@ximacloudx I’m a lawyer too, what we call a solicitor here in Scotland — to differentiate ourselves from advocates, who plead in the higher courts. Before that I ran a software company working in the oil business (drilling engineering), so my legal practise is flavoured (tainted? I guess it depends upon your viewpoint) by that experience. I retired a few years back, but have kept my practicing certificate so I can do some pro bono work for local charities.
Of late, however, I’ve been working on the question of why so many people using a lawyer as a last resort, a distress purchase.
You didn’t say whether your practice was private client or corporate, court or commercial, so please don’t take these next comments as gospel, but in my view there are two barriers to access. Breach these barriers and untapped markets open.
The first is education, many people simply don’t know what services a solicitor can offer them. Perhaps their view of the profession is shaded by too much court room drama, but very few people come through the door saying “I don’t have a problem, yet …” and asking for help to avoid a potential situation. There is, I’m sure, much, much more advisory work out there to be done, be that for individuals, the self-employed or small businesses. Law is too often seen as the stick by which the big and powerful — corporations, landlords, employers — beat the small and weak. It can and should be a shield, not a sword.
The second barrier is cost; not so much absolute cost as cost uncertainty. People expect to pay for services, but they want, indeed need, to make informed decisions as to whether purchasing such services is cost effective for them, in their circumstances, today. You expect to pay a mechanic to fix your car or an electrician to install a new socket, but you expect an accurate quote up front.
As a profession we simply have to give up the billable hour and learn how to estimate accurately. Seriously, it’s not rocket science. A lot of legal work falls in the category of “same play, different actors”, or at worst “variations on a theme”, so it’s entirely practical.
We’re all driven to record billable hours, but precious few firms I’ve come across say (i) you need to spend time planning what you’re going to do and how long you think it will take; (ii) record the hours you actually spend on every task, including those you didn’t plan to do; and (iii) at the end of each matter, compare what you planned against what you actually did. Step (iii) is vital; it closes the loop so that next time around you can estimate time and cost better. There are reliable, quantitative processes that you can use to improve estimating — we were using them thirty years ago, so there’re not exactly new — but even just a “lessons learned” review is better than nothing.
Address these two issues — education and fixed fees — and I’m certain there is a viable professional practice there. I can’t help you much with the first, but would be happy to share thoughts on the latter. If you think it might help, DM me.
Anyway, all the best. Running your own business is hard work, even a bit scary at times, but can be very rewarding.
