The New Firm Begins
It's official. As of May 1, 2004, Homann Law and Mediation officially becomes "The Silver Lake Group." The biggest news is that another lawyer will be joining me as I officially leave the land of solo practice. My new partner, who is now winding up his present partnership (on good terms), will be formally announced here next week. There are over one hundred things on my "to-do" list, so my blogging may be a bit sporadic, but here are some highlights of our business plan that I'll flesh out in individual posts on this blog.
1. No client will be billed by the hour. I'll unveil our Service Pricingsm plan in more detail next week.2. We will guarantee each client's satisfaction with our service or refund their money.
3. We will hire a "client concierge" who will be responsible for one thing: keeping our clients happy. The client concierge will contact every client weekly, organize monthly seminars of interest to them, write topical newsletters, send birthday and holiday cards, solicit client feedback, and manage our firm's master client to-do list.
4. We will set up the "Silver Lake Small Business Foundation" and contribute ten percent of our profits to it. The money in the foundation will be used to teach entrepreneurship in local schools, donate books to public libraries, encourage people to start small businesses (with micro-loans), establish mentoring programs, and fund scholarships and work-study programs for local students.
5. We will share our methods, forms, letters, and experiences with others to encourage all of us in the legal profession to move away from the billable hour and toward a saner, customer-centered way of practicing law.
6. We will have a hell of a good time.
To say that I am excited is a massive understatement. I started this weblog to write about transfoming my practice, and I feel that I am almost there. Look for more details here over the next two weeks.