Orchestrate Your Future

Get Your Inbox Under Control

"Most people haven't realized how out of control their head is when they get 300 e-mails a day."  David Allen

Is that you?  Maybe it's more like 400, 500, 1,000?  An out-of-control inbox is a problem for almost every attorney I know.  It's impossible to function with that kind mess in your inbox.  So, what can you do to stop the madness?!?!  There are a couple of simple strategies you can start with. 

First, make it a habit to deal with your email when it comes in.  Either delete it, delegate it, defer it to a later date, file it, or do it if it takes less than two minutes.  David Allen's Two Minute Rule applies not only to email but to every task you are faced with throughout the day.  If it takes less than two minutes, do it.  Period.

Second, create folders for all of your clients, and move your client related emails to those folders.  Attachments to emails should be saved to a client file on your server.  Simply leaving them as an attachment to email in your inbox is dangerous because no one else has access to your inbox. 

Third, create an Archive Folder where you can place old emails that you don’t  necessarily want to delete.  Use the Archive Folder – you can create sub-folders, too – to get those emails out of your inbox.

To really crank up your productivity, download the Getting Things Done Add-In for Outlook from David Allen and Netcentrics.  The GTD Add-In toolbar will be added to your Outlook toolbar.  One of the coolest features of this add-in is that it allows you to automatically save the emails you send to the appropriate Outlook folder.  No more looking through your sent items for the email you sent to a client two months ago.  No more filling your inbox with cc's to yourself.  With GTD you can send a copy of the email directly to the client folder when you send the email.  This one feature alone makes the GTD Add-In a "must have" for most attorneys.

Click here to download a Pocket PC Magazine review of the GTD Add-in.
Click here to download a free trial copy of the GTD Add-In.

Plan Your Day and Know Your Commander's Intent

There is a saying in the military:  "No plan survives contact with the enemy."  In your law practice, the "enemy" may show up in a number of disguises: a member of your staff, opposing counsel, a client emergency.   The "enemy" is anyone or anything that “blows up” your plan for the day or the week.

In the 1980s, the Army created a planning process inventing a concept called Commander's Intent.  Commander's Intent (CI) is a plain-talk statement specifying the plan’s goal or desired end-state.  For example, at the tactical level the CI might be: My intent is to have the third battalion on Hill 43, to have the hill cleared of the enemy, so we can protect the Third Flank as they pass through the lines. The CI never specifies so much detail as that it risks being rendered obsolete by unpredictable events.  (See Made to Stick, p. 26, for this example.) When you know your CI, you might lose the ability to execute your plan, but you never lose the responsibility for executing the intent. 

Weekly and daily planning are essential, but you need to know your CI so that you can adjust your plans accordingly.  To arrive at your CI for the day or the week, get in the habit of asking yourself questions similar to those that officers ask themselves to arrive at their commander's CI.

If we do nothing else tomorrow, we must ______________.
The single most important thing we must do this week is _________________.

Don’t Let Your Email Take Over Your Life

"Easier said than done," you’re probably thinking. How to deal with email overload is one of the most consistent questions I’m asked with respect to increasing productivity. The truth is there are no easy answers. The key is to find the strategies that work for you and implement them.

If you’d like some ideas on how to better manage your email, check out The Hamster Revolution. The book contains some simple tips for creating more effective emails and managing email glut. For a quick lesson on organizing your inbox with folders and rules for incoming email, click here to visit The Hamster Revolution web site.  Harvard Business Review online also provides some excellent tips on managing email.

Finally, if you’re addicted to the ping of a new email hitting your inbox, check to see how often your email server is set to perform a send and receive. I’m willing to bet it’s every minute or two. Stop the madness! For starters, set your email to perform a send and receive only once per hour. That will guarantee you two productive outcomes: 1) You won’t be constantly interrupted, and 2) You will have created a built-in, hourly break for yourself.

Time Management’s Most Important Question

Attorneys often get stuck in a sense of overwhelm.  Overwhelm occurs when you feel like there is just too much to do and not enough time in the day to get it done.  Sound familiar?  Often, when we’re experiencing overwhelm, rather than tackling something, we opt for tackling nothing.  Rationale: “I just don’t have the time to get anything done.”   Stop thinking like that!

Rather than thinking, “I just don’t have the time to get anything done.”  Ask yourself this question: “What is the one thing I can do right now that is the most valuable and productive use of my time?” Answer the question; then act on the answer.  You don’t need to finish the task, just start.  There is power in momentum.

The Guru of Getting Things Done

“Most people haven’t realized how out of control their head is when they get 300 e-mails a day.” – David Allen

Can many lawyers relate to the quote above?  You bet! 

Just a quick update on David Allen, the GTD Guru.  (See post under Time Management & Productivity, Sept. 22, 2006.)  If you’re looking for ways to increase your productivity check out The Five Secrets to Getting Things Done at Time.com.  Then do yourself a favor and buy the book.  Even if you only use a few of Allen’s strategies, you’ll be way ahead of those who aren’t on the GTD track.

Q: “What’s the Best Time & Billing Software?”

A: “The one you’ll actually use.”

I can’t tell you how many attorneys I speak with who are still keeping their time on some sort of manual system.  Most often this involves taking a few minutes at the end of the day to recall what they did, estimating time spent, giving the list to their assistant, and having the assistant enter it in some sort of timekeeping system.  Some of these attorneys have timekeeping software installed on their computers, but for whatever reason just don’t want to use it.  Well, if you need some incentive to find software that you’ll actually use, take a look at the numbers. 

Statistics show that attorneys can capture up to 15% more billable time by keeping their time contemporaneously with computer software.  So, an attorney billing at $300 per hour who typically bills 6 hours per day, could increase the time billed by .9 hours per day or $270.  That's found money because the attorney is not working and extra .9 hours, just capturing the accurate time.  And that captured time adds up to $1,350 per week and $64,800 over the course of 48 weeks! (Yes, you should be taking at least 4 weeks off each year.)  If you beat the curve and only lose 7-8% of your billable time, you’re only missing out on around $32,000 per year.  Do you have staff who bill their time?  They’re not capturing all their time either.

There are plenty of great software packages out there, so find one that you like and use – or as they - say lose it.  Don't cheat yourself out of earning all you're worth!

Here are links to three of the top time & billing software companies.  Please check these or others out and find one that works for you.
Abacus Law
Amicus Attorney
Time Matters

How’s Your Inbox?

Email.  Can’t live with it; can’t live without it.  And it can be a source of ongoing (endless) frustration unless you feel like you can get a handle on it.  One strategy that works well for some is to set aside a certain part of the day to deal with emails.  While that strategy can be very effective, it just doesn’t work for everyone. 

If you can’t stand the idea of waiting until a prescribed time to answer all your emails, try setting your email to do a “send and receive” only once per hour, rather than every five minutes, or three minutes or (please tell me you don’t do this) every minute.  By setting your “send and receive” on an hourly basis you not only limit your interruptions, you also build in breaks and won’t feel stressed by not looking at your email until the end of the day.   

Better the Ball

I was talking to my friend Debbie Foster, President of InTouch Legal, the other day, and she said, "It's everybody's job to 'better the ball.'"  She could tell by the look on my face that I didn't know what she was talking about.  She explained that her daughter is the "setter" for her volleyball team.  As the setter, she hits the ball second to set it up for the all important third hit.

Well, Debbie's daughter complained to the coach that the first person was giving her "bad" passes.  The coach's response?  "Don't complain about what you get.  Your job is to better the ball."  In other words, regardless of how bad the ball is when it comes to you, make it better before you pass it on.  Wow.  Words to live by.

The next time you or one of your staff complains about ANYTHING, remember, it's our job to "better the ball."  Regardless of how a situation comes to us, we have the opportunity to make it better.  We have the opportunity to make a client's life better each time we interact with them.  Write it down, put it on your office refrigerator, make it a screen saver for your office computers.  Better the ball!   

Getting Things Done

Read any good books on productivity lately?  It's a challenge to stay on top off all that's out there. I'll write about some of my favorites in these posts.  Many are filled with great information to help attorneys grow their practices, earn more money, serve their clients better, and generally have a life.  My goal is to be your resource for anything that will help you in the practice of law.  -To help you work smarter, not harder.  To help you reclaim your life.  Let's get started. 

Have you heard of David Allen?  He is the guru of "getting things done."  As a matter of fact, that's the title of his first book.  Have you read it?  If you haven't you should, especially if you can't remember the last time you actually saw the top of your desk.  Check out his ideas for productivity at http://www.davidco.com.  Click here to download free tools and gear from David's website.   

As David Allen says,"Knowing what to do and doing it are two separate things."  Start today doing what you know you should be doing . . . and get it done!

Your Primary Aim

As Goethe said, "Things which matter most should never be at the mercy of things which matter least."  Do you know what matters most to you?  The process of figuring out and writing down what really matters most to you must take place before you can determine what you want from your law practice.  This process has been referred to for some time as creating your Mission Statement.  While a personal Mission Statement is crucial to your personal and professional success, many people are put off by the idea.  Maybe it's because Mission Statements have become trite or been trivialized over the years. Or maybe you think the whole process is just too "touchy-feely."  If your reaction to creating your personal Mission Statement is akin to having a root canal, then don't think of it as a Mission Statement.

In his book, The E-Myth Revisited, Michael Gerber speaks in terms of a Primary Aim.  "What do I value most? What kind of life do I want? What to I want my life to look like?  Who do I wish to be?"  If you don't know - or have never thought about - the answers to those questions, how can you design a law practice that will serve your life?  The answer is simple.  You can't. 

So take some time to discover your Mission, your Primary Aim, or whatever you'd like to call it.  You owe it to yourself.  Then you can create a law practice that serves your life, rather than living a life that serves your practice. 

If you need some help getting started, check out this nifty On-line Mission Statement Builder from Franklin Covey.