Posted by on Jun 2, 2012 in Law Firm 101 | 1 comment

Checklist

If you read any post on this blog, start with this one. It links to most of the others… I’m a linear thinker.  Yet another reason why I struggled in law school.  If law school could have been reduced to flow charts, I would have broken records.  In sitting down with a friend who’s starting her own firm, I realized I need to reduce the steps involved to some sort of linear process.  So, here goes. 1.  Address.  Regardless of the type of business, I recommend that you nail down your business address at the beginning of the process.  It’s the...
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Posted by on Jan 17, 2013 in Law Firm 101 | 1 comment

The Nuts and Bolts of Starting a Law Pra...

Published in the January 2013 issue of Nevada Lawyer Magazine. How To Start a Law Practice from GBongiovi Recommend on Facebook Share on google plus share via Reddit Tweet about it...
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Posted by on Nov 12, 2012 in Law Firm 101, Office | 0 comments

Office Equipment Essentials

I was dusting my office yesterday and realized that office equipment is a big question for people starting their firms.  What do I need, what do I NEED, and what do I just want? You can absolutely run your entire practice from a laptop, a printer, and a cell phone.  If you have the laptop and use Google Voice, you don’t even need the phone.  Eventually you’ll want to expand on the bare minimum, especially because those are business expenses, so here are my suggestions, in the order you should get them… 1.  Fujitsu ScanSnap: $400-500 This is the piece...
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Posted by on Nov 1, 2012 in Law Firm 101 | 0 comments

More on Marketing…

A business attorney in solo practice who just relocated to a very large city and knows not a soul e-mailed me for marketing advice.  My reply… Here’s my recipe for marketing, which has worked for me: 1.  You need a kick-ass website.  This doesn’t mean you need to spend thousands of dollars a month on search engine optimization.  This means you have a site that’s easy to navigate and to which you add new content regularly, like once a week.  Once you have a solid website, you will point your other marketing efforts to it, which will increase...
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Posted by on Oct 3, 2012 in Law Firm 101 | 0 comments

Is BigLaw Worth the Salary?

My friend, a solo practitioner and mom to two young girls, was recently approached by a female BigLaw senior partner about going to work for the big firm.  My friend agreed to go to lunch with the partner, and, concerned that a BigLaw schedule might take her away from her kids, asked the partner (who is also a mother of two) to describe a typical day. Female senior partner:  A ‘typical day’?  Well, I get up at 3. My friend (wiggling her finger in her ear): I’m sorry, I thought you said ’3′. Partner: Yes. I get up at 3am because I can get...
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Posted by on Sep 26, 2012 in Confessions of a First Year Associate | 0 comments

An FYA’s* drafting failure…

I gave my senior partner a rather complicated proposed order and I cited to language from the hearing transcript. He took it and read for about four seconds and said: NO NO NO THIS IS F*** THIS IS ALL WRONG WHAT IS THIS He slammed the paper down on his desk, whipped out his pen, and changed the placement of one semi-colon, added two words, and took out an extra space I had between two words.  He thrusts the paper back at me and waved me out of his office. - from a BigLaw *first year associate Recommend on Facebook Share on google plus share via Reddit Tweet about it...
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Posted by on Sep 19, 2012 in Confessions of a First Year Associate | 0 comments

FYA’s elevator music today is̷...

F*** GO**AMMIT S**T F*** THIS IS F*** WHAT THE - from a BigLaw *first year associate Recommend on Facebook Share on google plus share via Reddit Tweet about it
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Posted by on Jun 25, 2012 in Law Firm 101 | 0 comments

Craptastic Job Market

Everywhere you turn, it seems the amazingly craptastic job market for lawyers is making the news.  Today’s Wall Street Journal article (“Law Grads Face a Brutal Job Market”) points out that 2001 graduates had about a 50/50 chance of landing a job.  This is a swift kick in the crotch to those graduates who now have six-figure student loan debt they have no way of paying and little hope of negotiating. A friend of mine has done battle with Sallie Mae for basically her entire 4-year career.  The first job she landed paid so little she qualified for (but...
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Posted by on Jun 19, 2012 in Law Firm 101 | 0 comments

Should I Charge for Consultations?

It depends. Don’t we lawyers LOVE that answer?  But seriously, it really does depend.  In full disclosure, I do charge for consultations.  I didn’t at first.  I do now.  Yes, people pay.  Yes, I’ve lost clients who expect a free consultation.  No, I don’t lose sleep over those clients.  Yes, those clients who do pay make it well worth it. This is yet another question that you need to consider from your client’s perspective.  If clients expect a free consultation because every other lawyer in your practice area offers them, then you...
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