practicehacker

The ABA recently posted an article in its Law Practice Management (LPM) section with the following title – and I kid you not – “How ‘Pointless Interaction’ Helped Law Firm Communication .” Naturally, I was intrigued. I expected a study of some sort or statistics at least… but instead I got this:

Surveys of young lawyers’ attitudes show [that] they report feeling “isolated, overspecialized and dehumanized… So any initiative that treats them like individuals and communicates with them like humans will enhance morale and improve retention.

But what I really loved was this little nugget:

As the lawyers got to know each other, they warmed to each other, floated ideas and formed collaborative alliances.

Wow, what an enlightened concept! Talking to your employees leads to productive collaboration. I’ll be the first to admit that technology has greatly facilitated our job as attorneys – it is after all a reason why PracticeHacker even exists – but have we seriously gotten to the point where gadgets have replace actual human interaction?

Hmmm, well, I’ll think about that.  After I respond to the text message I just received.

Dear ABA Journal:

This is news? For the last time, I don’t care that some over-fed, arrogant, self-indulgent, preening, sycophantic law school grads may not receive the 6-figure bonus that goes with their 6-figure salary. In case you haven’t noticed, most lawyers are underemployed, and most new graduates are not employed at all – casualties of the economy and a broken system of lawyer production. Apparently law schools were competing to see who could crank out the most under-qualified graduates. It’s hard to say who won, but in the end everybody lost.

Practicehacker

And in response to another commenter’s post

Dear Mr. McLeod

Why would you make such a snide comment? Based on your use of words such as “swimmingly” and “ladies and gents;” as well as your belief that lawyers need only be likeable to secure work, I am going to guess that you started practicing law before the profession became crowded and clients treated lawyers like merchants, haggling over ever dime. That said; I wanted to congratulate you on remaining safely within your comfort zone. Trust me; it isn’t as warm and fuzzy out here as it is in there. Happy Holidays.

Sincerely,
Practicehacker

Windmill Networking: Understanding, Leveraging & Maximizing LinkedIn

“Dig your well before you’re thirsty”
Neal Shaeffer, Author

Summary: I’ve been a member of LinkedIn since 2007. But like many people I’ve had doubts about the network’s value. In Understanding, Leveraging & Maximizing LinkedIn entrepreneur Neal Schaeffer shares specific suggestions about growing your network. Best of all, the author never talks down to the reader – that allows me to develop my own rational and strategy.

The Good: Shaeffer explains that LinkedIn is meant to function as a virtual favor-bank so members can help one another without obsessively searching for a quid pro quo. The author then goes further by providing a step-by-step guide to: creation, maintenance, and leveraging of your brand, asking for and offering recommendations, answering questions, and other pillars of social networking.

The Bad: While he explains things in a clear manner, Schaffer probably devotes too many pages to his windmill analogy. The result is not necessary to understanding LinkedIn and can get longwinded (ha!). But while I found the windmill abstraction a little forced, it ties in with Shaeffer’s own brand.

The Ugly: Schaeffer explains why LinkedIn (not Twitter or Facebook) is THE site for professionals. But the author comes from a general business background – not a legal one – so his point of view may be slightly off for our purposes.

Evaluation: While not intended specifically for lawyers, Windmill Networking is a great primer for members of the profession interested in using LinkedIn to connect with one another, reach out to referral sources, or recruit a team of professionals to serve our own business needs. I give the book 4 hacks out of 5

Sure you have a LinkedIn profile, but what has it done for you lately? In “Windmill Networking: Understanding, Leveraging & Maximizing LinkedIn,” Neal Schaffershares ideas on getting the most out of the social network. Windmill Networking as Neal refers to it, involves creating a network via web 2.0 social media like Facebook, Twitter, and (you guessed it) LinkedIn then leveraging that network. He even includes diagrams and boxes to help you along the path to Windmill enlightenment. The book is divided into 3 intuitive sections -

• Creating a LinkedIn Brand
• Understanding LinkedIn
• Leveraging LinkedIn

Each section provides step-by-step instructions regarding profile creation, features, and networking for fun and profit. The book is not specifically targeted for lawyers (a plus) but “Windmill Networking” is a great primer for lawyers interesting in taking advantage of what LinkedIn has to offer.

This was a Quick Review. Look for a full book review in the next couple of posts!

Law firms looking to perform services online still need to pay careful attention to the rules of professional conduct. The ABA gives a few minimum guidelines:

1. You must still establish an attorney-client relationship before representation.
2. Terms and Conditions should be published on the public portion of the firm’s website.
3. Clients must be residents of the state in which your firm is authorized to practice.
4. Clients should have access to a fully secure web account to ensure confidentiality.

This is by no means an exhaustive list. If you’re interested in “going virtual”, contact our office for more information.

Source: ABA Law Practice Today

From Guy Kawasaki’s Alltop – some good advice about how to get found online:

• Don’t Be Ordinary. Unique ideas will take you further than throwing money at marketing
• Create Good Content. Blogs, videos, podcasts, social networks, and tweets get noticed
• Optimize It. Optimize posts to be found on Google, Facebook, Twitter, Bing, Yahoo, etc.
• Promote It. Post your content as many ways as you can and email it to interested parties
• Measure Results. Act once, measure twice and keep measuring for continued success

GoodSharks Founder Alicia Dearn has a vision: she wants to humanize lawyers and uplift her profession in the eyes of the consumer public, while helping solos and small firms market efficiently.   Her website, www.GoodSharks.com, blends social media technology with a lawyer-client matching interface to promote easy and open communications between lawyers and potential clients.  Equally important to Dearn and GoodSharks are the ethical issues implicated by the use of web 2.0 as a marketing and practice management platform.  GoodSharks was meticulously designed over a two year period with these myriad of ethical issues in mind; moreover, it continues to evolve to address the needs of its attorney members.  GoodSharks is free for all users while it is in beta. To encourage lawyers to sign up and harness the marketing value in GoodSharks, the site recently started a SharkWeek promotion on Twitter (@GoodSharks).  Each week, one attorney-member is chosen to have his or her profile tweeted several times over the week.  The promotion has been an instant success, yielding at least one lead for the first featured GoodSharks member within hours of the first tweet.