Speaker 1: You're wondering how to run a law firm like a business? Well, I've got the answer to that question and several others on this episode of The Inside BS Show. I am Dave Lorenzo, and this is The Inside BS Show, where we teach you how to get more clients as a lawyer. We also do sales tips, and we do them every day, so thanks for joining me today. What we're going to do is, in this video, I'm going to cover seven specific tips for how to run a law firm like a business, and I'm also going to share with you another great video with a strategy for getting clients for your law firm. So if you're concerned about attracting new clients, you're going to want to stay with me all the way through this video, because at the end, I'm going to refer you to another video that I have, which is going to provide you with some great legal marketing strategies. So let's dive right into the content, how to run a law firm like a business. There are seven different tips I have for you. Tip number one, you must have a system everyone can follow. When it comes to running a law firm like a business, you have to have a step-by-step system that everyone can follow. So what does this mean for the day-to-day practice of a law firm? Well, you have to have systems for everything from answering the phone, to onboarding a new client, to requesting the documents or the information the client must provide you. Everything in your firm must be part of a system. Now we call these standard operating procedures, and the best law firms have standard operating procedures because that makes it easier for them to delegate the systems and the practices they need to people who can do them. So you have a system for answering the phone. You write out your standard operating procedure for that system, and you share it with the receptionist. You practice it with her a few times, and then she's good to go. You have a system for client attraction. You implement that system, and maybe there is a marketing assistant or a marketing manager in your firm who runs that system. You check in with them from time to time. You see what the key performance indicators are telling you as to whether the system is working. Everything in your firm has a system, and you focus on that system, and you run it to a T. All right. The second tip for how to run a law firm like a business is you meet weekly with your team members for communication purposes. People underestimate the value of communication internally within an organization, and a weekly meeting for communication purposes, it could be a 10-minute meeting, it could be a stand-up meeting outside the front door of your office, it could be a meeting in your conference room, a short meeting where you give everyone on your team a chance to ask questions. You make weekly announcements. You share what the initiatives are for that week. You talk about what your goals are. You talk about how you're going to achieve your goals. Meeting weekly for communication is the second step, and one of the most important steps to running a law firm like a business. Step number three is that your law firm must have someone who coordinates everything. Now, in some firms, this is an office manager. In some firms, it's a chief operating officer. But there has to be one person in the law firm who coordinates the day-to-day activities. And this is a person who not only guards your time to make sure you're spending your time most efficiently and effectively, this is a person who knows what's going on with marketing. They know what's going on with billing. They have a handle on your accounts receivable. They know what's happening with all the administrative tasks of the firm. They keep track of the work in progress. This one person is probably the most valuable person in the firm to you. That person is a chief operating officer or an office manager in a smaller firm. So having that one person who coordinates everything, that's step number three in how to run a law firm like a business. Step number four, you must track all activity and have deadlines for everything. An assignment without a deadline is just a wish. It's just you wishing somebody would do something. So every assignment that you give in your law firm is something that must be tracked and there must be a deadline and you must hold people accountable for those deadlines. So tracking all activity and having deadlines is a key element to running your law firm like a business. Everything you assign to anyone has a deadline just like you have deadlines imposed upon you by courts. You have filing deadlines imposed upon you by the legal process. Every activity inside your firm has to have a deadline and it has to be tracked and measured. Step number five in how to run a law firm like a business is focusing on cash flow. The biggest mistake law firms make, the biggest mistake law firm leaders make, people like you, the biggest mistake you guys make or you gals make is you don't focus on cash flow. If you bill by the hour, those bills need to go out monthly but hours need to be tracked on a daily basis and you need to know what each of your attorneys is billing and you need to know when the bills are going to go out and you need to understand that cash flow is the number one responsibility of a law firm leader. Your law firm exists to make money. Your law firm is not a charitable organization. It is a business and I'm going to say that again. You went to law school, you didn't go to business school. You're a professional and you work in a profession but your firm is a business. If your firm doesn't make money, you're out of business. If your law firm doesn't have positive cash flow, you're out of business. You need to focus on the cash flow process which is number one, attract new clients. Number two, onboard those clients and set expectations as far as billing and payment. Number three, bill the client. Number four, collect payment. Number five, evaluate your cash flow to make sure you have more money coming in than you have going out. If you have less money coming in than you have going out, that's negative cash flow and you'll go out of business. A focus on cash flow is critical. That's job one in your law firm and it's tip number five in how to run a law firm like a business. We've got two tips left. I'm going to remind you that if you want to discover new ways to attract clients, I've got a great video you should watch. The title of that video is Great Legal Marketing Strategy. There's a link to it right up there. There'll also be a link to it at the end of this video. Be sure you watch my Great Legal Marketing Strategy video. That video will help you attract new clients and it'll help you focus on your positive cash flow. All right, tip number six is never, ever get behind on your billing. Law firms go broke when they don't send out bills on time because what happens, you get into a big matter with your client and you rack up a lot of billable hours but you forget to send out the bills or you just get behind in sending out the bills. You send out the bill three months after the case is over and guess what? The case result wasn't ideal in terms of what the client expected. What's going to happen? They're not going to pay your bill or they're going to wait to pay your bill. Your bill payment is going to be delayed and you're going to have to discount your bill. Step number six, tip six in how to run a law firm like a business is never, ever get behind on billing. Step number seven, our final step is to set goals and ruthlessly hold people accountable. This is where law firm leaders fall short. You have to set goals for productivity for each person in your law firm. You have to set goals for yourself for revenue growth and then you have to ruthlessly hold people accountable. I mean that you tell folks that there is going to be trouble if they don't achieve their goals. A lot of them have input into their goals in the first place, but if they don't achieve their goals, then you will find somebody who will achieve the goals. So people set their own goals and they set their goals so that they are a stretch, but people who don't achieve goals, they don't have a place in your law firm. So set goals and hold people ruthlessly accountable. That is the final step in running a law firm like a business. These have been the seven steps to run a law firm like a business. My name is Dave Lorenzo. We're here with a show for you just like this every day. Be sure and go and watch the Great Legal Marketing video now. Watch the Great Legal Marketing strategy video right now. Click on that link. That's the video that's waiting for you. I will see you in that video right now.