RJon Robins

Be an ADEQUATE lawyer

August 16, 2006 by RJon Robins

As you may or may not be aware, a committee appointed by the New Jersey Supreme Court decided that calling yourself a “Super” lawyer violates the professional code of conduct. After learning about this decision , fellow Blogger Nathan Burke created a page for “adequate” lawyers in hopes that such a moniker would meet with the appoval of our bretheren in New Jersey.

But there’s a more serious side to all of this that most lawyers fail to consider in their marketing & client servce plans: MOST CLIENTS PREFER ADEQUATE. That’s right, if given the option of paying top dollar for a “super lawyer” vs. a more reasonable amount for legal services that are adequate to solve the problem at hand, the vast majority of your clients would choose the latter. Don’t believe me?

Take the following informal survey to prove that what I am saying is correct:

1. Make a list of all of your clients who are driving around in Bentlys or Rolls Royce’s.

2. The rest prefer adequate.

The upshot is that you can actually get more work from existing clients by being sensitive to the fact that they don’t all want the highest quality legal services available to handle their routine matters. If 100% of your practice is high-stakes / life or death / bet-the-ranch work, then ignore this advice. Otherwise, you’ll close more sales with prospective and current clients by taking pride in offering adequate solutions to their problems.

Where will you be in 12 months?

August 15, 2006 by RJon Robins

Which came first, the succcessful Rainmaker or the Happy Lawyer?

Lots of lawyers out there toil away year-after-year doing work they can tolerate but don’t enjoy for clients they can tolerate but don’t actually care about. They tell themselves that not caring too much about a client keeps them objective and the work is a means to an end. The end being to make enough money so they will be happy.

My experience in my own career and in my deeper-than-average involvement with the careers of many Rainmakers – and the sideline view I’ve had of many unhappy legal careers – has me convinced that the way to BECOME a successful Rainmaker is to do work we enjoy for clients who we do care about. And there’s no lawyer out there who can’t build some happiness into his or her career – THAT’S ONE OF THE GREAT THINGS ABOUT BEING A RAINMAKER!!!

You see, one of the main causes for lawyer stress in small firms where no-one is feeding you work is the worrry about where the next case is going to come from. In most practice areas the life of a case is less than one year, so whatever cases you’re working on now will in all likelihood be out of your active case roster & probably out of your life within 12 months. That’s stressful if you don’t know where to get more work, but very liberating if you do. Because if you know how to make it rain you can be deliberate about going after the kinds of cases you would prefer to work on and/or for the kinds of clients whom you can say honestly to yourself that you actually care about.

And before you start to make excuses, let me just add one more point of reassurance…in every practice area you can find ways to get cases you will enjoy and/or serve clients you will care about. It doesn’t happen overnight & it may never be 100%. Make your goal perfection & you’ll go nuts. With progress as your mantra you can always make yourself happy.

Overheard in the restaurant. . .

August 12, 2006 by RJon Robins

I often like to eat breakfast out at a little place around the corner by myself. I go there so often they let me take my coffee mug home with me like other places let you take a doggie bag (of course that’s because I always return with the mug after I clean it). Anyway, reason I like to eat alone is because I like to eavesdrop on people eating at tables nearby…

What I overheard yesterday REALLY UPSET ME. Two men were sitting at the table next to me talking about a client they were working for. I never quite figured out if they were lawyers, accountants or some other kind of service but here’s what they said:

“With all of us working on it, that job isn’t going to last much longer.”

Reason(s) that upset me so much are too many to go into here so I’ll write a more in-depth article in the newsletter soon. But the short version was that it was SO DEPRESSING. I wasn’t so much upset for the client who they were talking about, as much as for them! Imagine going through your career worried about a case or matter drawing to a close b/c you don’t know where your next case was going to come from. I felt so bad for them that I almost got up to introduce myself to tell them that I could help them never have to feel that way again, but then my breakfast arrived, so I didn’t. Oh well, maybe they are reading this blog.

Law Firm Gets Scammed – Here’s How It Happened. . .

August 10, 2006 by RJon Robins

Note: My friend J.R. Phelps, Director of The Florida Bar’s Law Office Management Assistance Service (where I used to work as a Practice Management Advisor) shared the following heads-up with me & gave permission to post to the Blog to warn my readers:

Last Friday, I received a telephone call from a bookkeeper for a law firm that had just been scammed by the IRS (or so they thought.) Here is how it worked…

The bookkeeper received a call from the IRS stating that the month end payroll tax had not been received . The caller insinuated that unless the IRS could track the payment electronically from her bank account – today- there would be a significant tax penalty assessed. They then asked her for the account number of the firm’s checking account, the bank’s routing number, and the amount of her payroll tax payment so IRS could track her check.

Of course, it seemed logical to her that IRS would need that information to trace a payment from her bank. Hearing nothing further from the IRS she thought all was okay until she received the following month’s bank statement. She could not balance the firm’s bank account and began looking for a reason why. She then noticed an amount equal to her payroll tax paid to a business she did not know with the notation TIL (Telephone Initiated Entry). AND her payroll tax check to IRS cleared. The firm, it seems, had been scammed.

Making A Payment By Phone With A Check Is NOT The Same Thing As Paying By Credit Card

A key difference between checks and electronic payments is that when funds are electronically debited though the ACH (Automated Clearing House) network the transaction is initiated by the business that is going to receive the funds, not by the person paying the bill. As an example, if you pay your electric bill automatically, each month the electric company, not you, instructs the bank to have money withdrawn from your account and deposited into its account.

The bogus IRS agent utilized a type of electronic payment called a “Telephone Initiated Entry,” which the ACH network accepts. This is different than paying for something over the phone with a credit card, because you provide your banking account information off the bottom of your check. However, unlike other types of ACH transactions, no written approval is required and the potential for fraud is greatly increased.

The company initiating a telephone transfer through the ACH network is required to use “commercially reasonable procedures” to verify the identify of a customer. Businesses are only required to record your verbal authorization or hold off making the transfer until they send you written confirmation that you verbally authorized it. They seldom use written confirmations they just record your phone authorization. In this case the scammer recorded enough of the bookeeper’s conversation to make it seem she authorized the deduction.

SO…how do you protect your firm from this type of activity.

It is up to you to object to a questionable ACH withdrawal on your account. Your bank has NOTHING to do with authorizing these payment and has no way of knowing whether they are legitimate or not, until you complain.

You have 60 days from the time your bank statement is sent to you to contest an ACH debit on your account. Moreover, your bank is not liable for fraudulent ACH activity. Here again, ACH payments are different from other account activity.

Typically your bank is responsible for obtaining proper authorization to access your account – your ID if you visit your bank in person or your signature on a check. But ACH entries are different. By law, it is the merchant’s bank which originates the payment, and not your bank, that bears the final responsibility for any fraudulent entries.

By law you cannot be responsible fraudulent charges IF you report them in time. Your best defense is to review your bank statements regularly, and to protect your checking account information and checkbook as carefully as you protect your credit cards. Even if you have never paid a bill by phone or through automatic deduction, your bank account is vulnerable. Forewarned is forearmed.

The Smell Test

RJon here again…everyone whose attended one of my Trust Account Management programs knows what I mean by “The Smell Test” & knows exactly what steps to take with your trust account to catch this kind of fraudulent activity.

The same simple system & steps will protect your operating account too. If you haven’t attended one of my trust account management programs, they are actually kind of fun & show you how to use your trust account as a profitable business management tool to boost your income, cut down on billing problems & virtually eliminate your a/r headaches.

We turned that live program into a fun & easy Powerpoint presentation that takes about an hour. Working title (still in editing for the audio) is A Simple System For Managing Your Trust Account That Won’t Make You Feel Like A Schmuck

If you want to be notified when the program is available, send me an e-mail.

What Start Ups (and everyone else) Want In A Lawyer

August 10, 2006 by RJon Robins

Matt Homann has it right! Here’s an excerpt from a post “What Start up’s Want In A Lawyer” that appeared recently on his popular blog “The Non Billable Hour”:

“Make it your number-one priority to contribute to the growth of your clients’ businesses, not to extract the maximum amount of money from their coffers. Build client-centered teams — and make sure your client meets everyone on the team BEFORE their time shows up on a bill. Finally, start your representation by focusing on the goals of the client and the results they desire. Then agree upon a budget (or, gasp, a fixed price) to meet those goals and achieve those results.”

Couldn’t have said it better myself! There are so many ways to contribute value to your clients to enhance their perception of you as a trusted advisor, and not merely a technician…no matter what your practice area! I challenge ANYONE to suggest a practice area where you can’t find a way to add value to your client relationships above & beyond the bare legal services you deliver. I PROMISE you, it will payoff for you in the long run & even in the not-so-long-run!

Anyone who wants to learn how you can add value to your clients and begin to enjoy all the benefits that go along with being a trusted advisor & not merely a lawyer should definitely check out the How To Market A Small Law Firm audio program. And for any lawyer who can stump me with a practice area you are actually in (at least 10% of your practice) where I can’t show you how to implement the skills from that audio program to dramatically enhance the value your clients percieve they get from doing business with you, I’ll give you $100.00 cash. I’m THAT confident in what’s in store for you!

The Morality of Marketing A Law Firm.

August 9, 2006 by RJon Robins

Recently I got into a conversation (argument) with a lawyer who was complaining that 1.) He isn’t making enough money; and 2.) He feels lawyers marketing our practices is an unprofessional thing to do.

My points to him were as follows. . .

As attorneys, we have an ethical obligation to actively market our services and engage in Rainmaking activities. Now, I am not going to try and convince you to take out an expensive ad in the telephone directory or advertise on late night television. Those are examples of “advertising” not Professional, Ethical or even especially profitable Rainmaking. Sure, advertising has its time and place in a proper marketing plan, but it is generally the most expensive and least effective tool available to us as attorneys, in our ethical quest to market our services to the public.

Why do we have an ethical obligation to engage in rainmaking activities you ask? Well, take a look at your local telephone directory. Two-to-one, what’s the largest section? Unless things have changed a lot since I am writing this article, your answer is probably “attorneys.” The telephone directory is chock full of attorney ads & this is a very poor reflection on us as a profession, but probably not for the reason you think.

Know, Like & Trust

In every business, in every city all over the world, people prefer to do business with people they know, like and trust. What does it tell you that there are so many attorneys who find it beneficial to advertise in the telephone directory? It tells me that there are an awful lot of people out there who don’t know a single attorney, or even know someone who knows a lawyer they can turn to when they have a legal problem.

Have Some Empathy For Clients

You know, it’s not exactly fun for a potential client to sit down in front of a perfect stranger and explain to them the details of possibly the most embarrassing situation of their life. Wouldn’t you think that client would be more comfortable and communicate more freely with a lawyer whom he or she already knows, likes and trusts? Maybe it’s just me but I was never happy when my new clients were less than candid. Most of the time, this was the case when they were not yet comfortable enough with me as a person. In other words even after they signed the retainer agreement, it was nearly impossible to provide the highest quality legal services to my clients unless & until they felt like they knew me, liked me and trusted me. So, doesn’t it just make common sense to address this point as early as possible?

I’ll save the historical argument for marketing a law firm for a more in-depth discussion in another post. It will suffice to say here that I firmly believe that as members of the learned profession of law, we have an ethical obligation to make sure that as many people as possible already know, like and trust a lawyer when they have a need for someone to help them protect their rights. That’s one of the reasons why I encourage you to make a commitment today to reach-out & give a prospective client the opportunity to know, like & trust a lawyer.

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