If you’re like a lot of attorneys, one of the more significant sources of overwhelm in your law practice comes from the sheer volume of emails and other communications you have to process in the course of your day. Effective communication is always a hot topic and it plagues law practices everywhere.This episode incorporates elements from last week’s conversation with Alexandra Devendra about intentional design in your legal practice, as well as previous episodes on quality standards and policies as a way of improving standards in your law firm.In today’s episode, I share my recommendations for designing a better communications policy for creating more effective, efficient communications that will ultimately ... (Keep reading)
The Agile Attorney Blog
One of the hardest things to recognize in a law practice is how the default way in which lawyers approach and deliver their work creates barriers to access for everyday people trying to reach that lawyer’s services. So, how do you identify it and what can you do about it?In today’s episode, I talk with Alexandra Devendra, founder of design-focused B Corp law firm Aligned Law. Alix shares how she injects design principles into contracts, into client-only videos that she creates, and even engages in organizational design to improve client experiences and outcomes.Tune in this week for a wide-ranging interview with Alix. We discuss the design elements that help meet ... (Keep reading)
For this episode, I continue with the theme of quality, specifically how focusing on better quality standards can improve the flow of work in your law practice while creating better outcomes for your clients.Today, I have two specific tools that work beautifully together and amount to a specific type of quality standard policy that you can implement within your law practice.The Definition of Done and Definition of Ready are two important parts of the Agile Framework, and they’ll help you dramatically in improving the consistency and the flow of work in your law practice.How do you know that you’ve done enough to meet the standards you’ve set for your law ... (Keep reading)
Policies are those little rules and practices that, when followed, help make sure that you and your team are actually hewing to your values and consistently taking the steps necessary to create the value for your customer that you’ve promised them. If you don’t have any explicit policies, it becomes incredibly difficult to develop any consistency around how and when you deliver your work.In today’s episode, I’m diving deeper into one of the six core practices of the Kanban Method: make policies explicit. In other words, drag your assumptions out into the open where you and your team can actively contend with them together.Tune in this week to discover the ... (Keep reading)
What if the best way to improve the efficiency of your law practice is to not try to improve efficiency at all, but to focus on quality instead? This may sound paradoxical, but focusing on quality, not efficiency, is the key to unlocking more balanced workloads, smoother workflow, increased capacity, and ultimately greater efficiency while delivering an improved client experience along the way.In his most recent book, Slow Productivity: The Lost Art of Accomplishment Without Burnout, Cal Newport suggests that we should, “Obsess over the quality of what you produce, even if this means missing opportunities in the short term. Leverage the value of these results to gain more and ... (Keep reading)
In today’s episode, I’m speaking with South Carolina consumer rights attorney and co-author of The Lean Law Firm, Dave Maxfield. Dave joins me today to provide an interesting look into how lawyers can adopt techniques from the Lean methodology to empower and improve their law practices.Lean and Agile share essential DNA, including using Kanban to make work flow more smoothly, as well as limiting work in progress, and a formula for actually measuring the productivity of our law practices. This episode is packed with information and practical advice you can use to implement Dave’s insights in your law firm.Tune in this week to discover how to take lean production systems of ... (Keep reading)
Streamlining processes in your law practice makes sense. It saves you and your team precious time and energy and keeps the backend running smoothly.However, optimizing a system for efficiency doesn’t always go down well with clients. In fact, it can reduce customer value and loyalty, leaving them disengaged from the process you’re helping them through.In this episode, I’m introducing you to a piece of business school research focusing on the impact of self-checkouts in grocery stores. And yes, this is a vastly different industry, but it does teach us about how optimizing a system for efficiency risks creating a worse customer experience for your client, negatively impacting their overall perceptions ... (Keep reading)
When somebody hires a lawyer, what are they really looking for?They almost certainly have practical needs, but providing value to your client often requires more than just a practical, technical solution. One mainstay of being an Agile Attorney is a constant focus on delivering customer value. So how do you align your team, your practices, and your tools to create an environment that prioritizes client value in your firm? And how do you do it in a way that delivers value in every interaction, not just with your end product?Part of getting this right is really putting yourself in your client's shoes. From their perspective, navigating the legal system is ... (Keep reading)
I join Jim and Tyson on the Maximum Lawyer Podcast and we talk about implementing the Kanban methodology in legal practices.I provide some insight on what the Kanban methodology is and why it is such a great thing to add to law firms. Kanban boards are meant to allow users to see workflows and identify areas where there is a roadblock. It can be customized to the likeness of any team!I also share some of the templates I have created that can help law firms succeed. One is a litigation workflow, which can be used to help outline a case. There is a column for intake and research, one for ... (Keep reading)
Do you have numerous cases close to being completed but, because they are no longer urgent, they sit among the rest of your work and make you feel overwhelmed by all there is to do? Many firms overlook addressing this common issue as an opportunity to reduce the total amount of work in their system.I’ll provide insights on how to reduce the work in progress to also reduce the stress and anxiety that come with feeling overwhelmed by a heavy workload. I’ll discuss things that may be consuming a significant amount of capacity without directly contributing to productivity, and explain how reducing those things will help the higher-value work flow ... (Keep reading)
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