Your Law Firm, Two Decades Ago
T he late ’90s and early 2000s weren’t all that long ago, especially when you consider that the legal profession has its roots in third-century Greece and Rome. The last twenty years make up just over 1 percent of the entire history of the industry, but boy, have things changed during that time.
When I conducted interviews for this book, I asked each person to think back twenty years (or, for the younger crowd, as far back as they possibly could) and tell me what that time was like. How did they get their work done? How did they interact with people inside and outside the firm? What was the atmosphere? Their experiences have helped shape the snapshots that follow, which in turn will shape our discussion of how quickly and how massively the landscape has evolved over such a short period of time.
See if any of these scenarios sound familiar.
Identifying a Potential New Client
“Bill’s going to what tonight?” The associate raised an eyebrow.
“Network. You know, meet people. Schmooze. Find more clients.”
An attorney chimed in playfully: “If you’ve gotta hunt for them, you’re doing something wrong!”
You hadn’t heard of very many lawyers networking. Certainly not partners—they wouldn’t dream of doing such a thing. Almost 100 percent of the firm’s clients had come in by referral. They had been given your name by a friend, a colleague, a family member, or whomever, and they were hoping that you could help them with X, Y, and Z because yeesh, were they in some hot water.
You commended Bill for experimenting, but would stick to having your clients come to you, not the other way around.
Winning That Client’s Business
You couldn’t remember the last time you had to run through your qualifications. It happened every now and again, but most of your potential clients already “knew” you through friends or colleagues. Plus, when they visited your office to make things official, they could see the framed certificates plain as day. You didn’t get too many questions about your rates, either. When you did, clients seemed to have two conflicting reactions simultaneously: (1) Yikes! and (2) If they cost that much, they must be good!
Really, your clients just wanted to feel like you understood their problems and were confident you could fix them. They’d pay what it took and leave the details to the experts. Besides, their friends wouldn’t have sent them to someone who couldn’t get the job done.
Securing Repeat Business
You took out your stationery set and your favorite pen. You had just won a case and always liked to close out your engagements with a little extra flair. Your secretary always told you it wasn’t really necessary, but what could it hurt? It only took a couple minutes
all told.
Kim,
Congratulations on your win! I told you we could do it.
If you or someone you know needs help down the road, you know where to find me.
Sincerely . . .
Catching Up on Missed Communications
Monday morning, 9:00. You settled into your desk chair, fired up the desktop computer (it took a while to get going), and rifled through the stack of pink notes your secretary had left for you. She had transcribed the voicemail messages from your missed calls—one from Friday evening and a few from over the weekend. None were urgent, of course; it wouldn’t be much use for anyone to make demands of your answering service. You’d give these folks a call back in an hour, maybe two.
After your computer finally booted up, you logged into your electronic mailbox to see if a note or two had trickled in since you had checked last Friday, though you didn’t usually get many messages outside of business hours.
Having a Conversation with Another Attorney
“Is Jean around?” You popped your head out of your office to ask your secretary, who shrugged in reply.
“I saw her grabbing coffee earlier today, but she might’ve left since.”
The search began.
You wanted to discuss a client matter with Jean, who had worked through a similar situation before. She hadn’t picked up when you called her desk. But that was a few minutes ago, so maybe she’d be back by now?
You walked down the hall to her office. Empty. An associate passed by, and you asked him if he knew where you might find her.
“No, sorry. Maybe she’s in the kitchen for a fresh cup?”
On your way to the opposite end of the floor, you heard Jean’s voice coming from another attorney’s office. You knocked at the doorway.
“Sorry to interrupt. Jean, will you have a minute for me this afternoon?”
She checked her watch. “I need about an hour. Will that work?”
You checked your watch. “That should be fine, yes. I’ll meet you in your office.”
Back to your desk for now, then. Well, since you were already here, you might as well make a quick pit stop in the kitchen.
Doing Research
You decided to check in on your new paralegal, who was still learning the ropes. That afternoon she’d be tasked with going to the “library” (your conference room, really—it was lined with shelves upon shelves of reference binders) to research: finding headnotes in the right categories, checking the indices for the right subject matter, identifying which cases would be worth reading through, going to the shelf and pulling all the books, and then Shepardizing the case to see what other cases cited that case and whether or not it had actually proven useful. The standard process.
You’d heard rumors that LexisNexis was releasing a new tool that would allow you to enter a string of words into the platform and have your computer pull a set of cases and legislation that used those same words. It would do all the work itself. For now, though, you needed help getting this research done—it would take hours that you didn’t have to spare.
Finding a Document
The document wasn’t in the file folder. You sighed, took a deep breath to calm yourself.
The same thing had happened last week, and you really hoped it wouldn’t be the same ten-minute ordeal this time. You needed to get a document together, and you knew there was an old document that would get you halfway there; why re-create the wheel when you don’t have to?
When you had gone to pull that document from the file cabinet last week, it hadn’t been there. The attorney who had created it said he didn’t have it. He thought his secretary might. She didn’t. The three of you went searching. An associate pitched in. You kept searching.
Ten minutes later, where did the file end up being? On the attorney’s desk all along.
Here’s hoping you could bill that ten minutes this time around.
Collaborating on a Document
“Will you be at your office for the next half-hour? I want to fax over the latest version of the document.”
You had already made it through a couple rounds of revisions, but needed to make sure your client was on board with a few more changes you’d made.
“I’ll mark it up so you can see what’s different,” you told him. “Write down any comments you have and fax it back to me, okay?”
There was a chance he’d get it back to you before you left for your appointment, but more than likely, your secretary would grab the fax off the machine and place it on your desk, where it would sit until the next morning. You’d give it a look and call your client’s office with any questions. Fortunately, this client was pretty easy to reach—you almost never played phone tag with them.
From there, another round of internal reviews. You were probably three or four days away from having the final document ready to go.
Sending and Filing a Finished Document
You handed your dictation to your secretary. It was 1:00, and you needed this letter to go out with the day’s post, which usually came around 2:00.
“I’ll get started right away,” she said, already making a beeline back to her computer.
Over the next hour, she listened to the recording and typed the letter in WordPerfect. (She was much faster on the keyboard than you, thankfully.) She printed the first draft on plain paper and brought it into your office. You marked up the page with your edits and walked the paper back to her. She applied those changes to the document, loaded the printer with official firm letterhead, printed the revised letter, and brought it to your office. Luckily, you were there to give it a final review and add your signature immediately. She made a copy of the signed letter for your records and put the original into an envelope that she addressed. Last step: postage. The letter made it into the outbound mail tray at 1:53. Just in time.