A tale by Gustavo Rocha (lawyer and consultant in management, IT and quality for law firms. He’s the author of Gestão.Adv.br - content in Portuguese only), based upon real events from his clients before hiring services:

Once upon a time there was a lawyer. He read and heard about the changes the legal practice was going through, IT and all, still he thought that his business was going pretty well as it was and so he kept it.

Time went by and his office procedures were the same as always.

Relentless, there came upon his door the technology snags.

At first the lawyer tried to appeal the Supreme Court by writing. No way. Faxing, not allowed. The appeal only could be submitted electronically, which requires a digital certificate. Not knowing at all bout any of this, our lawyer only found about it at 4 PM on the last day for the appeal to be presented…  their was no way he could ever get a digital certificate on time. So, once upon a time there was an appeal deadline…

After this setback, he contacted his Bar Association and got the most needed digital certificate. “That solves it” and back to his office he went. There, he gave it to an intern: “Here you go. Now it is all up to you”, he said, confortably from behind his marble top desk…

While stuck in a traffic jam, another reality struck him: the car he was driving, his hardly earned car, that had cost him many sleepless nights, was now in someone else’s hands. He, of all people, had given his digital certificate and password to an intern, who had just transfered part of the lawyer estate to a sleazeball…

Once upon a time, there was the estate…

The lawyer took legal action against that and got his belongings back. Then, he got himself a new digital certificate and decided that him and him alone would use it…

Still he was not free from arm.

As a law professional, he had overlooked his office management, its procedures systematization on matters and the bussiness itself. That meant that he was tied up by electronic procedures and digital certification… Then he took the decision of hiring the services of consulting agency for updating procedures, implementing IT, legal marketing, etc… they need 12 months for the whole deal, though. “That’s an absurd! 12 months?? I can do it myself in 12 months! Less than that.” Poor devil… 12 months came and went and not much was changed…

Moral of this tale: Once upon a time, there was a lawyer…

Do not allow your business to sink this low. There is a way out if you have will enough, perseverence, love for what you do and hard work, lots of it. If you think you can not do it on your own, look for help from someone who is an expert on that field.

Don’t let yourself be stuck on “once upon a time, there was a lawyer”…

IT and management do really make the difference.

Post by Gustavo Rocha, lawyer and consultant in management, IT and quality for law firms. He’s the author of Gestão.Adv.br (content in Portuguese only):

I’d like to share with you all a situation that I was in recently, not just because it is hilarious, as well as a good example of planning (or the lack of it):

Every time I have to visit a certain client of mine, I park my car in a parking lot near by and there it stays for the entire day, every week.

One of these weeks, after leaving the client, I got to the parking lot at 5.40 PM and found no one there. The reception booth was empty. I clapped (the parking lot is next to its owner’s home), honked a few times, waited for nearly 30 minutes and still nobody showed up. I drove away without paying for the parking.

The following week I arrived at that parking lot around 9 AM and nobody was there, again. Open but no one at the reception booth.

When I got back at 11.30 AM the parking owner was there. After having paid for the previous week worth of parking, I asked him how come no one was there.

His answer: ” You see, the reception worker is away on vacation and since there’s no replacement I myself open and close the parking, though during the day only the security cameras control the cars in and out. Many of those I don’t collect the parking fees ’cause I can’t control it.”

Moral of the story: not planning ahead can change the way a company is viewed overnight (I never had any complaint regarding the parking lot up until then).

How often does this happen in companies? Not planning ahead employees vacations, just ‘fixing things’ along with someone unfit for the job.

It is paramount that companies understand every employee’s function, so that substitutions can be adequate and companies do not loose identity.

A client that quits you service for it being a bad one, won’t be back and will bring along and spread that stain on your company’s image.

Make planning a part of your company’s DNA. Now and always.

Post by Nuno B.M. Lumbrales, lawyer, partner at Lumbrales & Associados and LawRD user:

The use of social networks for marketing and promoting a vast array of economical activities is definitely in and there are some several examples of its good results.

The opposite is also true, though. Many economy players have real doubts on the return of their companies investments in that area (namely the non physical resources, such as time allocated to that task by employees, among others) which, given its nature, are hard to quantify.

Therefore, there is room enough for debating on the efficacy of this sort of marketing, and which are the best procedures to go about it through all different products and economy branches.

There are sectors, like the legal practice, that are bound to restrictions concerning its publicity, either by deontological or professional culture when displaying their image towards the market and society at large, thus making them more reticent and cautious when using these social tools  of promotion.

However, that trend has been slowly changing and, still far from being a universal attitude, a growing number of lawyers and law firms are taken an open and noticeable stance in that area.

Actually, in a business area where personal trust between lawyer and client is paramount, even more so than in any other business activity, there is a natural and reasonable mistrust as to the efficacy of social networks as tools for promoting and marketing services provided by the legal practice.

But there is no turning back on the increasing numbers of law professionals adopting social networks for promoting their businesses, and in the end time will tell who was right, after all.