Ignite Law at ABA TECHSHOW
Tiny Ignite Logo 2
What happens when you give fifteen speakers just six minutes and twenty slides each to discuss their vision of the future of law practice? Ignite Law!
Taking place on the eve ofABA TECHSHOW, Ignite Law will be a fun evening of entertaining, rapid-fire presentations that all answer the simple question: What is the future of law practice?
If you’re interested in submitting a presentation, or if you’d like to attend, act soon!
Check out IgniteLaw.com for more info.
Social Media Primer -- Comic Book Style
Telestra (an Australian Telco) is training its 40,000 employees on the do's and don'ts of social media. To do so, it has created an interactive comic book.
I really like their focus on the "Three R's" of social media: Responsibility, Respect and Representation. Lots of companies (and employees) could learn from this. Here's the introductory video:
Resolve to Stop Being a Sheep
Lawyers are creatures of precedent. We're told from the first day of law school that everything we do, every argument we make and every brief we file must be based upon something that's happened before. Unfortunately, we use our reliance on precedent to justify why our offices, our rates and even our business cards look just like those of our competitor down the street.
I'm challenging you resolve in 2010 to ignore your peers when it comes to changing your practice. Don't worry about what they're doing, and don't ask for their advice.
Hugh MacLeod, in his tremendous book Ignore Everybody, explains, "The more original your idea is, the less good advice other people will be able to give you." He continues:
[A] big idea will change you. Your friends may love you, but they may not want you to change. If you change, then their dynamic with you also changes.... With business colleagues it's even worse. They're used to dealing with you in a certain way.... If your idea is so good that it changes your dynamic enough to where you need them less or, God forbid, the market needs them less, then they're going to resist your idea every chance they can.
So, in 2010 resolve to stop being a sheep. Do something different. Surprise your clients with tremendous service. Dump the billable hour. Offer a guarantee. Just don't expect your peers to understand why you're challenging their status quo. And remember, while the practice of law requires precedents, the business of law does not. Knowing that your competitors aren't doing what you are isn't cause for concern, it's cause for celebration.
Unofficial Techshow Pub Crawl
This Thursday (April 2, 2009), I'll be leading the second annual Unofficial Techshow Pub Crawl at ABA's Tecshow. We took a year off last year, but are back in 2009.
We'll meet up at the Hilton Chicago Lobby at 8 and head out for a few beers at 3-4 bars in the neighborhood. Expect a great time, good fellowship and a hangover Friday morning.
UPDATE: Here's the "agenda" for our evening:
8:00 - 9:30: South Loop Club, 1 E. Balbo Ave. (about a block from Hilton)
9:30 - 11:00: Hackney's Printer's Row, 733 S. Dearborn
11:00 - 12:00: Villains Bar and Grill, 649 S. Clark
12:00 - ???: Kitty O'Shea's in the Hilton Chicago
Here's the map:
[googlemaps https://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=113120818844087991030.000466495c503eb129dbb&ll=41.872507,-87.624269&spn=0.007608,0.005748&t=h&output=embed&w=425&h=350]
If you want to join the group early, many of us will be convening at a Tweetup here.
For real-time Twitter updates from the Crawl, you can follow me (@matthomann), or follow the Unofficial Techshow Pub Crawl hashtag (#utspc).
See you in Chicago!
Re-Thinking Business Cards
Several years ago, I started using 3" x 5"business cards in place of traditional-sized cards. Since then, I've never gone back, and constantly get comments about how my cards (printed, by the way, on my own printer) are "unique," "creative," and even "cool."
In fact, I'd bet that the average person to whom I hand my card interacts with it at least 5 times longer than they do with a traditional one -- pretty much the reason you hand out cards to begin with, don't you think?
At LegalTech, I promised someone I'd share my current cards here on my blog, so here you go:
If you position yourself as a different kind of lawyer to your clients, make sure you have a different kind of card. And lose the scales of justice -- they're so 1909.
Tweet Me at LegalTech
I'm headed to NYC next week (Sunday-Tuesday) for LegalTech. I'll be speaking on a panel about Twitter on Monday, from 3-4. Here's the link to the session. If you'd like to catch up, shoot me an email at Matt@LexThink.com. You can also follow me on Twitter here: twitter.com/matthomann
Encourage your Clients to Look Back From the Future
Want clients to spend more on legal services? Ask them to step into the future. From this article from Psychology Today about economists studying why people pay premiums for immediate over future rewards (called temporal discounting), we learn that people who better connect their present with their future selves make better long term decisions:
Stanfordresearcher Hal Ersner-Hershfield has preliminary results from a studyin which virtual reality lets people experience old age. Subjects puton video goggles and move through a world where they look just likethemselves, or similar, but with gray hair and wrinkles.
Standingin front of a virtual mirror, they're asked to decide how to spend athousand dollars. Gifts? Parties? A retirement plan? Those with theelderly avatar put more than twice as much into long-term savings.Ersner-Hershfield says that embodying your future self may alsoencourage more responsible planning in other domains, such asrelationships (should I cheat?), the environment (should I recycle?),and health (should I smoke?).
So what if youdon't have a VR system at home? You might get results from simplythinking about what you'll be like when you age. "Realize that yourinterests and values will be similar when you retire,"Ersner-Hershfield says. "Sure, a 25-year-old avid rock climber mightnot be as into scaling Everest when he's in his 60s, but he'll probablystill like outdoor activities." Once identified with your future self,you might suddenly care whether he looks back on you and curses you forbeing such a knucklehead.
What does this mean for lawyers? If you're working with clients and encouraging them to make better long-term decisions for themselves or their businesses (estate planning, incorporating, succession planning, etc.), you'll get better results -- the study suggests -- if you ask your clients to look to future and imagine themselves already there.
Ask clients to see themselves twenty years from now. What have they accomplished? What challenges have they overcome? What are their children doing? Who's running their business? Etc.
I think you'll find them far more open to your advice and less likely to say, "Well, we'll just wait 'til we get there" because they already are.
Pop the Bubble on Each New Day
I have to admit, I LOVE the Bubble Calendar. It is a "poster sized calendar with a bubble to pop every day." If you're looking for something cool to give your customers, you can even have them customized. Just one customization idea: if you're a tax attorney or CPA, imagine having one with your logo as well as April 15th (and other appropriate deadlines) highlighted in red. I'm ordering mine today.
Do it all Online.
Mashable has a comprehensive list of over 270 Online Tools to Help You Run Your Business. If you're thinking of moving more of your business functions "into the cloud," you should check out this list. Sites covered can help you with Accounting, Billing, Invoicing, Scheduling, Collaboration, Meetings, Presentations, etc. Lots of cool things I'd not seen before. Enjoy!
What Will Change Everything?
Each year the World Question Center rounds up dozens of experts from multiple disciplines and asks them a simple question. This year's question: "What will change everything?" Among the essayists answering the question are anthropologists, philosophers, physicians, artists, humorists, biologists, novelists, playwrights, psychologists, actors, mathematicians, and physicists (though not a single lawyer makes the list).
Check out the entire list of essays. I'm certain you'll find more than a few big, new ideas that will stretch your brain in a good way. While you're reading what others have to say, think to yourself:
In my profession, what will change everything?
Are you prepared?
Do Anything Online
From Mashable: How To Do Almost Anything With Social Media. Bookmark it, and read one or two of the linked posts each day and you'll be a social media wiz in no time.
Taking the "Less" out of Jobless
Looking for a simple way to help the jobless in your community? A local bar here in St. Louis (where lots of Anheuser-Busch employees are unemployed for the first time) has a great idea: Host a resume-writing clinic.
What else can you do to help the members of your community in their time of need? Just a few ideas:
- Do a seminar on unemployment law, including the rights/responsibilities of employers or employees.
- Donate a portion of every payment you receive to a food pantry.
- Collect interview-appropriate clothes for job-seekers.
- Partner with the local copy shop or printer and offer coupons for free resume printing and mailing.
- Enlist local schools and ask them to provide non-peak use of computers (with student mentors) to job hunters.
- Donate (and ask clients to as well) used computers, appropriately reformatted, to those who need them.
- Teach about LinkedIn, Craigslist, Facebook and other online services that can help job seekers.
- Ask your business clients to volunteer to do practice interviews with -- and give feedback to -- the newly unemployed.
- Create and sponsor a job fair in your town.
I'm sure they are hundreds more. The point is, help those in need. They'll thank you and you'll thank yourself.
Designers Don't Have a Monopoly on Design
If one of your goals for the New Year is to upgrade your firm's image, here's a bit of inspiration for you. Andy Mangold a 20 year-old design student, took a something we all take for granted (the Monopoly board game package) and looked at it in a different way. Here's his stunning re-design:
If you asked a 20-something design student at your local college to take a crack at re-imagining your legal brand, what could it look like? I bet there are a few design students who'd be interested in tackling the challenge. Do you have the guts to let them?
(via TheDieline)
Make Meetings Shorter
Here's an easy way to make your meetings shorter: Fill your conference room with seating from The Slightly Uncomfortable Chair Collection. It is a series of chairs that look just a bit more than "slightly uncomfortable." Follow the link to see the whole collection.
Get Paid Faster
Some great advice from Howard Mann on ways to get paid faster. Here's my favorite:
4. Make the invoice an experience not a pain. You work so hard to deliver a great experience to your customers -don't you? Why stop when the product or service is delivered? How canyou make the delivery of your invoice a memorable event to therecipient? It is a chance to ask for feedback. It is a chance to thankthem for their business. 2 suggestions:
a) Make your invoice look nice great! Your invoice represents yourcompany. Does it do it well? Have the designer that designed your logo,web site or brochure design your invoice. Make it clear and pleasantto read. Forms do not have to be ugly. Make it stand out from theothers.
b) Add a message to the invoice that is memorable. Maybe it is afunny quote or a fun way to present the total due. If you don't sendmany invoices then take the time to write a personal email with eachone. If you send a ton, then this is impractical. But you can create acover email that briefly thanks them for entrusting the work to you. Change your message every month or so. Even a variety of facts aboutyour company or staff works. Make it memorable and make it work withthe personality of your business. I had one vendor who mentioned intheir invoice when staff members had a birthday or had a baby, whichdrove home their family oriented nature.
An absolutely dynamite idea! Look at your invoices, are they interesting or memorable?
What I like is...
A quick tip from Johnnie Moore, from this post on improvisation, that's worth keeping in mind when negotiating with opponents, listening to clients or making restaurant plans with your significant other:
Respond to all offers with, "What I like about your idea is ...."
Twelve Days For You
As a thanks to everyone who's made my personal and professional life as great as it has ever been, I'm going to give away 12 days in the New Year to you. Each month, I'll give a day away to someone to help them make their business better -- no strings attached. I'm working out the details now, and will post them by the New Year.
Here's my challenge to you: Can you find your best twelve clients (or their favorite causes) and give each a day of your time and talent in 2009?
Amazing things will happen if you do. I promise.
London, England
I'm in London from 12/7 - 12/13. If you'd like to connect, give me a shout: Matt (at) LexThink (dot) com.
The Blawg 100
Thanks to the folks at the ABA Journal for naming this blog to The Blawg 100, their list of the "best legal blogs" for the second year in a row. Check out the entire list, there are tons of great blogs you should be following.