipends of $55 and being plyed with too much expensive food and alcohol. (link)

Is it any wonder that legal costs to clients have been soaring out of control? Why does a law firm need to charge $400, $500, $600 an hour and up? Corporate America is finding the answer to that question and changing course. Major corporations are slashing their legal budgets by using smaller law firms.

The Association of Corporate Counsel is also involved in an active quest to redefine the value of legal services with its “Value Challenge.”

“ACC believes that many traditional law firm business models and many of the approaches to lawyer training and cost management are not aligned with what corporate clients want and need: value-driven, high-quality legal services that deliver solutions for a reasonable cost and develop lawyers as counselors (not just content-providers), advocates (not just process-doers) and professional partners. . . . ACC has launched an initiative to reconnect value and costs for legal services . .

Freelancers, this is your time to make contact with those law firms and inhouse counsel that want and need to make a change in how they provide legal services to clients. Show them your skills and abilities, and demonstrate they can decrease their overall costs without sacrificing high-quality services.

NAFLP Co-Founders Quoted in Major Legal Publications

2009-05-07T10:15:00.000-07:00

The interest in legal freelancing is gaining momentum as reflected in major periodicals publishing articles about this segment of the legal industry. In the past week, NAFLP co-founders were each cited in articles published by the American Bar Association and the National Law Journal.

"Lawyer for Hire: Freelance Contractors Change the Marketplace", Hannah Hayes, Perspectives, Vol. 17, Number 3.

"[M]any freelance contract lawyers must fight the perception that 'they are between jobs or don't have it in them to be a "real" lawyer," [Amanda] Mineer points out. "It's about a balanced life . . ."

"Downturn May Have an Upside for Contract Attorneys", Emily Heller, National Law Journal, May 5, 2009.

"'I have more work than I know what to do with,' [Melody Kramer]
said. 'I think the market is perfectly primed for freelancing right
now.'"

The true nature of legal freelancing - setting the record straight

2009-04-14T16:01:00.000-07:00

There are many misconceptions about legal freelancing on the internet, so much so that I am compelled, again, to explain the fundamental differences between “freelance legal professionals” and other things such as “contract attorneys.”

Freelance legal professionals are self-employed

Freelance legal professionals are their own employers, maintain their own office, pay their own taxes, arrange for their own insurance and benefits, set their own schedules, set their own fees, sets their own working conditions, and market their services directly to law firms and inhouse legal departments. Freelance legal professionals do not work directly for, nor get paid by, ultimate clients. They do not work for, nor get paid by, an employment agency. Freelance legal professionals, whether licensed attorneys themselves, or paralegals or other service providers, work on an independent contractor basis for licensed attorneys who have the relationship with the underlying, or ultimate, client.

Freelance legal professionals sometimes work on a project-by-project basis, or may have a long-standing relationship with a law firm, doing work on a long-term and ongoing basis. The key distinction between the freelancer and an employee, however, is that the freelancer is paid as a 1099-reportable independent contractor, whereas the employee is paid as a W-2-reportable employee. Other distinctions flowing out of that relationship are the level of control over how the work is done, where it is done, and whether the worker can do work for other law firms.

“Contract attorneys” are employees of agencies

The type of work that is more commonly known phrase “contract attorney” or “contract lawyer” is actually that of an employment relationship between an employment agency and the legal professional (this arrangement is also common with other legal support personnel). The employment agency contracts with law firms for the use of their (the agency’s) employees to perform work on a temporary basis. The agency bills out for the worker’s time, billing rates that are marked up from the hourly rates paid to the workers. The agencies are, as employers, responsible for withholding taxes and, at least theoretically, responsible for insurance and benefits. Agencies, pursuant to their contractual arrangements with law firms, control working schedules, work location, working conditions, fees, and marketing (in general) to law firms and inhouse legal departments. They can, and often do, cancel scheduled assignments without any cancellation fees to the contract attorneys.

Work for legal employment agencies is on an assignment basis has many barriers to transition from temporary employment via agency to direct employment with the law firm. These barriers often include segregation of contract attorneys from the firm's associates and partners, and substantial payments due to the agency by a law firm wanting to “buy out” the temporary worker's contract. The temporary employee usually has no voice in negotiations over such buyouts, nor do they have any say in working conditions or pay rates.

Why do we at NAFLP care about such distinctions?

NAFLP was designed to assist professionals in the legal industry to gain and maintain the benefits of self-employment, to take control of their careers, and run financially successful businesses. “Contract” or “temporary legal professionals” have little control over their careers and have to sit and wait for their phone to ring with a job assignment. Freelancers are meanwhile out marketing their services, networking, and building successful businesses and never have to simply wait for someone else to hand them a job.

In 2005, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics compiled some interesting data regarding the differences between several types of contingent and alternative employment arrangements. They found that “fewer than 1 in 10 independent contractors said they would prefer a traditional work arrangement.” By contrast, 56 percent of workers employed by temporary help agencies wanted a traditional work arrangement. Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, “Alternative employment arrangements and worker preferences,” originally published August 4, 2005.

Horror stories abound about the poor working conditions and career dead ends awaiting any legal professionals working for legal employment agencies. Blogs such as “Temporary Attorney: The Sweatshop Edition” explicitly solicit “horror stories” and seek “help expos[ing] the nasty sweatshops, swindling law schools, and opportunistic staffing agencies.” My Attorney Blog recently posted an article entitled “Disregard Anything Positive I’ve Ever Said About Contract Attorney Work - I’ve Finally Come To My Senses.” With such “marketing,” who would possible want to work that way?

By contrast, personal experiences of freelance legal professionals consistently reflect job satisfaction, financial success, and increased ability to have work-life balance. I have worked as a freelance attorney off and on for 16 years, sometimes full-time and sometimes in combination with my own solo law practice. I have found freelancing to offer endless opportunities and challenges and look forward to receiving projects from my law firm clients. We at NAFLP want others to enjoy the same positive experiences.

Upcoming TeleWebinar - "You Are Your Own Brand - Make the Most of It" - April 16, 2009

2009-04-14T09:33:00.000-07:00

Join Lisa Solomon of Legal Research and Writing Pro, and presenter Carol Schiro Greenwald, for a marketing telewebinar -

You are Your Own Brand—Make the Most of It

Thursday, April 16, 2009 at 3 p.m. Eastern (noon Pacific)

Everyone talks about branding your firm, but few talk about the more important concept of branding yourself. You are your own brand: how you dress, move, and speak convey reams of information about you that is quickly absorbed by your audience.

You have only seven seconds to make a first impression. In this program, you’ll learn:

what your clothes, the colors you wear, your bearing, your eye contact and your body language all say about you before you even open your mouth
how to use all forms of communication to present a coherent set of messages to clients, contacts and prospects about how you approach your work and what services you sell
how marketing terms such as “branding,” “positioning,” and “key messages” apply to your personal marketing activities

The major areas that transmit messages about you—from your workspace to your web site, from your writing to your networking spiel

Presenter Carol Schiro Greenwald works with law firms, practice groups and individual lawyers to help them quickly grow their client base. She uses a research-based approach to discover how her clients are perceived by their clients and prospects, and helps her clients create effective marketing strategies. Carol also works with individual lawyers to maximize their client relationships, cross-selling and referral opportunities, and to develop the personal marketing and sales skills that work for them.

This program will be presented as a “tele-webinar.” In a tele-webinar, you call in to a conference call line to receive the audio portion of the program. If you have access to your computer, you can follow along with a Power Point presentation as well. There is no need to install any software on your computer. If you will be calling in from outside the office, don’t worry: you can view or print the slides before the program, if you wish.

Registration for this program includes the live tele-webinar, plus access to downloadable audio and video recordings.

The cost for this program is $97. NAFLP members receive 25% off ALL Legal Research & Writing Pro programs and products using the members-only promotion code during checkout.

To register, visit Legal Research and Writing Pro and add a Silver Membership to your cart.

Recent TeleClass - "Building Your Freelance Business During a Recession" - March 26, 2009 9am Pacific/12noon Eastern

2009-03-24T13:10:00.001-07:00

On March 10, 2009, NAFLP hosted its first monthly Telecoffee where the topic of discussion was "Building your Freelance Business During a Recession." Based on the high level of interest and lively discussion it became clear that a formal Teleclass would be beneficial to our members and guests.

"Building Your Freelance Business During A Recession"

The current economic downturns can provide fertile ground for building a successful freelance legal practice. In this teleclass, NAFLP founders Amanda L. Mineer and Melody Kramer will discuss:

The importance of adjusting your perspective about how you earn a living
Analyzing the needs of your potential clients and creating a way to meet them
Differentiating yourself from the competition
and much more!

PURCHASE A RECORDING OF THIS CALL

NAFLP Co-Founder to Speak at the Lawyers Club Balance Symposium in San Diego, CA

2009-03-11T10:20:00.000-07:00

Join, co-founder, Amanda L. Mineer at the annual Balance Symposium hosted by the Lawyers Club of San Diego. Amanda will be representing NAFLP on the panel entitled "Let's Talk About Balance: A Discussion About Work/Life Balance with Women Lawyers on Varied Career Paths"

Join us March 19, 2009 in San Diego, CA 10:45am - 1:45pm.

Pedigree vs quality revisited - dogs and lawyer resumes have a lot in common

2009-02-21T06:10:00.001-08:00

I recently watched a dog show and found myself intrigued by the pomp and circumstance of the entire process. Dogs combed and brushed and primped within an inch of their lives are trotted out by very serious owners adjusting stance, tail, ears, holding snacks at just the right distance and angle to optimize the dog's profile. A judge feels up the dog from head to toe before dog and owner take a trot around the ring.

The dog looks majestic and beautiful in a very controlled trot. The owner looks a tad silly running in a suit (forgive me, all dog lovers; I have a point to make). This is when I feel very sorry for the dog. When did he last get to run with reckless abandon, chase squirrels, get muddy, be a dog? Did he ever get to? Did he ever get to exercise his dog skills? Can't you see his owner yelling "get out of that mud, Fido, we'll never get that mud out of your fur!"

Lawyers resumes are managed just like show dogs. Go to the most prestigious school (get brushed and primped). Join every possible organization to make yourself look busy and important (have your stance, tails, ears properly adjusted). Have law firms hold high enough "standards" as to who they will interview (holding dog treats almost out of reach). Don't work as a contract or temporary lawyer (don't play in the mud) because, says Gary Sedlik of the Lateral Attorney Report (www.lateralattorneyreport.com) article "To Temp or Not to Temp" (www.lateralattorneyreport.com/2009/02/to-temp-or-not-to-temp/)

The Stigma: The truth is that some firms simply will not consider hiring a lawyer if her resume reflects one or more stints as a contract lawyer. Whether this is fair or not is beside the point. Some firms and lawyers have this bias.

When did putting in an honest day's work create a stigma that would impair your ability to obtain another job? When did working on a temporary or freelance basis disqualify legal professionals for permanent positions?

What does it say about a law firm that ranks "not working" as a superior job qualification to "working"?

Primped show dog or qualified legal professional? Which do you want to be?

Upcoming NAFLP Sponsored Teleclass - How to Market a Freelance Practice Using Blogging and Social Media

2009-02-16T16:18:00.000-08:00

JOIN US! February 19, 2008, Noon (PST), 3pm (EST)

Internet-based tools, from e-mail to online legal research, are fundamental to the rise of appellate practice and contract lawyering as viable practice niches. The web is critical not only to how we do our jobs, but also to how we market our services to other lawyers. A blog is one of the most powerful tools you can use to market your practice to fellow lawyers, because blogging allows you to showcase your writing ability and legal skill in an informal, easy-to-update, and readily accessible format. Since blogging requires only a minimal financial investment (you can start a blog for under $50—and that includes buying a domain name and a web hosting services!), it’s a perfect marketing tool for lawyers just starting their own practices, as well as for more established lawyers seeking the highest ROI for their marketing dollars. In this program, appellate law blogger D. Todd Smith will teach you how you can use a blog to market any kind of contract or appellate law practice, whether your practice is state-specific or nationwide.

Join us to learn more about:

Why you should blog
How to create a blog
How to generate content
How blogging fits into a broader social media strategy
And more . . . .

D. Todd Smith is creator and publisher of the Texas Appellate Law Blog, a trusted source of practice tips, resources, and news for anyone with matters pending before Texas appellate courts. A former big-firm lawyer, Todd opened a solo practice in 2006 and has been blogging ever since. In addition to catching the attention of local media outlets, Todd’s blog posts have been republished on CNN.com and in the online versions of the Wall Street Journal and Chicago Sun-Times. As a result of his blogging efforts, legal publications including Texas Lawyer have published his expert commentary on appellate law issues.

Registration for this program includes the live teleseminar, plus access to a downloadable recording (mp3 format).

The cost for this program is $97. NAFLP members receive 25% off ALL Legal Research & Writing Pro programs and products. Enter promotion code NAFLP during checkout.

Click here to register and add a Silver Membership to your cart. Don't forget to enter promotion code NAFLP during checkout for your discount!

Distinction for achievement in the legal profession? For sale to the highest bidders

2009-01-30T16:29:00.000-08:00

How does a women lawyer achieve distinction as a leader in the legal profession? You might be surprised at the answer that arrived in my mailbox today.

"In recognition of Women's History Month, women attorneys who have achieved leadership status will be profiled with bios," etc. in a future issue of the LA/Los Angeles Times Magazine. This opportunity was described in a colorful brochure as "the perfect way to salute those high-achieving women who are excelling in their professional roles."

"Wow!" I thought. "What a great idea! It is about time women lawyers who are making a positive impact on the legal profession get some recognition. What is the criteria for selection of these attorneys?"

My jaw dropped as I read further. It appears that the one and only criteria for selection of these high-achieving women is payment of between $8,000-$55,000 (early bird discounts apply).

I have an alternative suggestion. In recognition of Women's History Month (March), let's stop pretending that a pretty face, designer gown, expensive diamond ring, or a splashy display ad, measures the achievement of women in the workplace, the legal industry, or anywhere else.

Join me in proposing a list of high-achieving women in the legal industry that are daily making a positive impact. No price tag attached. Just submit your entries to melody@naflp.org with a description of why you think they qualify as high-achieving women in the law.

Quality vs. Quantity - the billable hour mousetrap

2009-01-28T06:35:00.000-08:00

Billable hours have become a vicious task master hanging over lawyers’ heads, encouraging them to abandon all life outside of the office in quest of squeezing the most hours, and thus the most money, out of the day. It discourages efficiency of work by definition (why finish a project in 8 hours if you can stretch it out to a 20-hour billable project?) and has no correlation to the “quality” of the work product. “Quality” is defined here as something of value or use to a client. Is the 20-hour brief a “higher quality” than the 8-hour brief? At best, the client will never know. At worst, it is blatant fee gouging.

These facts seem self-evident to many, including veteran attorney Evan R. Chesler in the Forbes article "Kill the Billable Hour":

The billable hour makes no sense, not even for lawyers. If you are successful and win a case early on, you put yourself out of work. If you get bogged down in a land war in Asia, you make more money. That is frankly nuts.

Of course it is nuts, but these self-evident facts are still lost on far too many involved in the legal profession. In the January 2009 issue of the California Bar Journal, the article "Will a bad economy force more changes in the profession?", cites Richard Gary of Gary Advisors, a former chair of Thelen, Reid and Priest, as thinking the billable hour isn’t going to disappear.

“We’ve been thinking about going to a different model for 20 years and it’s never happened. Maybe young people will come up with a different mousetrap.” However, [Mr. Gary] added, “I still think it’s the best way to measure value because it is a mechanism of measuring the amount of work that a lawyer did for a client on a particular matter.”

With all due respect, hogwash! The amount of time spent on a project is not an accurate reflection of the end product’s value. Lawyers have forgotten that basic truth.

Early in my career I found myself as plaintiff’s counsel in a small civil matter against a defendant who was a part-time lawyer who seemed to revel in the opportunity to “practice” law. I vividly recall receiving a 25-page, single-spaced motion to dismiss the case. I can only describe reading the verbose brief as exceedingly painful on the eyes and brain. My opposition brief was one page, double-spaced, setting forth the statute supporting my position. I won the motion. Which brief was more “valuable”? The one that took at least 25 hours to write or the one that successfully convinced the judge?

In a more recent example of overkill, a federal judge in New York City found a $100,000-a-day fee application from law firm Dewey & LeBeouf for receivership work to be excessive. U.S. District Judge Denny Chin said that the fee request was “excessive in the context of a securities receivership where hundreds of victims of fraud have suffered substantial losses” and he questioned the firm’s billing rates which were as high as $950/hr for some partners, $605/hr for some associates, and $285/hr for summer associates.

Billing rates that high deserve far more than "questioning" and partial and temporary reduction in fee allowances (Judge Chin said they could reapply for the fees later in the case). Billing $285/hr for work done by law students (remember, summer associates have not even completed law school) is unconscionable by any standard.

Clients who pay such excessive fees, however, especially large corporate clients, need to acknowledge their own role in encouraging outrageous billing by lawyers. Law firm prestige, and thus the law firms that tend to attract higher net-value clients, has for too long been measured on the same scale as Fortune 500 companies – by annual revenue. Not cost efficiency. Not creative thinking. Not being able to demonstrate insightful legal opinions. Not being successful in any other arena than extracting the most money out of their clients.

Every year the American Lawyer magazine publishes AmLaw 100 and AmLaw 200 lists of supposed top law firms in the country. These lists have become the Fortune 500 equivalent for law firms. I verified AmLaw’s criteria for choosing the top law firms on their website; it was disturbing. AmLaw describes “revenue per lawyer” as being “the key measure of law firm financial success, and profits per partner [as] the metric that has turned law firm managers into contortionists.” They go on to credit increases in these metrics by “surging demand for high-end legal services and unrelenting annual rate hikes” and a continuing slowdown in naming equity partners (the top echelon of law firms) and increase in the number of non-equity associates. (see the referenced article at "Lessons of the Am Law 100 2008").

Corporate clients – the “surging demand for high-end legal services” is you, accepting the definition of “high-end” as being on the AmLaw 100 list. The “unrelenting annual rate hikes” is the price you are paying for accepting this criteria and rate hikes will keep increasing at these firms until you, the client, say "no." You are choosing “pedigree” and "prestige" over “quality” in legal services and have only yourself to blame for the outrageous legal bills on your desk.

In this time of economic downturn, with companies failing right and left, only the strong and flexible companies will survive. Finally, a substantial incentive to reinvent the antiquated mousetrap of billable hours has emerged. Corporate clients, stop paying outrageous hourly rates and look for quality legal counsel that will provide cost-efficient and useful services. Your company's survival may depend on it. Lawyers, law firms, and freelance legal professionals, take the lead in offering cost-effective, solution-based services to your clients at a price that is a good value for the money.

Here's to building a better mousetrap in 2009!

The great divide between legal education and practice

2009-01-21T06:02:00.000-08:00

Legal education in the country is very expensive. Most students emerging from law school these days are stooping under the weight of a $100K+ student loan burden. They (and their law schools) justify incurring such debt by saying that it will prepare them for a profession that will pay more than enough to cover these loan payments. Reading newspaper stories talking about $300, $500, $900/hr billable rates for lawyers, and seeing starting associate salaries advertised at well over $120K, buttresses that belief.

The fundamental problem, however, is this -- law school does not teach students to be lawyers, it teaches students to think like lawyers. This leaves them completely unprepared to actually practice their profession, making it infinitely harder to guarantee that they can pay those outrageous student loans in any meaningful period of time.

As a law student, one concern looming over our heads was the bar exam we would have to take at the conclusion of our legal education. "Are we being prepared for taking the bar exam?" we would query on more than one occasion. "No," was the answer, "you'll take a bar review course [at additional cost, of course] for that later. Law school teaches you to think like a lawyer." Another concern was the practical nuts and bolts of, say, what paperwork needs to be prepared for filing a lawsuit. The response to our queries? "You'll learn those things when you are working as an associate." The topic of how to run a law firm was probably never breached and there certainly wasn't any formal education on the subject.

In defense of my law school (not Ivy League, but a Tier 1 school), this approach has been the accepted model for law schools. Law schools churn out eager graduates with sharp legal minds, but with relatively no skills that they can convert into a meaningful, enriching career. These finely tuned legal minds are:

Recruited for the reputation of their law school and made to work ridiculously long hours to try to generate enough billable hours to cover artificially inflated entry salaries. These are often let go, or burn out, within a few years and a new crop of new associates take their places.
Become part of law firm and temp agencies' cash cow of document review, sitting in basements in front of computers with no hope of ever interacting with other lawyers, being paid a small fraction of the billable rate to the client.
Opt to work for themselves, working overtime to learn basic business skills while they try to generate enough income to pay their massive student loan bills.

There is a different way to approach legal education. It isn't novel or radical. It is just common sense.

Part of a lawyer's education should be practical, how to do tasks X and Y in the real world. While this part of learning a lawyer's profession used to be part of the mentoring process in law firms, it isn't anymore. A law firm's stature in the legal industry is, unfortunately, gauged by the number of billable hours they can crank out in any given year. Bigger is considered better. Training young lawyers in their profession is not directly billable time, thus dead wood that must be eliminated from the program. Those who decided to practice out on their own right after law school have an even worse situation. They are smart, they can learn, but it is a difficult financial curve to both educate yourself and bill enough hours to make your law firm stay afloat.

Another part of a lawyer's education should be in the business of law - how to run a law firm. I had the distinct pleasure some weeks ago to be invited to speak at one of our local law schools - Thomas Jefferson School of Law. Judi Sanzo, a local solo attorney, teaches a class called "Law Practice Management." I read the class syllabus with amazement. In a semester class, her students are taught about every aspect of starting and running a law firm - finances, marketing, personnel, insurance, everything. They even have mock law firms as part of the course. I daresay that her students emerge from law school with more practical business knowledge than most attorneys who have been practicing law for years.

As this new year starts and you begin working towards your business goals, look around you for sources of mentorship and education so you can bridge the gap between having a finely tuned legal mind and having a successful business as a legal professional. As you learn, share your knowledge and experience by mentoring someone less experienced than you.

Want to leave your "secure" legal job despite the economy? You are in good company

2009-01-09T06:27:00.000-08:00

I wanted to share with our readers an article from the CNN website about former high-paid executives of Google who have recently left their high-paying, secure jobs to start their own businesses and work for themselves, despite the uncertain economy.

"Big company. Big salary. Big sendoff.
That's the formula millions of American workers used for years to map their career trajectory. Conventional wisdom advised workers to land a job with a big company and retire with generous benefits.
But there's a new breed of worker who is making that formula seem as quaint as a VHS tape. They are the ultimate risk-takers -- they leave large, successful companies to pursue their own dreams even though the economy is reeling."

Read the entire article at They left the cocoon to blossom

Undoubtedly some of you resolved that this year you would leave the job you hate and work for yourself, but may hesitate because of the state of the economy. Read this article; you may change your mind.

Upcoming NAFLP Sponsored Event - Jan 22, 2009

2009-01-07T05:28:00.000-08:00

Join Lisa Solomon, Legal Research and Writing Pro, and presenter Cheryl Stephens, in an exciting teleseminar -

Plain Language Principles for Better Briefs

Thursday, January 22, 3:00 p.m. Eastern (12:00 noon Pacific)

In Making Your Case: The Art of Persuading Judges, authors Bryan Garner and Justice Antonin Scalia advise lawyers to “[b]anish jargon, hackneyed expressions and needless Latin” from their briefs. You can accomplish this goal, and write more persuasive briefs, by applying the principles of plain language legal writing. Plain language legal writing refers to legal writing that is well thought out, well organized, and understandable to the reader without interpretation: the language is clear, the legal concepts are explained and the technical terms are defined.

In this program, you’ll learn:

What it means to really know your audience
What your intro should include
When and how to use precedent
Ways to reword legal terms so they’re understandable in plain English
Methods for reducing wordiness
When ambiguity is useful, and when it’s a hindrance
Traps that make your writing cumbersome
How to structure a sentence for clarity
How to design paragraphs that work
What passive voice is good for

. . . and more!

Presenter Cheryl Stephens is the author of several articles and books, including Plain Language Legal Writing. Her plain language blog, Rapport, is a popular resource online. For nearly twenty years, she has been writing, speaking, and teaching about plain language, helping legal professionals to become more successful communicators using plain language principles.

Registration for this program includes the live teleseminar, plus access to a downloadable recording (mp3).

The cost for this program is $97. NAFLP members receive 25% off ALL Legal Research & Writing Pro programs and products. NAFLP will receive the promotion code via separate email for use during checkout.

To register, visit http://legalresearchandwritingpro.com/products and add a Silver Membership to your cart.

Reserve your place early!

What We're Working on for NAFLP in 2009

2008-12-19T09:11:00.000-08:00

2008 was an amazing year for the National Association of Freelance Legal Professionals. Thank you to all of our members and sponsors! We are overwhelmed and blessed by the response to the Association since our opening. Our goal has always been to provide a place of support, education and benefits for the freelance legal professional. Therefore, we are working hard to provide more opportunities for education and professional development, networking and specific benefits to our members. Here are a few things we're working on for 2009.

New Fresh Upgraded Website allowing immediate Access to Member Benefits including recorded teleclasses, the NAFLP forum, etc.

Teleseminars:

How to Market Yourself as a Freelance Legal Professional

How to Use Economic Downturns as Marketing Opportunities

Personal Coaching for Legal Freelancers

Financial Planning for the Self-Employed

How to Develop Flat-Fee Service Packages for Law Firms

Sponsors and Member Benefits:

Complete marketing packages for freelancers (website and print materials)

Discounts to various stores for your office needs

Retirement Solutions

Insurance (Health, Auto, Malpractice), and

Gym memberships

We would love to hear your ideas for member benefits, teleclasses you'd like to hear, or other resources we can provide. Please never hesitate to contact us!

Amanda L. Mineer - amanda@naflp.org
Melody Kramer - melody@naflp.org

Freelance legal professionals continue to unite

2008-11-10T10:05:00.001-08:00

In early 2008, Amanda Mineer and I launched an ambitious project - creating an organization to support and educate freelance legal professionals across the country. We didn't know how many freelance legal professionals were out there, and didn't know how many were embracing freelancing as a meaningful career choice.

We have been pleasantly surprised, and indeed somewhat overwhelmed, at the incredible response to our efforts. We have personally communicated with legal freelancers throughout the country and are working to assemble the resources that they need to enhance and grow their freelancing business.

Six months ago we reported that the NAFLP blog had been visited by readers from 39 states and 15 countries and NAFLP already had members from 26 states. As of today, we can now report that the NAFLP blog has been viewed by thousands of readers in every state in the United States, and in over 40 countries. NAFLP now has members in 45 states, including the District of Columbia.

Members, we encourage you to get on the NAFLP Members Forum and get to know your fellow freelancers and share ideas and excitement for this important segment of the legal profession. If you have not yet joined, we invite you to do so today.

Within the next few weeks, we will be announcing a new round of educational teleseminars on topics ranging from marketing to retirement planning. While plans are being finalized, please respond to our new poll regarding topics of interest.

Thank you for your continuing support of NAFLP!

Melody Kramer and Amanda Mineer

What is "success" in the legal profession?

2008-10-31T09:01:00.000-07:00

"If success is not on your own terms, if it looks good to the world but does not live in your heart, it is not success at all." Anna Quindlen

This quote prefaces an interesting YouTube video showing 30-ish lawyer "Jack" performing a ritualistic burning of his Harvard law school diploma.

An interesting article about "Jack" appears on the ABA Journal website "Looking for Simpler Life, Lawyer Burns Harvard Law Degree

What is the measure of success in your career?

Upcoming NAFLP sponsored event

2008-10-07T14:36:00.000-07:00

Join NAFLP affiliate, Lisa Solomon of Legal Research and Writing Pro, and Ed Poll, a nationally-recognized law firm strategist for this exciting tele-webinar -

Business Competency for Lawyers

Tuesday, October 21, 12:00 p.m. Eastern (9 a.m. Pacific)

Are you interested in launching a solo practice or small firm, but don’t know where to start?
Are you in the process of opening, or planning to open, a solo practice or small firm?
Do you want to take your existing solo practice or small firm to new levels of profitability?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, don’t miss this information-packed program, in which you’ll learn about:

metrics that measure your success
the importance of a business plan
the elements of a business plan
where marketing fits into your business plan
the different types of financial statements—and why they’re important for solos

All practicing lawyers need to have a firm grasp of the subjects covered in this “tele-webinar.” In a “tele-webinar,” you call in to a conference call line to receive the audio portion of the program. If you have access to your computer, you can follow along with a Power Point presentation as well. There is no need to install any software on your computer. If you’re calling in from outside the office, don’t worry: you’ll receive a link to the presentation slides the day before the program, so you can view them at your convenience.

Presenter Ed Poll is a nationally-recognized law firm strategist who coaches lawyers and consults with law firms for their greater profitability. Ed enables lawyers to be more effective with their clients, more efficient in their delivery of legal services and more profitable. The net result is more revenue for the family and less stress in the practice of law! The cost for this program is $97. Plus, when you register, you'll have an exclusive opportunity to purchase Ed's book, Business Competency for Lawyers: A Special Report for $18.50 (that's half off the $37 cover price).

NAFLP members receive 25% off ALL Legal Research & Writing Pro programs and products. (Members, the promotion code for use during checkout has been sent directly to you).

To register, visit http://legalresearchandwritingpro.com/products and add a Silver Membership to your cart.

Bigger is apparently not better - just look at Wall Street

2008-09-23T18:58:00.001-07:00

The current turmoil in the U.S. economy should emphasize an important point for freelancers - bigger is not necessarily better. Mega corporations are failing right and left and leaving disastrous consequences in their wake.

Is bigger really better? Fortune magazine says so with their Fortune 500 list. American Lawyer says so with their AmLaw 100 list. But I don't think so.

Since 1965, development of the internet has provided a classic example of "small and interconnected" being far superior to "big." During the Cold War, it was deemed essential to have communication links via military and university computers that would not be vulnerable to a single bomb or spy. The solution? Decentralize. Have a network that has no central point subject to disruption. Has it worked? Most definitely. Have you heard about any need to "bailout" the internet?

As freelancers, we are part of the "small and interconnected" business model and in a position to create a stronger economic structure within our own sphere of influence. Legal freelancers provide flexibility for law firms so they can expand and contract their overhead costs according to need, thereby making them more able to weather tough economic times. Likewise, freelancers themselves are able to balance work from various sources to create enough business for themselves.

The current economic downturn is an opportunity to market and build your freelance business. Use it!

Labor Day updated - envisioning a flexible work force

2008-09-01T10:26:00.000-07:00

Today is Labor Day, an annual celebration of the American worker and the important contribution of labor organizations to this country. What better day is there to rethink the structure of how Americans do their jobs?

Our daily lives have dramatically changed in the last few decades from established structure to flexibility on every level. It used to be that if you wanted to watch the 6 o'clock news, you had to be in front of your TV at 6 o'clock. If you wanted to conduct bank transactions, you had to physically go to the bank during regular business hours. If you wanted to do research, you had to go to a library during their regular hours. If you wanted to take a college course, you had to sit in a classroom. If you were away from home and wanted to make a phone call, you had to find a payphone. None of that is the same.

With all this new found flexibility in our lives, why do employers still have their employees work the same hours, with the same pay schedules, with the same leave schedules, and in the same offices? Does that create for more efficient work product? Hardly. Americans who are searching for more work-life balance, and parents who are committed to spending more time raising their kids, and abandoning traditional work modes in droves.

Labor unions were useful in their day, and in some industries and industry segments probably still serve an important purpose, but there are other options.

The National Association of Freelance Legal Professionals was founded and designed to assist individuals in creating their own jobs, their own careers, on their own terms and parameters. It is not, and never will be, like a workers union. It is NAFLP's goal to assist individuals in their own businesses.

NAFLP is just the beginning, however. What would the American work force be like if all industries had quality, driven freelancers who bargained for their own working conditions and led balanced lives?

Birds of a feather - selling the flock

2008-08-20T17:28:00.000-07:00

In fairness to the readers of my July posting regarding online networking groups on Facebook and LinkedIn ("Birds of a feather, or a wig . . .), including a reference to finding legal groups on LinkedIn via David Barrett, I thought I should post this information.

For those who are unaware, the managers of LinkedIn groups have access to the email addresses of group members. That is disclosed when you sign up for the groups. However, I just was advised that there is at least one effort to sell these "groups" on eBay. The following is the relevant portion of the email I received:

David Barrett (largest lawyer network on LinkedIn) acknowledges the new
LinkedIn policy on group ownership and seeks to transfer ownership of
approximately 90 of his 100 LinkedIn Lawyer Networking groups.
As a member of these groups or a connection to David, you are invited to contact
David about taking over ownership of a Lawyer Networking Group in the My
Link Law family and found at http://www.mylinklaw.com/
Contact David with your proposal for a particular group by email before
groups go up for auction on Ebay.
Best Regards, David A. Barrett, Esq

Birds of a feather up for auction? It just doesn't seem right.

Just to be clear, NAFLP does not, and will not, sell its LinkedIn or Facebook member lists (both are called "Freelance Legal Professionals") to anyone.

A lesson in work-life balance from Michael Phelps

2008-08-13T14:50:00.000-07:00

What kind of work schedule produces 5 Olympic gold medals (and counting)? According to the phenomenal US swimmer Michael Phelps who has been dominating the swimming competitions in Beijing, he trains 2-5 hours a day, 6 days a week. (Source: http://sports.ign.com/articles/627/627665p1.html)

Just something to think about when you plan your work week.

Recent USD law grad Edward R. Truitt, III uses legal freelancing to jumpstart his legal career

2008-08-06T08:27:00.000-07:00

Do law graduates have to work for a law firm for several years before they start their own law practice? No. Find out how to get started at NAFLP's August 12, 2008 event in San Diego, from someone who has forged his own legal career path straight out of law school.

Edward R. Truitt, III, graduated in 2005 from the University of San Diego School of Law. Upon receiving his license in December 2005, Mr. Truitt opened his own law office focusing on start-up and emerging growth business transactional and litigation services.

As a young practitioner, Mr. Truitt leveraged freelance contract work from other local attorneys to gain valuable experience, connections, and cash flow. Mr. Truitt currently serves as General Counsel for a San Diego start-up operating in stealth mode.

Mr. Truitt will be a panel member discussing "Realities of a Freelance Legal Professional" at NAFLP's August 12th "Finding Freedom! Working as a Freelance Legal Professional" event at the University of San Diego.

Register now to attend the August 12th event!

Jere R. Batten of Batten Accountancy will be featured at NAFLP’s August 12, 2008 event in San Diego

2008-08-01T13:20:00.000-07:00

NAFLP is pleased to introduce one of its panel members for “Logistics for Freelancers,” part of NAFLP's August 12th "Finding Freedom! Working as a Freelance Legal Professional" event at the University of San Diego.

Tax planning for any self-employed professional, including legal freelancers, can seem complicated, but Jere Batten has a way of making it simple. She will be giving an overview of what freelancers need to know about taxes and tax planning.

Jere R. Batten is a certified public accountant and a certified fraud examiner who is currently the president of Batten Accountancy, Inc. in San Diego. Ms. Batten has over 16 years experience in conducting audits, preparing tax returns, and consulting for small businesses, not-for profit organizations, and individuals. She received her CFE designation in 2002 and specializes in fraud prevention with her clients. She conducts fraud investigations usually pertaining to embezzlement issues and financial statement fraud. She is a member of the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners, the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants and the California Society of Certified Public Accountants.

Batten Accountancy, Inc. is a full service accounting firm for businesses, individuals and organizations that are serious about growth. Our clients value strategic planning and rely on accounting information to make business decisions. We work with clients who have high ethical standards and expect the same from their business advisors.

Register now to attend the August 12th event!

A definitive textbook on contract and freelance lawyering

2008-07-29T05:41:00.000-07:00

The concept of contract lawyering is foreign to many in the legal profession, but it doesn’t have to be anymore. In the most comprehensive book I have found to date on contract lawyering, "The Complete Guide to Contract Lawyering, What Every Lawyer and Law Firm Needs to Know About Temporary Legal Services" by Deborah Arron and Deborah Guyol, you can get a solid understanding of this segment of the legal industry.

The “Complete Guide” begins with a short history lesson about the structural development of the legal profession in the last century, and how the trends of “the megafirm and the billable hour, advances in technology, and individual lawyers' rejection of the existing law practice model" have lead to the growth of today’s market for contract legal services.

Using real life examples, the book looks at each side of the equation – what contract lawyers should know, and what hiring lawyers should know – and concludes with a section of joint concerns such as ethical issues, labor laws, and malpractice concerns.

For potential contract lawyers, exercises help the reader determine whether contract lawyering is right for them, and then talks about marketing, setting rates, finding work, and staying in business. The pros and cons of staffing agencies are also discussed.

“Contract work is not the right solution for every unhappy lawyer. But it’s not fraught with horrors either. As with most choices in life, real benefits coexist with definite disadvantages.”

Likewise for law firms, the book separates myth from reality, and then walks through the steps necessary to find and appropriately use contract lawyers to augment one’s practice. One of the featured attorneys is Trisha Mathers, a 41-year-old solo practitioner who had been working 15-hour-days and only making a moderate income. By coincidence, she got pitched by a contract attorney just when new motherhood and pneumonia were pushing her to the brink. She liked his work and soon had four contract lawyers working for her on various aspects of her work, allowing her to provide better service to her clients and earning a “very respectable living” while working an average of 30 hours a week.

I had some disagreement with the authors on terminology. Their hallmark criteria for contract work is being of a “temporary” nature, even though the book discusses both working for staffing agencies and working for yourself. For NAFLP, there is a bright-line distinction between “contracting” (working as an employee of a staffing agency) and “freelancing” (working for yourself). Even casual research shows a much higher level of job satisfaction among freelancers vs. temporary/contract workers. Despite the terminology, however, the book does give plenty of examples of lawyers making a permanent career of contract/freelance work.

I consider this book an essential textbook for anyone who wants to learn the basics of contract or freelance lawyering, or wants to enhance their freelance practice.

In fact, I was so impressed with the “Complete Guide” that I contacted the publisher to get a special rate for NAFLP members. Go directly to the publisher’s site - http://www.decisionbooks.com/ - to order this book and identify yourself as an NAFLP member, and you can get the book for $27.00 + free shipping. (NAFLP doesn’t get any money out of this; we just want you to have the opportunity to read this book.)

Upcoming NAFLP Sponsored Event

2008-07-22T10:28:00.000-07:00

Brought to you by Legal Research and Writing Pro -

Beyond Hourly Billing:

How to Implement Flat Fee and Other Alternative Billing Arrangements
Tuesday, August 19 at 12:00 p.m. PST

There’s been a lot of buzz recently about abandoning or moving beyond billable hours, but is it possible for freelance lawyers to use alternative billing? What are the most common alternatives to hourly billing? What does "value pricing" mean? In this teleseminar, law practice management expert Allison Shields will explore these questions and more. The program will focus on which alternative billing methods are appropriate for freelance lawyers. You’ll learn how to implement those methods, even if you’re a new lawyer. You’ll learn what value billing is and how to talk about it with the lawyers who hire you. And you’ll learn the special problems encountered by freelance lawyers in using alternative billing arrangements, when it’s possible to overcome them, and how.

Click here to register, add a Silver Membership to your cart. The cost for this program is $97. NAFLP members receive 25% off ALL Legal Research & Writing Pro programs and products (the promotion code will be provided to NAFLP members directly). A recording of the program will be made available to registrants at no additional charge.

Birds of a feather, or a wig . . . online networking groups from serious to silly

2008-07-16T20:17:00.000-07:00

Online networking is all the rage these days, from our own NAFLP Members-Only Forum and open Freelance Legal Professional groups on LinkedIn and Facebook to any number of other online communities. I set out to compile a list of groups that might be of interest to NAFLP members and found more than I ever imagined. Thus I abandoned, for the moment, any attempts at a comprehensive list. I have collected, however, a list of some groups that you may want to check out for business leads, mutual support, job postings, or a hearty laugh.

First on the Facebook paralegal group list is Did I seriously graduate from college to become a paralegal? boasting a membership of 477 (apparently unhappy in their career) members.

“Did you just finish paying $40,000 a year to earn a degree from a top university and are now wondering why you now make binders for a living? Are you sick and tired of making labels and sticking them on folders? Do you understand (but do you truly understand?) what a redweld-cut feels like? Do you have more client/matter numbers ingrained in your memory than phone numbers of your friends (who you don't hang out with anymore anyway because you're always at work)? Do you have nightmares about having bates stamped documents beginning with the last number from the last production rather than the next consecutive number? Have you pulled an all-nighter doing privlogging? Do you have absolutely zero desire to be a career-paralegal? Do you need to use a Tide pen after lunch to remove pizza? Do you eat all your meals in the same building you work in? If these disgruntled complaints sound familiar and you get your daily workout by lifting boxes of documents, then this is the group for you.”

I, of course, invited them to check out NAFLP for more career options.

Other Facebook groups for paralegals include Paralegals Networking Gateway, Legal Assistant Support Group, Paralegals Anonymous, Paralegal Division of the State of Texas, Paralegal & Temp Jobs in London, BC Paralegals, Paralegal, Paralegal Pipeline, Paralegal/Legal Assistants of Halifax, and Paralegal Protest.

Facebook groups for interpreters and translators include Freelance Translators, Translators United, Leave Translation to the Translators, Interpreters and Translators, Translation Jobs, and I'm a Translator, get me out of here . . . (maybe they should chat with the "Did I seriously graduate from college to become a paralegal" group).

Here are a selection of Facebook groups for lawyers – Law Students Building a Better Legal Profession, Women Lawyers - Back on Track , Future Corporate Lawyers, Future Lawyers of America, and Young Barrister Group.

Want to find legal groups on LinkedIn? Here's how I do it. Log in, search for David A. Barrett, Esq., the World's Largest LinkedIn Lawyer, review his group list and pick your favorites.

The Brits, however, take today’s award for the best laughs! These two groups were my favorites:

Save the Wig! “Various types have been threatening to abolish barristers' wigs for decades. But to my dismay, I learned last night that the Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales has resolved to abolish wigs in all civil courts in England and Wales. Voice your opposition.”

Perhaps those in opposition to wig abolishment want to ensure they continue to be recognized as barristers rather than solicitors, for reasons set forth by the next group.

"Barristers are better than solicitors in every conceivable way" group. “On the one hand you have barristers- dashing, glamorous, obscenely intelligent and effortlessly classy. Daily they stride forth, fearless and proud, to fight tirelessly for justice, freedom and the underdog, while nobly robed in wig and gown, which may be archaic, yet remain oddly alluring. The pitiful masses can only gaze in admiration as counsel hoist aloft their verbal lances, and engage in their rhetorical joust, intent only on victory (and on getting the £50 fee for some shitty bail application). And on the other side you have solicitors- squinty eyed, sallow skinned desk monkeys. Clothed in their cheap, sensible suits, boasting less charisma than a volume of the white book, and more often than not impotent. Essentially glorified secretaries, these bastards still for reasons unbeknown to any reasonable man receive sickeningly generous training contracts, before starting work on a salary which would give the average pupil a wet dream. But this is clearly only a comfort blanket, a pathetic attempt to numb the awe and envy we know they all feel for their glorious legal brethren at the Bar.”

Have any great groups to share? Email us at melody@naflp.org.

Talk about outsourcing - law firm travels to cyberspace to market services

2008-07-14T06:49:00.001-07:00

Some law firms are desperately hanging on to traditional ways of doing business, but some are boldly going where no law firms have gone before. I am talking about Davis LLP, a Canadian law firm whose Video Games & Interactive Entertainment Law practice group has opened a branch office in cyberspace.

No kidding! Davis LLP, who prides itself on creativity, has opened a law office in a virtual world called "Second Life."

“The virtual world of Second Life gives us the opportunity to interact with our current and potential clients in a unique way,” says Dani “Lemon Darcy” Lemon at Davis LLP. “We also aim to generate business leads and attract job candidates for our bricks-and mortar business through Second Life,” according to a story on the blog Law Vibe blog.

Maybe the virtual world is a great place for law firms to test innovation. The Second Life world has a fully-integrated economy architected to reward risk, innovation, and craftsmanship. Residents create their own virtual goods and services. Because residents retain the IP rights of their creations, they are able to sell them at various in-world venues. Businesses succeed by the ingenuity, artistic ability, entrepreneurial acumen, and good reputation of their owners. The legal profession sure could use some ingenuity.

Second Life has over 14 million “residents” and 65,000 virtual acres to develop, so I am sure they will need many more legal professionals.

I couldn’t resist a visit to the future and checked out the cyber Davis LLP. After teleporting to the closest town square, I made the short walk to the Davis waterfront offices. I didn’t find any attorneys, but settled into a comfortable leather couch in the lobby. As I sat down to relax, hoping that an associate or paralegal would peek around the corner at any minute, I suddenly began laughing at the irony. This modern, cyber law office still had massive bookshelves with legal books!

Breaking the quality code, Part 1 - review work product, not law school diplomas

2008-07-08T15:56:00.000-07:00

Last week, Bruce MacEwan, at the Adam Smith, Esq. blog, joined NAFLP in tackling the question of what constitutes a good attorney – "How High Quality Are Your Lawyers? (How Can You Tell?). He submits that there is “an inability, or at least a failure, of clients to measure quality of legal services. With no real handle on what’s extraordinary work, what’s acceptable work, and what’s unacceptable work, client’s buy the ‘proxy’ of prestige firm, law school pedigree, and yes, high hourly billing rates. . . .” Citing a “core market information failure, which is clients’ consistent and nearly universal inability to assay quality of their lawyers . . .” he challenges BigLaw and Fortune 500 firms to “start thinking creative . . . about what ‘quality’ in legal services really means.”

At least one new company is thinking of some new ways. JD Supra) is an online directory of lawyers with samples of their work product for any client or attorney to view. Aviva Cuyler, a San Francisco-based attorney who founded JD Supra, is cited a recent article as hoping to create “a central hub for information about the law and the people behind it” ("A Revoluation in Online Legal Content", July 7, 2008. http://www.law.com/). I see it as something far more – it is at least one place where potential clients and other lawyers can see and evaluate one’s work.

Mitch Matorin, a solo practitioner in Massachusetts, was cited in the same article as “see[ing] JD Supra as one way to help level the playing field between small and large firms. . . . a tool for potential clients to find qualified solo or small firm attorneys with the experience to handle matters that they otherwise would direct to large firms simply out of familiarity. JD Supra permits them to see examples of his actual work product and make a reasoned hiring decision.” Before you think that this is limited to showing off legal writing skills alone, think again. You can also post transcripts of court hearings and depositions to show off your verbal skills too.

On the flip side, looking at law school diplomas is not creative. Out of curiosity, I did a little research regarding the tiering of law schools. My brief research was so disturbing that I will be returning to the subject in later posts. Here’s the short history. The most widely known ranking of law schools is published by U.S. News & World Report. Their criteria can be found here - http://www.usnews.com/articles/education/best-graduate-schools/2008/03/26/law-methodology.html.

This ranking system has been widely criticized and is not endorsed by the American Bar Association or the Law School Admission Council. The Association of American Law Schools, via its executive director Carl Monk, is cited as saying that "these rankings are a misleading and deceptive, profit-generating commercial enterprise that compromises U.S. News and World Report's journalistic integrity.” I absolutely agree.

Now it seems that new games are afoot in the ranking system. ("Change Ahead for Law School Rankings"). It seems that US News wants to include part-time students in its ranking process, which could prompt some law schools to drop such programs in order to keep up their rankings because part-time students don't fit into the same profile as full-time students. According to Daniel D. Polsby, dean of George Mason University School of Law in Arlington, Virginia, cited in the article,

"At every law school I know with a part-time program you are talking about [students who are] older, racial or ethnic minorities, people with jobs and families, people with interesting life experience that kids who are just past adolescence can't be expected to have," he said. ‘Their college records are many years in their past [part of US News ranking criteria] and a less impressive measure of the law student he or she will be. Shutting them out will damage the profession.’”

We have now come full circle, haven’t we? If you don’t have a proper “pedigree” you can’t get into the high ranked school, if you can’t get into the high ranked school, you can’t get the mega-bucks BigLaw job, thus lowering your school's ranking . . .

Enough already!

For those who are still hung up on law school rankings, however, you may find it interesting to learn that many members of NAFLP come from Tier 1 law schools such as Columbia, University of Virginia, UCLA, George Washington, Boston College, Notre Dame, Washington and Lee, Seton Hall, UC Hastings, Indiana University, and Brooklyn Law School. We even have two members from No. 1 ranked Yale Law School. Yours truly graduated from No. 73, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, also Tier 1.

Upcoming NAFLP Sponsored Events

2008-07-06T20:54:00.000-07:00

LIVE EVENTS

FINDING FREEDOM! WORKING AS A FREELANCE LEGAL PROFESSIONAL
August 12, 2008, 11am-2pm PST, San Diego, CA
PROGRAM SCHEDULE

11:00 am - Welcome and Opening Remarks
11:15 am – 12:15 pm - Realities of a Freelance Legal Professional Career
Learn how law firms use freelancers as a part of a successful business model, and how freelancing can be used by young attorneys starting a practice, or more experienced attorneys seeking a career change.
12:15 pm – 1:00pm - Lunch is served
1:00 pm - 2:00pm - Logistics for the Freelancer
Experts on tax planning, retirement planning, and marketing techniques will give freelancers ways to increase income and spend it wisely.

This event will sell out quickly! Reserve your space today! Cost is $49 for NAFLP members and $59 for non-members. Become a member today!

REGISTER NOW - SPACE IS LIMITED

TELESEMINARS

THE SUCCESSFUL SOLO MINDSET: OVERCOME YOUR FEARS TO ACHIEVE YOUR PROFESSIONAL GOALS
Tuesday, July 15 at 10:30am PST
Many lawyers and professionals long to hang out a shingle, but fear holds them back. Others may face an opportunity to take their practice to the next level—perhaps to hire that first associate or take on a case outside of their comfort level—but rather than embrace these challenges, they hold back or procrastinate about making a decision. In this course, presenter Carolyn Elefant will identify some of the fears that solos and solos to be face, such as:

*fear of failure
*fear of asking for help
*fear of loss of financial stability
*fear of "what others will think"
*fear of embarrassment

Next, Carolyn will examine the mindset of successful solo lawyers and entrepreneurs and devise a plan to address each of the fears that prevent you from achieving success. This program will not only offer the inspiration you need to break free from your fears, but will also provide intensely practical steps on how to reach this goal.

Click to register, add a Silver Membership to your cart. The cost for this program is $97. NAFLP members receive 25% off ALL Legal Research & Writing Pro programs and products. Enter promotion code NAFLP during checkout. A recording of the program will be made available to registrants at no additional charge.

"Pedigree" vs. "Quality" - Part 2

2008-07-05T08:16:00.000-07:00

The Wall Street Journal Law Blog article that prompted my last post (there were actually two inter-related articles on the Blog - "New Comer Law Firms Are Creating Niches with Blue Chip Clients" and "The Model Seemed Broken To Me - Looking At a Law Firm Alternative") have been commented on extensively in the past day and the same issues keep rearing their ugly heads. What constitutes “an elite firm”? Why is there a heavily promoted theory that if one does not land a job in a BigLaw they are a lesser lawyer?

On a corresponding note, Jeff Bleich, President of the California State Bar, wrote "Reflections on our Reflection" in the California Bar Journal, July 2008 issue, about how the makeup of the legal profession is a poor reflection on the diversity of our society as a whole. Looking at the portraits of prior presidents of the state bar, primarily white males, caused him to reflect on the legal profession.

“You can’t look at that wall for long without wondering what the bar and what this profession lost decade after decade. All of the talented men and women who were excluded from practicing law, or from the bar, or from leadership because of their race, their gender, their orientation, their disability. Decade after decade, our profession was deprived of their talents because of a culture of narrow-mindedness and bigotry.

“While the portraits in the last few rows change a little, it is only a little. Outside the building, on the sidewalks and in the stores and restaurants nearby, men and women of every race, ethnicity and physical disability are doing every sort of job. But when we go to meetings of lawyers — whether it is local bar meeting, or a court calendar, or to see the next class of bar members sworn in, our group looks different. We have not come close to reflecting the sort of diversity that exists everywhere else in our society. . . . White males constitute only 44 percent of California’s population, yet they are 81 percent of the lawyers here. . . . "

I think Axiom (cited in "New Comer Law Firms Are Creating Niches with Blue Chip Clients") summed up the legal industry’s pervasive bigotry in its choice of words – “pedigreed” lawyers. The definition of “pedigree” is a line of ancestors, a lineage, or a list of ancestors of a purebred animal. The word is most often used by dog and horse breeders, as well as other geneticists.

“Quality” on the other hand, is defined as superiority of kind, degree or grade of excellence, and having a high degree of excellence.

Am I missing something? Is it really true that for Axiom to place its lawyers with blue chip clients (corporate America), the lawyers in its stable (pun intended) need to demonstrate “pedigree” rather than “quality”?

I came across a blog article from 2003 (which could have been written yesterday in that its contents are equally applicable today as then) entitled "Why are Lawyers Such Snobs?" The article is worth reading in its entirety, but a few quotes are cited here:

“Any conversation about the future of the profession is incomplete if it doesn't acknowledge how pervasive and influential our profession's snobbery about pedigree is. . . .

“[O]ur profession worships credentials. We assume people from big, fancy law firms are smarter, and we assume people from fancy expensive law schools are better. You're a big liar if you pretend it's not true. . . .

“People, this is crap! Let's think about this. Is this really a good way to discern among people in our profession? I thought the Harvard summer associates in my class were the worst of the bunch -- not good writers, not especially impressive thinkers, and with an air of entitlement that was really ugly. The guy in my class who will be the best lawyer is a former merchant marine who didn't have the interest or inclination to go anywhere but UMaine, but he's got a fantastic mind, a real-world practicality and a great work ethic. . . .

“[T]he gist of it is, our profession exerts a nearly irresistible pressure on talented young people to climb to the highest rung of a specific and extremely narrow ladder. To do so, they incur big big debt, and take on impossibly demanding schedules, at school and in the beginnings of their professional career. And then the golden handcuffs kick in (and the professional snobbery sinks deeper) and making a different choice means admitting you can't "hack it". It's a real trap for the unwary.”

I wholeheartedly agree!

"Pedigree" vs. "Quality" - stereotypes continue to plague the legal and corporate world

2008-07-03T06:22:00.000-07:00

Ashby Jones at the Wall Street Journal Law Blog has reported about one example of inroads that an innovative law firm has made into well-known large corporations such as Morgan Stanley, Credit Suisse Group, Cisco, General Electric, Google, and Xerox. "New Comer Law Firms are Creating Niches with Blue Chip Clients"

“The legal industry isn't known for innovation. But a few upstarts have come up with a business model that challenges the tight grip big law firms hold on corporate business. This new breed of firms is landing blue-chip clients and, in the process, making money.”

The article features Axiom Global, Inc. and discusses how they charge corporate clients less by using more virtual practices, usually having their attorneys work at the client's offices, and use of a flexible staffing model. At least one of the obstacles that they are facing is equally applicable to legal freelancers - perception of quality of attorneys.

“Axiom will have to continue to persuade the change-resistant legal world that its lawyers are good. ‘I was skeptical at first,’ says Xerox's Mr. Liu. ‘I had to get over a fear that they weren't going to be as committed to the job or to the work as a permanent person.’”

Axiom's solution to this obstacle, however, smacks of the same snobbery that has caused big law firms hold on corporate business practice in the first place - "pedigree" over skill.

“Perhaps the biggest obstacle to Axiom's growth plans: a lack of lawyers who fit its bill: pedigreed and law-firm-trained lawyers ready to jump off the traditional track. 'It's our biggest hurdle right now,' says Mr. Harris [a founder of Axiom], who adds that for every 100 lawyers who apply for employment at Axiom, the company hires one."

“[I]t isn't a problem that seems to be causing Mr. Harris sleepless nights. ‘Law firms are likely to continue making lawyers unhappy for years to come,’ he says.”

This may be a shock to the corporate world, but neither "pedigree" nor big law firm experience provides any reliable indicia of quality of legal services. Freelancers, go out and show corporate America how good you are!

A little something for legal interpreters and translators

2008-07-02T05:35:00.001-07:00

As little information as there is "out there" about freelancing lawyers and freelancing paralegals, information for freelancer interpreters and translators seems to be even more sparse.

From my personal experience, a large proportion of lawyers do not comprehend the delicate and critical nature of an interpreter or translator's role in legal proceedings at all. They have no understanding of the cultural impact on language and communication, resulting in inaccurate assumptions about credibility and demeanor of the foreign speaker.

I found a great article that outlines many of these problems and proposed solutions which may also be helpful to freelance interpreters as they create their marketing materials for law firms.

"A Lawyers Guide to Cross-Cultural Depositions", All Language Alliance, 2003

Feature article on FreelanceSwitch.com, and more

2008-07-02T05:06:00.000-07:00

FreelanceSwitch.com, an online community of all types of freelancers, has just published an article titled "Freelancing and the Law" featuring Melody Kramer and the National Association of Freelance Legal Professionals.

"Most people think about creative careers when they consider freelancing. But not Melody A. Kramer. She’s the Co-Founder of the National Association of Freelance Legal Professionals, and has cracked the code on how legal eagles can break into freelancing, too." Read more at http://www.freelanceswitch.com/.

Other recent postings regarding legal freelancing include the following:

"Freelance Paralegals - A Balancing Act", LawCrossing, undated

"What Holds Unhappy Lawyers Back from Leaving?", Law Street Journal Law Blog, June 23, 2008

"Outsourced Legal Services", Prism Legal, undated (this article includes a survey of legal outsourcing providers and users in the US and the UK)

"Legal Outsourcing in India is Growing, but Still Confronts Fundamental Issues", Law.com, January 23, 2008

Update - Law Street Journal interested in why lawyers leave the law too

2008-06-25T03:50:00.000-07:00

Just a brief update on my prior post - it seems that Monica Parker's upcoming book has also caught the attention of main stream media. The Wall Street Journal Law Blog has also interviewed Ms. Parker. (http://www.leavingthelaw.com/blog/2008/06/good-news-about-unhappy-lawyer.html)

We'll post the link when the article appears.

Escaping the legal profession is becoming its own business

2008-06-19T07:43:00.000-07:00

How do you know that dissatisfaction with the legal profession has reached an all-time high? When helping lawyers leave the profession becomes its own cottage industry.

That may sound far-fetched, but it is not. (Former) lawyer Monica Parker in Atlanta, Georgia, has done just that in starting her own company – LeavingTheLaw.com. I recently talked with Monica about her company and the reasons for creating it.

“LeavingTheLaw.com is a business that helps unhappy lawyers find and pursue fulfilling work outside of the law. What inspired its creation was my own experience practicing law. Despite working at great firms, I was miserable because I wasn’t engaged in my work or using my talents. I longed for someone to help me find a way out of the law and into work I loved. Working with my own coach to make an escape, I discovered that I wanted to help others in the same predicament I was in. So I launched LeavingTheLaw.com.”

Not only has Monica started her own coaching business, she has also written a book on the subject of leaving the law, the soon-to-be-published book, “The Unhappy Lawyer: A Roadmap to Finding Meaningful Work Outside of the Law” (Sourcebooks, September 2008). This book is an action guide containing lots of self-assessments to help guide the reader in the transition process. Lawyers are excellent problem solvers, Monica said, but it is hard for us to make decisions for ourselves.

Not everyone completely leaves the law, Monica acknowledges. “Doing freelance law is a terrific option for a number of my clients. They get to use their legal skills and work on short-term projects that give them the flexibility to pursue owning their own business, volunteer work, and just spending time doing things that they enjoy, like traveling, spending time with family, etc.”

Monica had some very direct advice for legal professionals considering changing their career, something that I wholeheartedly agree with - “Stop waiting for permission to make a change.” I add, “just do it!”

If you are interested in pre-ordering Monica’s book, link to Book Resources Page on the right.

Contract or freelance? Choosing your identity is essential to job satisfaction

2008-06-18T12:23:00.000-07:00

In 2005, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported a job satisfaction rating of freelancers is dramatically higher than that of temporary workers. In February 2005, there were 10.3 million independent contractors. The majority of independent contractors (82 percent) preferred their work arrangement to a traditional job. In dramatic contrast, on-call workers and temporary help agency workers had only 46 and 32 percent, respectively, preferring their work arrangements. Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, “Alternative employment arrangements and worker preferences,” originally published August 4, 2005.

The term “contract attorney” has often been used to identify any lawyer who works on a non-employee-for-the-law-firm basis. There are a large number of staffing agencies that serve as the “employer” and provide lawyers for law firms to use on a temporary basis. The same happens with paralegals, legal assistants and secretaries, interpreters and court reporters, though the appellation of “contract” is not usually applied to these other professionals.

Working for a staffing agency, however, is not the same as working as a freelancer, and confusion of the terms undermines the perception of legal freelancing as a whole.

Contract attorneys are treated as second-class citizens both in terms of law firm atmosphere, mentoring opportunities, and the perception of their resume for future jobs. The perception is that these attorneys were unable to get their first job option (assumed to be an associate position at a prestigious large law firm) and that working contract was their second choice. It is a perception of inadequacy and failure right out of the starting gate, hardly a selling point for ones competency as a legal professional.

Unfortunately, this perception is not far off of reality in most instances. Contract attorneys often work the same long hours as young associates, work on repetitious and boring work, their brains on not challenged with new problem-solving opportunities, are often denied overtime pay (because they are lawyers), have neither stability of income (projects come and go and are often cancelled on short notice), benefits, nor the promise of eventual partnership. Not only that, but many contract attorneys continue to seek a “regular” job with the same prestigious law firms that they were unable to get into initially.

The key difference between contract attorney (or paralegal, etc.) and a freelancer by definition is the identity of employer. A staffing agency simply does not have the incentive to provide a contract legal professional with any benefit other than sufficient pay to get them to come to work every day that they want them to come to work. A freelancer does not wait for a phone call and then jumps when asked to work here or there on some boring project or another that will simply pay the bills. Freelancers are employed by the only people that has the freelancer’s best interests at heart – themselves.

Upcoming Events for the Freelance Legal Professional

2008-06-09T10:06:00.000-07:00

Powerful Persuasive Writing Techniques for Your Marketing Materials and Briefs

Presented by Lisa Solomon of Legal Research & Writing Pro

As a freelance legal professional, you're responsible for both your professional development (improving your substantive legal knowledge and skills) and business development (marketing). In an exiting teleconference, nationally-recognized legal writing expert Lisa Solomon, Esq. will help you achieve both your professional development and business development goals. Lisa will explain some of the most powerful persuasive writing techniques used by professional copywriters, then teach you how to apply these techniques to boost the effectiveness of both your briefs and your marketing materials.

The teleconference will be held

Tuesday, June 17 at 12 p.m. Pacific (3pm Eastern)

The cost for the live program is $97

A recording of the program will be made available to registrants at no additional charge.

NAFLP members receive 25% off ALL Legal Research & Writing Pro programs and products. Enter promotion code NAFLP during checkout.

To register, visit Legal Research & Writing Pro at www.legalresearchandwritingpro.com/products

Tax Planning and Accounting for the Freelance Legal Professional

Presented by National Assocation of Freelance Legal Professionals with special guest speaker, Jere Batten of Batten Accountancy

Working as a Freelance Legal Professional brings a lot of freedom and the ability to focus on what you truly enjoy about the legal profession. It also means that you are self-employed, responsible for your own bookkeeping, billing, tax planning etc.

In this teleclass, Jere Batten, President of Batten Accountancy and advisor to small businesses and the self-employed for over 15 years will provide information related to business expenses, tax planning with irregular income and recommended bookkeeping and recordkeeping techniques specifically for the Freelance Legal Professional.

The teleclass will be held on
June 20, 2008 12pm PST (3pm EST)
Cost is $39 for NAFLP members and $49 for non-Members
a recording of the class will be available to registrants at no additional cost

REGISTER NOW, SPACE IS LIMITED

If you are a member, please see your email for a special link for the discounted price or email us at info@naflp.org for the link.

Not yet a NAFLP Member? Join us at www.naflp.org

How balanced is your work-life?

2008-05-25T12:21:00.000-07:00

This morning I found an interesting tool on the JDBliss - Balancing Life and the Law site. You input times you arrive at the office and leave the office, and then you input time spend on administrative matters, personal matters, professional development, and meals. It works for working at a law firm or working for yourself. It then calculates how many hours a year (and how many a week) you will need to work at home to meet your target hours. I was stunned by the outcome for my days - no wonder I'm so tired!

Do your own work-life balance and let us know what your results are.

http://www.envoyglobal.net/jdbliss/test/calculator2.htm

"Finding Freedom" teleseminar for freelance attorneys was a great success

2008-05-23T17:34:00.001-07:00

Nationally-recognized contract lawyering expert Lisa Solomon, Esq. presenting NAFLP's first teleseminar on May 22nd and met with resounding positive feedback from participants. Members from New York, New Hampshire, Florida, Maryland, Missouri, Kentucky, Oregon, California and other states were among the participants.

"Freelance Freedom: How to Get Started as a Contract Lawyer" served as an introductory session covering the essential information for freelance attorneys who are just beginning in a freelance career track, but also served as a reminder to veterans of the key elements for success. Even I, who have done freelance work for the better part of 15 years learned new things and got new ideas for increasing the freelance side of my law practice.

A recording of the teleseminar will be available shortly. To reserve a copy, email amanda@naflp.org. To obtain information on upcoming teleseminars put on my Lisa Solomon, check out her website at http://www.legalresearchandwritingpro.com/.

NAFLP's first live event has been rescheduled for August 12th in San Diego. Additional information on this event will continue to be posted and we welcome everyone to join us!

"If You Build It . . . They Will Come" - Legal Freelancers Are Uniting!

2008-05-08T14:12:00.000-07:00

It has been less than two months since Amanda and I officially launched the NAFLP blog and started accepting memberships. The response has been phenomenal and we want to thank all of you for supporting our efforts.

Just to give you a little glimpse of how far word has spread about NAFLP, as of today, our site has been visited by readers in 39 states and 15 countries, including India, Pakistan, Australia, Norway, Canada, Germany, Spain, Russia, and others.

Members of NAFLP are signing up daily and are currently located in the following states: Alabama, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Virginia, Washington, and Washington DC.

We suggest that you participate in the NAFLP Forum to get to know your fellow NAFLP members and support each other. Upon registration you should receive information on accessing the Forum. Contact us if you need this information - amanda@naflp.org. We also welcome you to participate in one or both of our upcoming educational events; information and registration links are above.

Thank you for joining with us in working towards successful careers and a better legal profession!

Practice Pointers - Making Tax Time for Freelancers Less "Taxing"

2008-04-30T14:06:00.000-07:00

Transitioning from getting a regular paycheck to getting paid as a freelancer can result in tax shock if you have failed to properly plan for your tax liability. With some simple planning, it can be much less traumatic.

CAVEAT – The following constitutes general suggestions of the author who has been self-employed for 13 years. It does not constitute legal or tax advice for any particular reader and by no means is a substitute for advice of a tax professional.

Regular paychecks have taxes withheld in an amount that at least approximates your tax liability at year’s end. This, of course, does not happen with self-employment income. Not only are there no withholdings, but you will probably be subject to self-employment tax in addition to your regular tax rate. Failure to pay estimated tax payments (as many freelancers do), you could result in a hefty tax bill on April 15th and possibly even additional penalties.

There are ways to avoid or minimize this unpleasantness.

First, and most importantly, talk to a CPA. It is impossible to overestimate the value of a competent CPA to your business. They can review your personal financial situation and make appropriate recommendations for recordkeeping and tax planning that fit your own situation.

Second, separate your business and personal finances. Whatever the structure of your business, take practical steps that will allow you to record and track income and expenses that are related to your business. It is complicated and inefficient to go through your personal checkbook to pull out business-related expenses for your tax returns, or other purposes. A simple solution can be to have a separate checking account into which you deposit all fees earned, and out of which you pay all business expenses. This will help you work with your CPA to maximize available deductions and ensure that your tax returns are correct.

Third, set aside money for taxes where you won’t be tempted to spend it. Armed with the information from your CPA, allocate a certain percentage of each paycheck to estimated taxes. It can be helpful to set this aside in a separate savings account to have handy for estimated tax payments or year end tax liability. Remember, your employer took this money out of your paycheck before, now you are your own employer.

Escape the Billable Hour Trap for Good, and Win $500

2008-04-11T11:09:00.000-07:00

I must give a heartfelt thank you to Jeff Bleich, President of the State Bar of California, for his recent article “Escaping the billable hours trap.” Several quotes are worth repeating here:

“We all know about the lifestyle burden that billable hours places on lawyers, but on a deeper level, a billable hours system is corrupting to our profession in both obvious and more subtle ways. . . .

“[the billable hour system] has cast an ethical cloud over the work we do, demoralized lawyers and degraded our efforts to train lawyers to solve problems.”

“[A]s a profession, we need to start finding billing methods that will reduce distrust and damage to our client relationships, that will refocus young lawyers on being problem-solvers again, and that will remind us of – rather than distract us from – why we are lawyers in the first place.”

The entire article, which is a very good read, can be accessed here: http://www.calbar.ca.gov/state/calbar/calbar_cbj.jsp?sCategoryPath=/Home/Attorney%20Resources/California%20Bar%20Journal/April2008&MONTH=April&YEAR=2008&sCatHtmlTitle=Opinion&sJournalCategory=YES

Mr. Bleich’s observations are not new. The legal profession has given lip-service to the problems inherent in a law firm business model that rewards inefficiency for years, but very little change has been made. So, if law firms are unwilling to lead the action to change, perhaps it is the freelance legal professionals that should make the first step.

Let’s stop talking about escaping “the billable hour trap” by actually opening the door and walking out. FreelanceLaw, Inc., a sponsor of NAFLP, has announced a contest related to this subject. FreelanceLaw will pay $500 to the freelance legal professional who produces the best marketing brochure for their services that features non-billable-hour pricing to potential law firm or inhouse counsel clients. The requirements are as follows:

1. The entrant must be a member of NAFLP.
2. The marketing brochure must be limited in size to both sides of an 8-1/2” x 11” page or the equivalent in an electronic format (i.e. for email advertising).
3. The brochure must contain an explanation of the benefits of the freelancer’s pricing structure over billable hours, and sample fees.
4. Submissions must be forwarded to mailto:melody@naflp.org on or before June 16, 2008.
5. Submissions will be judged on (1) professional appearance; (2) creativity of billing structure(s); (3) likelihood of commercial success. The winner will be announced on July 4, 2008, and the winner’s brochure will be featured in this blog and in an NAFLP press release.

This is an excellent opportunity for freelancers to take a significant step to make a positive change in the legal profession. I look forward to seeing your ideas!

Practice Pointers - Time Management for Freelancers

2008-04-07T09:28:00.000-07:00

One of the most difficult transitions between a salaried job and freelance work can be learning how to manage your time. There is no employer telling you when and where you have to be, and no one looking over your shoulder if you take a long lunch. As most freelancers will confess, there can be exhilaration initially with that freedom, sort of like playing hooky from school. However, as with everything else in life, moderation is key. Some simple guidelines to time management will help keep you on track.

Keep regular hours. You may have changed bosses, but you still have a responsibility to your “boss” to maintain a reasonably predictable schedule. This ensures that you put in enough hours to perform your contract work and manage the business side of your operation, and also lets you know when you are off work and can relax. This is especially important when you have a home office.
Schedule time for non-billable tasks, such as billing, marketing, etc. It is too easy to get engrossed in the current project you are working on and forget the ongoing business aspect of being a freelancer. Set specific times in your week for reviewing and handling your finances, and for regular direct and network marketing.
Keep a timesheet. Staying busy is not the same as making money. Keeping track of your time, even if you aren’t billing clients on an hourly basis, allows you to monitor how effectively you are spending your time. Record time spent on necessary, but non-billable work also so you can factor that into your pricing.
Schedule down time. As an employee, you got certain allocations for sick days, vacation, and holidays. As a freelancer, you should have the same benefits, but you have to give them to yourself. Set aside a certain amount of income each month to cover for times when you are not working.

Why Even Temporary Contract Lawyers Should Bother Joining an Organization

2008-03-31T15:47:00.000-07:00

A consistent thread keeps surfacing in discussions on and off of this blog - why should contract lawyers bother joining an organization when they hope they won’t be doing contract work for long?

The answer is simple. Most lawyers will be contract lawyers at some point in their career. The reasons will vary. Fresh out of law school, doing contract work may be a means of paying the bills until passing the bar or while interviewing for other jobs. At other points in time, the reasons may be the desire to have a healthy work-life balance, to care for your children, or care for your aging parents. Others simply like the flexibility and control over one’s own career.

Additionally, an increasing number of law firms and corporate legal departments will be looking to contract attorneys to assist or handle special projects. Most lawyers will thus also be using contract lawyers to handle projects for them. Having an intimate knowledge about this sometimes untapped pool of contract attorney attorney talent can increase the bottom line for the law firms and their clients.

Another important reason is networking, networking, networking. Contract lawyer contacts are often the source of job referrals or information about more challenging contract work. Many lawyers currently working non-freelance jobs have reported to us that they take every opportunity to hire contact lawyers when they need additional work done.

Joining NAFLP will engage contract attorneys and other freelance legal professionals in a productive, proactive community that is coming together for mutual education and assistance about the legal outsourcing segment of the legal industry. Whether you intend to work contract forever or only until another opportunity presents itself, NAFLP will provide you with useful career tools and a supportive network.

Effects of Student Loan Debts on Career Options

2008-03-27T09:12:00.000-07:00

We have started to get comments on some of our blog postings and want to encourage more. This blog is intended to be a discussion, and we welcome your comments.

Another aspect of career development that has not been discussed much is the impact of student loan debt on career options. Law school is not cheap (nor are paralegal programs), but I suspect that most students incur student loan debt, viewing it as an investment in their future. After all, if you are able to land a $150,000 annual salary upon graduation, an $80,000 student loan debt may seem worth the investment. Sometimes law firms will assist or pay off student loan debt, making it seem an even better investment.

However, if you do not get that high annual salary, such debt seems insurmountable and pointless. You may take the first job you can find just to keep yourself financially afloat, even if it does not meet any of your career goals.
Solutions? I have a few proposals, some simple, some a long shot. I am open to more suggestions.

First, if you are working on a contract basis, take a new look at your rates. Take the rate that is reasonable for your work and then add a "surcharge" for student loan repayment (this also should be done for benefits that you have to provide for yourself such as retirement, vacations, health insurance, etc.). If your clients or temp agency think your rates are too high, explain that they include this items which are normally provided to employees.

Second, take ample advantage of forbearances and other programs for altering payment schedules or sometimes reducing the total bill when needed. It is important to pay your financial obligations, but lenders are willing to work with you; don't hesitate to take advantage of these options.

Third, look into jobs that will pay some of your student loan debt. Certain organizations will contribute to student loan repayment when you work for them for a certain period of time. I believe the Peace Corps is one of these, but there are many others.

Fourth, and this is the long shot, perhaps there should be some lobbying for changes in tax laws or bankruptcy laws to allow more flexibility with respect to student loan repayments when the industry conditions are dramatically different than expected when you started school, thus making repayment much more difficult. Who wants to take on this lobbying job?

Most importantly, have a plan for getting your student loan debt paid off eventually. You may have to make many adjustments as the years go by, but having a goal does help.

Take a moment to respond to our poll regarding the volume of student loan debt of our readers.

Working as a Freelance Legal Professional....It can be a CHOICE!

2008-03-24T14:10:00.000-07:00

We've recently received emails and comments related to legal professionals working contract work, not out of choice, but out of "necessity." Many of these comments come from contract attorneys working on document review projects. Having worked such projects myself I can understand the frustrations and the feelings that you are not going anywhere in your legal career while working such projects.

I would like to introduce a possibly new concept about contract work, not only for attorneys, but for paralegals, court reporters and interpreters. Working as a Freelance Legal Professional can be a choice. A choice you make for your own life in order to allow YOU to control your days, your hours, your life! It may feel like that is impossible, but let me tell you, it isn't! I've worked freelance work for about three years, and it has allowed me to have true balance in my life and allowed me to start my own practice while always having freelance work to lean back on. Freelance work was MY choice, MY decision, not because I couldn't find another job, but because I CHOSE to! Now in my legal practice I hire Freelance Legal Professionals to do project work and it allows me to outsource work while not undergoing the expense of hiring an employee. There are advantages on both sides of the coin!

Our goal for the National Association of Freelance Legal Professionals is not only to create an environment for Freelance Legal Professionals to communicate and share troubles, frustrations etc., but also to create a revolution in the legal industry, to provide a truly 'acceptable' way for talented professionals to work on a freelance basis, not 'destroy' their career. We believe in the ability for us to change the industry norm for how Freelance Legal Professionals are paid, treated, and promoted. We believe in creating a standard, to changing the perception of those who work on a contract basis. We also believe in educating the legal community on the value of hiring Freelance Legal Professionals!

Believe in our goals, our vision? Join US! Enter code "freelance08" for FREE membership!

Participate in a Salary Survey for Contract Attorneys

2008-03-19T14:54:00.000-07:00

NAFLP has been invited to participate in collecting data for a survey by The Posse List (http://www.theposselist.com/). The purpose of the survey is to provide contract attorneys with real information on what starting salaries are for those who move into full-time positions after doing contract work.

For consistency purposes, please provide the following information:

1. Position/Job Title
2. Type of organization (e.g. law firm, non-profit, defense contractor, lobbying group)
3. Compensation - salary plus any bonus/commission
4. Location
5. # of years doing contract work
6. Years of legal experience you had before transitioning into this position (do not include contract work).

This information can be emailed to melody@naflp.org for compilation and forwarding, or directly to Kamal_A_Kamara@yahoo.com of The Posse List. If you want to provide information about others you know who made successful transitions, this is okay; so long as it is first-hand knowledge and not the "a friend of a friend" type information, but identify the information as such.

We will be posting the results when the survey has been completed.

Offshore legal outsourcing sparks concerns, and marketing strategies

2008-03-14T12:20:00.000-07:00

There has recently been an emergence of legal outsourcing companies that send work traditionally done by associates and paralegals overseas. India seems to be a common home for these practices. The work reportedly outsourced includes legal research and writing, document review, and other tasks.

As a practicing attorney, I have always felt a little queasy about foreign outsourcing of legal work, but I hadn't ever sat down and listed out the potential concerns. However, I stumbled across a recent blog entry from someone who does not even appear to be part of the legal industry, that had an amazingly insightful list of concerns that law firms and clients should have about the practice. The most troubling concern raised was that of foreign nationals having access to highly sensitive client information that could easily be sold to the highest bidder, with absolutely no recourse for the U.S. client. Other concerns with the practice of course include the inability of the responsible attorney to adequately supervise subordinates in other countries, lowered ability to confirm qualifications, and possible problems with unauthorized practice of law.

As with rising associate salaries, increases in outsourcing of legal and paralegal work, but with simultaneous concerns about the practice, present a marketing opportunity for freelancers.

Marketing efforts can focus on education about legal outsourcing as well as offering your services. For example, prepare a brochure citing the rise in legal outsourcing by law firms wanting to reduce costs, then explain how local outsourcing (i.e. outsourcing work to you) provides the same cost-cutting benefits while avoiding the possible problems inherent in offshore outsourcing.

Welcome novice law firms into the concept of local legal outsourcing with an offer they cannot refuse – a money-back guarantee or a reduced rate on your first project. Then, and above all, DO QUALITY WORK. There is no better source of referrals than satisfied customers.

"Runaway Associate Salaries" Present Marketing Opportunities for Freelancers

2008-03-07T10:57:00.000-08:00

On February 27th, Dan Slater of the WSJ Law Blog posted an article entitled “Runaway Associate Salaries Denting Profits-Per-Partner” (http://blogs.wsj.com/law/?mod=home_in_depth_reports) which talks of equity partners “watch[ing] helplessly as two associate raises . . . eat into their year-end take.” Can’t you just see the cartoon? Law school graduates tying senior law firm partners to their leather chairs behind mahogany desks, putting guns to their heads, demanding higher salaries.

Ironically, study after study shows that associates are willing to accept substantial cuts in pay in exchange for fewer hours. In an ABA Journal poll, a stunning 84.2 percent of those responding indicated they would be willing to earn less money in exchange for lower billable-hour requirements. (http://www.abanet.org/journal/ereport/f2as.html) See also “Law Firm Associate Dichotomy: Mega Salary vs. Pay Cut for Fewer Hours” at http://www.jdblissblog.com/2007/08/law-firms-suffe.html). But law firm partners are highly resistant to such change.

Frequently increasing associate salaries, it seems, are not a result of associates demanding more money, but law firms in a mad recruiting competition with rival law firms as well as the perception that if you want fewer hours, you can’t be serious about your work. While we could spend a great deal of time commenting on the flaws in this system, as freelancers, there is a way to use runaway associate salaries as part of your marketing pitch to potential clients.

By way of example, consider an inhouse counsel who usually would use an outside firm to conduct legal research projects and other projects. They are accustomed to receiving billings for work of those increasingly pricey associates and may be growing weary of them. As a freelancer, you can provide higher quality work product at a much lower price. Pull up the bios of a couple associates from local law firms that have approximately the same length of practice as you. Compare those with your qualifications and experience, and provide some samples of your work product (a good place to post samples of your work is a newly launched website http://www.jdsupra.com/).

Inhouse counsel are tentatively discussing outsourcing some of their legal projects. In January 2006 an article was published on InHouseBlog – “Freelance Attorneys: A Valuable Alternative For In-House Counsel . . . Sometimes.” (http://www.inhouseblog.com/index.php?sitesearch=search&s=freelance). Another article of note was published on the same site in January 2008 titled “GCs Embrace Outsourced Work” (http://www.law.com/jsp/ihc/PubArticleIHC.jsp?id=1201169145867&rss=ihc). If you are targeting inhouse counsel as potential clients, it would be well worth your time to peruse the InHouseBlog for other articles on the subject.

In your sales pitch, don’t forget to mention the benefits of outsourcing locally vs. offshore (India is booming with outsourced legal services). Then offer a money-back guarantee of your work. You have now given them no reason to not try your services and when you give them top quality work and predictable and reasonable prices, they will be hooked.

Lemons, Lottery Tickets, and Unintentional Contract Attorneys

2008-02-12T09:19:00.000-08:00

I have been reading with interest the complaints of contract attorneys nationwide. Washington DC and New York seem to be cities full of unhappy J.D.s in temporary attorney sweatshops grousing about this not being anyone’s dream job, being “hell on earth,” and surreptitiously looking for other jobs during lunch. (see “Attorney at Blah,” http://washingtoncitypaper.com/printerpage.php?id=34054). Of course there is also blogger Tom the Temp and his annual “Beastly Behavior Awards” and quest to “help expose the nasty sweatshops, swindling law schools, and opportunistic staffing agencies.” (see http://temporaryattorney.blogspot.com/ ).

Okay, life for the attorney that invested $150,000 of borrowed money into a law school education, betting on getting a six-figure salary upon graduation, is unhappy when he or she doesn’t get the expected payoff. They bought an expensive lottery ticket and it didn’t pay off. So they sink into a deep depression, don’t know how to explain their “failure” to friends and family (much less their student loan creditors), and take any work they can get, even mindless document review through temp agencies.

Some still hold on to their lottery tickets, sending out resumes and frantically job searching while they waste away in law firm basements with dusty documents, hoping against hope that some law firm will rescue them from their fate, and that the weeks, months, or years of contract lawyering won’t be held against them.

Other contract attorneys try to be more optimistic. “If life gives you lemons, make lemonade,” is their creed and they try to see the light at the end of the tunnel (“I won’t be doing this forever”) or try to enjoy the flexibility, even though flexibility with a temp agency means you never know from day to day whether you will have work.

COME ON PEOPLE! You are bright, educated, driven individuals. If you weren’t, you wouldn’t have made it through undergrad, certainly would have failed law school, never passed the bar exam, and would not have the privilege of paying annual bar dues. You can do better than allowing yourself to be treated by employers in a manner that is unacceptable. You have a voice – use it! You have feet – start walking!

You are in charge of your career future and no one has your interests at heart better than you do. Not a law firm (large or small) and not a temp agency.

Here is the thought question for the day – if you could structure your work week anyway you wanted (if it was not dictated to you by an employer), what types of work would you want to do and what compensation and benefits structure would you want? If you don’t know precisely what you want, you can never get it.

Next, we’ll discuss taking your goals for your legal career and talk about the necessary steps to making it a reality.

"Almost Impossible" Means It Is Possible for Contract Lawyers to Organize

2008-02-07T13:53:00.000-08:00

I read with interest a February 5, 2008 post by Joe Miller of http://jdwired.com/ entitled “5 Reasons Why Forming a Contract Attorney Union Is Almost Impossible.” I’m so glad he said “almost.” He is optimistic that something can be done, and I want to respond to his legitimate points.

1. Time Consuming. It is true that a large amount of energy is required to start a new organization, developing plans of action, mailing lists, etc. The National Association of Freelance Legal Professionals is the result of years of planning and preparation, and much remains to be done. However, Amanda and I are keenly aware of the need and desire for such an organization and are committed to its success.

2. Weak Economy. Plenty of lawyers and paralegals are doing contract work without a union. They don’t need a “labor union” in the traditional sense, but rather need assistance in taking control of their own career and learning how to be financially successful and independent. No more need to be held captive by BigLaw or a temp agency. As a freelancer, you work for yourself, govern your own hours and working conditions, and determine your own pay.

3. Contract Lawyers are too Decentralized. That is a true statement now, but won’t be for long. NAFLP is designed to bring in freelancers from all over the country to share their experience and expertise with each other. Contract lawyers and paralegals need a central support system that is not bound to any particular project.

Freelancers are about to have another source of centralization too – FreelanceLaw, Inc. FreelanceLaw, a sponsoring organization of NAFLP, is beginning beta-testing of a web-based legal outsourcing network that is specially designed and tailored to the legal profession. Law firms will be able to locate and retain qualified freelancers online, and payments will be processed through FreelanceLaw so that freelancers can receive direct deposit paychecks bi-monthly for their work. Freelancers determine what work they want to do and determine their own pay rate. Queries from potential beta-testers can be directed to freelancelaw@gmail.com.

4. Most Contract Lawyers Don’t Plan to Be Doing It for Long. Contract lawyers don’t plan to be contracting for long primarily because (a) they or their peers view contracting as being a lesser lawyer; or (b) the experience is not rewarding. Neither NAFLP nor FreelanceLaw preclude members from exploring their options. They are not bound to be contract lawyers forever, however, we can provide significant expertise, insight, and information to assist along the way.

5. Who’s the Employer? This question demonstrates why a traditional union for contract attorneys would not work. The very nature of freelancing is that the freelancer is their own boss. Let us dispense with the myth that lawyers or paralegals must have an “employer.” They don’t. During my first year of law school our career placement head made a statement that I will never forget – “when you are a lawyer, you don’t need a job, you only need a client.” Truer words were never spoken. Whether that “client” is another lawyer or the actual client, you do not need to receive W-2s from a law firm to have a successful legal career.

Mr. Miller is 100% correct. A traditional union structure is not the way to organize contract attorneys. However, a voluntary association created to assist, inform, and educate freelancers and law firms alike, is a workable model.

Cuddly law firms? You bet.

2008-01-29T17:00:00.000-08:00

As we all know, law firms are slow to embrace anything different. Years after almost every 3-year-old became computer literate, courts are finally embracing electronic filing and service of pleadings. Not all courts, of course, but I suppose we have to start with federal courts and go from there.

As slow as the legal practice is to change, however, the concept of flexible working schedules is finally catching on. Even The New York Times is talking about it. A January 24, 2007 article titled "Who's Cuddly Now? Law Firms," http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/24/fashion/24WORK.html?_r=1&ref=fashion&oref=slogin
talks about the "legal world racing -- metaphorical black robes flapping" to catch up with the rest of the world on work-life balance. IT'S ABOUT TIME!

You no longer have to step out on a limb to dream of, ask for, even demand, a flexible work schedule. If law firms won't give it to you, become your own boss. Turn the tables and offer your services to law firms on your own terms.

What is stopping you from having the work situation you want? How can NAFLP help you?

How can legal outsourcing help me?

2008-01-24T10:54:00.001-08:00

"Outsourcing" has become a buzz word in business these days, unfortunately often associated with American jobs moving overseas. However, the strategic use of outsourcing in a business is a means of providing clients with both a high quality product or service at a low cost. Select the best widget maker, the best widget distributor, and the best widget marketer and run them as a team, rather than finding someone who can perform all three functions, but not as well. (Does your 4-in-one printer/fax/copier/scanner come to mind?)

Now change the context to a law firm. The task is to write an appellate brief in an important case. Does the firm assign the most experienced counsel who can crank out a flawless brief in 50 hours flat (billable at $350/hr) or assign the 1st year associate who will take 120 hours to write a not-as-flawless brief (billable at $200/hr)? The law firm has zero incentive to use the efficient, higher quality producer. Imagine what the client would think if he/she knew?

So, how does outsourcing help the law firm? By offering a higher quality product for its client for a lower cost, and by reducing overhead. Instead of using the experienced associate who has written 20 similar briefs before, the firm uses a freelance lawyer who has written 100+ and due to low overhead only charges a $14,000 flat fee for appellate briefs. Even with a markup by the law firm, the client is paying less for a superior product. The law firm is not paying for an office, salary, or benefits for the freelancer, thus lowering its overhead.

How does outsourcing help the freelancer? By allowing the freelancer to choose the work they do best and the work environment that best suits them, while still making a good living. Instead of getting a set salary and being expected to work 70-80 hours a week with no overtime, the freelancer chooses the type of projects they do best and most efficiently and charge accordingly. An experienced appellate brief writer can write one brief a month and make more than a $150,000 salaried associate working 80/hrs a week.

Are you ready to be efficient and progressive in your career and business?

Great lawyers don't work 80 hours a week

2008-01-18T16:00:00.000-08:00

Have you ever noticed that the history of great lawyers never includes reference to the number of billable hours those lawyers accumulated? When you consider the greats -- Abraham Lincoln, William Jennings Bryan, Clarence Darrow, Gerry Spence, for but a few -- do you know what their billable hours were?

Of course not. Because great lawyers have great minds, can think well on their feet, and have excellent analytical and writing skills.

Unfortunately, even the best of intellects fray with fatigue and lack of a balanced life style, a fact that the legal profession is slow to acknowledge.

An article titled "Billable hours 'intersect' with the profession's woes" in the January 2008 issue of the California Bar Journal, contains the now familiar story of a successful big firm lawyer who, after 16 years, had had enough. She wanted a life, she wanted a husband, she wanted children. Rather than being marginalized for working part-time for a big law firm, she opened her own consulting/mediation practice and works zero to 20 hours a week. She is hardly the only lawyer that has made that choice.

Although some law firms are claiming to make some efforts to create a more work-life balance friendly environment, they have a long way to go. I recently heard a young associate from a large firm happily describe her 60% work week option as working "only 50 hours a week"!

It is up to lawyers themselves to change the profession, one person at a time. If you want to be a great lawyer (or paralegal or other legal professional), chart a career course that values your talents and abilities, rather than maximizing your hours at the office.