How to Make a New Year’s Resolution for Your Law Firm

It’s that time of year when we’re excited about the new outlook and possibilities. Are you looking to make changes in your personal life? Do you want to bring on a partner to your law firm? Have you implemented new processes and procedures to make your law firm more efficient? Whether it’s losing the holiday weight or growing your law firm, we offer our ideas about how to make a New Year’s resolution.

Be reasonable.

You’ve taken time off at the holidays and are refreshed and renewed at the prospect of what this year could bring. It’s time to make changes, maybe even big changes, and it’s easy to set lofty goals but what happens when you don’t reach them? You get discouraged so it’s important to set reasonable and achievable goals.

That’s not to say you can’t have THAT BIG GOAL in mind, only that you should map out a plan to reach that goal. 

Take time to review where you ended last year at your law firm.

• How many attorneys are in your firm?
• How many and what type of cases did each attorney handle?
• How many hours did each attorney, paralegal, and assistant work?
• Where are there opportunities to increase efficiency?

Ask yourself where you’d like to be at the end of this year. Perhaps you want to create efficiencies with these time saving tips that include simplifying systems.

Here’s something to keep in mind. Just because another firm is using a computer program for tracking leads doesn’t mean you need to track your leads the same way. If a shared color coded spreadsheet works for you, then just keep using it but if you’re spending too much time on it, then it’s time to consider other options.

Find what works for you and do that without concern for what everyone else is doing.

Not everyone wants to have a multiple attorney firm with endless hours of work. Maybe this year you add another attorney to help you balance life at work and home so that you can finally take that vacation you’ve been talking about. Maybe you hire a paralegal or assistant to meet your goal of staying in better contact with clients and prospects. Maybe it’s time to work on a business plan to help you meet your caseload goal.

Whatever you decide, we’re here to support you and your legal team with our services for legal professionals.