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Law office management

January 2008 | Volume 44, Issue 1

Should you risk taking the case?
John A. Day

Case selection is one of the most important parts of building your practice, and one of the most fraught with risk. Evaluate your projected costs and benefits—financial, professional, and personal—to build a solid portfolio of cases that will keep you busy without burning you out.

Old software, new tricks
Daniel J. Siegel

Getting more office computing power doesn’t necessarily mean buying fancier new programs. If you have Windows XP, Microsoft Word, Corel WordPerfect, PowerPoint, and Adobe Acrobat—and most law firms do—you may not be taking advantage of all their capabilities. Follow these tips to get the most out of these tried-and-true programs.

Build your practice with a blog
Benjamin W. Glass III

You might have a good sense of what Internet advertising can do for your practice. But to give your marketing efforts a solid boost, consider developing a blog. Blogs are a great way to share information, establish yourself as an expert, and get your message across to other lawyers, potential clients, and the media.

Keep malpractice and disciplinary problems at bay
Mark Bassingthwaighte

Potential malpractice and disciplinary-action bombs lie hidden in any interaction or communication you have with clients, especially where finances are concerned. To defuse them, keep detailed notes and well-organized files, document everything, and exercise caution whenever you discuss a client’s case.

The 21st-century paralegal
Rebecca Porter

Today’s paralegals are taking on more responsibility than ever before. That’s a boon for lawyers, who benefit from their savvy assistance—and for paralegals themselves, who say that interesting challenges and close involvement in cases are key to their job satisfaction.

Collaborative tools for tech-wary lawyers
Tom Mighell

New technologies make sharing documents a breeze: Programs like Zoho and Google Docs go beyond e-mail or faxes to let groups of people read and edit the same document at once, exchange comments on it, and produce a unified whole. And collaborative Web sites called “wikis” go even further, allowing many editors to produce a single source of information on a subject. Best of all, these new tools are designed for ease of use, and most are free.

Feature

More pain for hernia patients
Teresa C. Toriseva, Nancy C. Wilkins, and Rhett Klok

Until a recall in 2005, the Kugel mesh patch was widely used to repair tissue after hernia surgery. But a design flaw in the device has harmed many patients, leading to debilitating injuries and even death. Litigation has uncovered evidence that the manufacturer was lax in its testing, warnings, and adverse-event reporting, and that thousands of people who received the patch could be at risk.