Law Practice Management
Inside the Lawyer’s Mind Part 5: Resilience
The last trait we look at in this series is resilience. A lawyer high in resilience is receptive to criticism and feedback and is not defensive. He is less likely to take criticism personally and is better at focusing on accomplishing the task at hand. If he suffers a loss or is rejected, he will… Read More »
Categories: Career Management, Law Practice Management, Risk Management StrategiesAre You Being a Lawyer or Building a Practice?
Jay Harrington, writing in Attorney at Work, describes the journey from student to lawyer as a “well-lit path”, while figuring out the direction of one’s legal career is like venturing off into uncharted territory. There can be many routes to get where you want to be, as long as you have a clear destination in… Read More »
Categories: Career ManagementInside the Lawyer’s Mind Part 4: Sociability
In parts 1 to 3 of this series we discussed the three traits that lawyers score particularly high on in personality assessments: skepticism, autonomy, and urgency. In this post and the next we look at two traits that lawyers score low on: sociability and resilience. In some ways, these are the most surprising findings. The… Read More »
Categories: Career Management, Law Practice Management, Risk Management StrategiesInside the Lawyer’s Mind Part 3: Urgency
In our previous two posts we learned that good lawyers score in the top 10th percentile on measures of skepticism and autonomy. A third trait that lawyers score high on is urgency, which measures a lawyer’s need to get things done and degree of impatience. Consultant Dr. Larry Richard states in his LAWPRO article that… Read More »
Categories: Career Management, Diversity, Law Practice Management, Risk Management StrategiesInside the Lawyer’s Mind Part 2: Autonomy
Following up on my previous post on lawyers’ personality traits, we discuss autonomy, a trait that helps lawyers do their job but makes them poor bedfellows in a law firm environment. Dr. Larry Richard states in our LAWPRO magazine article “Herding Cats: The Lawyer Personality Revealed” that studies suggest high achieving lawyers score in the 89th… Read More »
Categories: Career Management, Diversity, Law Practice Management, Practice Aids, Risk Management Strategies, Wellness and BalancepracticePRO Resources: Real estate templates from the TitlePLUS program
The TitlePLUS program has some great resources for real estate lawyers and their staff that will help reduce claims exposure, including sample retainer and reporting letters – two important risk management tools. The documents you can use and adapt are: Sample retainer letter Sample report to purchaser Sample report to lender Work Order Warranty Waiver… Read More »
Categories: Law Practice ManagementThe Average Lawyer Is 90% More Skeptical Than Everyone Else: what this means for your clients, your colleagues, and your firm.
A skeptical lawyer is a good lawyer. He scrutinizes every line in a contract. He questions the opposing party’s arguments. He looks for hidden motives. He looks at the law with a critical eye. His legal decisions are guided by a healthy pessimism, which helps him guard against mistakes. At the same time, a skeptical… Read More »
Categories: Career Management, Diversity, Fraud Prevention, Law Practice Management, Practice Aids, Wellness and BalanceFour social media lessons for lawyers
Gabriel Chong at the Attorney At Work blog has four useful lessons for lawyers trying to incorporate social media into their practices. Lawyers are…well, lawyers, and not necessarily social media experts so these are some important things to keep in mind (here is the full blog entry) 1. Do only what you’re comfortable doing 2…. Read More »
Categories: Technology