027: Get Out Of The Way

Your Law Firm is a Business. Take it to the Next Level

As law firm owners, we can really get in the way. We can easily become roadblocks to the rest of our team. We do it unintentionally but, nonetheless, we are a roadblock.

Perhaps you’ve found yourself in this cycle: you’re a solo attorney struggling to keep up with all your work so you hire some help. However, you’re so overwhelmed that you don’t have the time to train that help or give them the processes or procedures for the work you need them to do. As a result, they don’t have much to do and you get frustrated. So, you hire more help and the cycle just repeats itself.

If you’ve been in that cycle, you know that it's not a fun place to be. However, there is good news: there’s a better way! It will take effort on your and your team’s part but the cycle can be broken.

In this episode, we’ll explain how to break the cycle. We’ll take you through the process of hiring, creating policies and procedures, and ultimately letting go of some tasks that you’ve passed off to other team members.

Going through these processes has taken Melanie’s firm to the next level and they can do the same for you so tune in!

Show Highlights:

• Why you should start documenting your processes before you hire anybody.
• Why you should hire help before you need it.
• When to let someone go.
• What policies and procedures are and why they’re important.
• How to prevent yourself from micromanaging.
• What it means to let go as a law firm owner.
• The benefits of letting go.

Subscribe and Review

We’d appreciate you subscribing to this podcast and leaving an Apple Podcasts review. Reviews help others discover and learn what Law Firm Next is all about. It only takes a second and helps us out a lot!

ACTION STEPS:

1. A personnel inventory

1. Write down the name of everyone that works for you (including your VA, contractors, and employees).
2. Next to each name put a number 1-3, 1 being they are not fulfilling their job duties well, 2 being they are fulfilling them, and 3 being they are fulfilling them well.
3. Then, next to each 1 on the list give some thought as to if you’ve provided them with training and expectations.
4. This will help you decide how to move forward with respect to this team member. We’ll dive in here more specifically next week!

2. Go to your calendar and block off 30 minutes this week to think through your team’s processes. Identify the one policy and procedure that you think would be most helpful to work torwards in your office. Then block off an hour on the calendar next week to write out the WHY for the policy and the steps for the procedure.
3. As you go through the rest of your day today, after everything that you do, ask yourself why you are doing it? Is it because it's an owner’s responsibility or is there someone else on your team that can be trained to do it instead of you? If so, let it go! Schedule the time to train them and let it go!

***

Episode Credits

If you like this podcast and are thinking of creating your own, consider talking to my producer, Danny Ozment.

He helps thought leaders, influencers, executives, HR professionals, recruiters, lawyers, realtors, bloggers, coaches, and authors create, launch, and produce podcasts that grow their business and impact the world.

Find out more at https://emeraldcitypro.com