Think Twice Before Crowdfunding as a Litigation Investment

We're in the middle of a crowdfunding golden age. Individuals have raised thousands of dollars to make potato salad ($55,000), create inflatable Lionel Richie sculptures ($12,500), and conduct a squirrel census ($9,000). When it comes to fundraising, it seems like...

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3 Reasons Attorneys Fail When Speaking to Reporters

You're more of a Perry Mason style lawyer than a Johnnie Cochrane, more Clarence Thomas than Antonin Scalia. You save the speechifying for the court room, leave the impassioned arguments in your briefs. But, when it comes to dealing with...

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Paying and Getting Paid: Effective Lawyer Compensation Schemes

Money isn't the only reason attorneys show up for work, but it's at least one of the main motivators. You may have joined the legal profession out of a sense of justice, but few lawyers' Atticus Finch dreams alone can...

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5 Tips for Working With a Virtual Paralegal

Trying to cut down on overhead and save some office space? Need some extra help but not enough to bring on a full team of support staff? You might consider contracting with a virtual paralegal.No, virtual paralegals aren't Siri with...

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Is the Customer Always Right? Not When You Practice Law

Like it or not, the law is a customer service profession. Getting clients and keeping clients depends on your ability to please clients. As the old cliche goes, the best way to do that is to remember that "the customer...

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Have Court Security Measures Gone Too Far? Some Lawyers Think So

Courthouse shootings and violent crimes are rare, but they aren't unheard of. From X-rays to pat-downs, many courthouses have installed security procedures to protect against potential violence. Some courts have extended those procedures to lawyers as well, requiring attorneys to...

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When You Should Encourage Clients to Not Settle Their Lawsuit

As litigious as Americans can be, the vast majority of cases settle before going to court. How vast is that majority? Less than two percent of federal civil cases go to trial, a fivefold decrease from 50 years ago. It's...

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Should You Use a Sliding, Income-Based Billing Rate?

Many lawyers dream of landing a corporate client with deep pockets or a millionaire businesswoman with a litigious ex -- anyone willing to pay an exorbitant hourly rate and to pay it often. But while the wealthiest few have no...

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3 Tips for Dealing With a Judge Who Hates Your Client

Judges hold their cards close to their chests -- usually. For all the impartiality and decorum judges normally demonstrate, it's not unheard of for a judge to slip up, letting you know exactly what he feels toward your client:...

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How Lawyers Pad Their Hours and Why You Shouldn't

We've all wished that there were more hours in a day. Some lawyers, however, have gone ahead and added their own -- at least in their bills. It's not unheard of for lawyers to pad their hours so extensively...

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What Gives a Law Firm a High Quality of Life?

Most discussions on work-life balance focus on giving lawyers sufficient time off, finding opportunities for lawyers to meet their children or glimpse a beach, while trying to still bill 80 hours a week. But there's more to quality of...

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Easy Hourly Billing Rate Calculation for Lawyers

You've hung your shingle, now how much do you charge? For many lawyers, figuring out the best billing rate can actually be quite daunting. Do you simply adopt the market rate, charging basically the same as other lawyers in...

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Federal Judge Stops Blogging (Again). Should You?

U.S. District Judge Richard Kopf is giving up on blogging -- again. Judge Kopf's "Hercules and the Umpire" blog had gained notoriety over the years for what some see as a breach of judicial decorum -- telling Congress to...

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Lawyer Disbarred for Tweets and Online Petitions

There's zealous advocacy on behalf of a client and then there's harnessing the power of the Internet to influence a legal proceeding. The first? Fine. The second -- well, it could get you in trouble, as the case of...

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Why Lawyers Should Publish

We've said it before and we'll say it again: lawyers are writers. Whether it's a motion to suppress, an email to a client or draft legislation, the legal craft is often a written craft. Sure, your Brief in Support...

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Law Firms Are Merging More Than Ever Before

We're barely halfway through 2015 and it already looks like this will be the year of the law firm merger. Firms are merging at a record rate, with 48 mergers thus far, according to the consultancy group Altman Weil....

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Should You Let Your Client Speak to the Media?

Alternative Title: It's Risky Letting Clients Speak to the Media Clients often want to be heard: by their lawyers, by the courts, by the public. Some take to the media to get their side of a story aired. Letting clients...

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Eric Holder's Transition From Gov't to Private Practice

The door between public service and private industry is a revolving one. Examples abound of regulators who join the industries they once supervised and ex-politicians who made millions as corporate lobbyists. Lawyers are no special case. Plenty of attorneys...

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Ethical Concerns When Representing Mentally Ill Clients

Nearly one in five American adults suffer from a mental illness at some point, with almost ten million adults experiencing serious mental illnesses that interfere with daily life. This means that, sooner or later, most lawyers will encounter a client...

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Don't Overlook Your Most Valuable Asset: Your Law Firm Brand

How do you set yourself and your firm apart from others? Your skill and expertise, yes. Your reputation as a trusted adviser, of course. But how is a potential client supposed to pick you out from all the other skilled,...

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Shark Week: A Brief History of the Lawyer as Shark

It's time for Discovery's Shark Week again, the annual celebration of all things cold-blooded, sharp toothed, and, well, sharky. FindLaw is jumping on the bandwagon, celebrating the shark in all lawyers. Even though Shark Week is in its 28th...

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5 Booming Practice Areas for Law Firms Looking to Grow

As the legal market begins to pick up, not all practice areas are growing equally. The growth in a few areas is far outpacing the rest. How can you tell which practice areas are booming these days? Look at...

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Advising a Corporate Client? Think Ethically, Not Just Legally

When advising a corporate client, lawyers may be tempted to limit their inquiry into the legality of a particular business practice or matter. Instead, they should also consider the ethical implications of their advice. There are codified ethics guidelines,...

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