Mind Your Business

43 ABA Journal Mind Your Business articles.

4 ways to grow your new law firm without overextending yourself

Before you start drafting a plan to expand your firm into new territories or practice new areas of law, it’s important that you don’t fall into the habit of overworking yourself in order to achieve your business goals.

Sep 18, 2023 11:19 AM CDT

Why differentiation is your firm’s responsibility

According to the Thomson Reuters 2022 State of U.S. Small Law Firms report, 22% of law firms admit that “differentiating your firm from your competition” is one of the top three goals or priorities for their practices. The report also indicates that 50% of firms find “challenges acquiring new client business” a moderate challenge, and 22% see it as a significant one. At the same time, almost three-quarters of the firms feel that the most competition comes from other law firms of similar size.

Aug 22, 2023 2:05 PM CDT

Beyond the Hype: Lessons on auditing AI systems from the front lines

“Generative AI systems are made up of billions or even trillions of parameters trained on vast amounts of data, and their complexity makes their outputs notoriously difficult to explain. But can complex generative systems undergo meaningful audits?”

Jul 17, 2023 8:12 AM CDT

Consider teaching law in business school as an alternative career

A JD degree is a gateway to various career alternatives. One of these opportunities, teaching law in a business school, receives little publicity and often is overlooked by law school graduates.

Jun 1, 2023 9:16 AM CDT

5 ways to scale in-house resources in the face of an economic downturn

After years of unbridled hiring, a growing number of tech companies recently have made headlines with layoffs and recruiting slowdowns. In-house counsel jobs, especially at tech companies, are not exempt.

Apr 20, 2023 8:51 AM CDT

Preventive Law: Helping your clients before push comes to shove

Rare is the client who looks to litigators, alternative dispute resolution specialists or even corporate counsel as the “go to” persons for providing services that will prevent disputes. Most attorneys serve their clients by representing them in disputes that are already or soon to be underway, with a focus on billable negotiation, mediation, arbitration or litigation representation. When it comes to employee and manager education, skills training and systemic dispute prevention, business leaders look not to their attorney advocates but to a potpourri of human relations consultants, trainers and behavioral science experts.

Mar 21, 2023 10:14 AM CDT

Humanizing the Process: A new approach to interviewing for law firms

For the past 20 years in the legal recruiting business, my firm, the Advocates, has focused on helping our clients land key lateral attorneys and improve retention through several unique processes designed to match candidates’ personalities to the right law firm and corporate cultures for them.

Feb 16, 2023 12:21 PM CST

Technology streamlines in-house work, but have a plan before making purchases

The pandemic pressured corporate legal departments to control costs and collaborate online to an unprecedented degree as demand for legal services surged. But missteps await legal departments that rush into implementing technology without first taking a thorough look at the bigger picture.

Feb 1, 2023 2:20 AM CST

Anti-discrimination laws are faltering in the face of artificial intelligence; here’s what to do about it

“On the basis of.” These four words from the Civil Rights Act of 1964 underlie the modern conception of illegal bias. From federal anti-discrimination statutes to state and local laws, this phrase nearly unites them all.

Jan 24, 2023 2:42 PM CST

How an Am Law 200 firm created an incubator program for associates to learn business, leadership skills

An intrepid cavalier King Charles spaniel inspired a microincubator program aimed at giving associates room to develop leadership skills, foster creative thinking and facilitate collaboration with colleagues in different locations and practice areas.

Dec 12, 2022 8:45 AM CST

Your law firm’s fee structure can affect financial planning

A firm’s chosen fee structure and how its finances are handled can lay the foundation for the entire life of the business and sometimes provides early indicators in determining whether it will grow and thrive or eventually crumble.

Dec 1, 2022 2:10 AM CST

How to get more clients from the comfort of home

As the world continues to digitalize, legal professionals must embrace this change sooner rather than later to remain competitive. Check out five steps to increase your online client base before you find your business left behind gradually, then suddenly.

Nov 1, 2022 8:41 AM CDT

How to make strident predictions about predictive analytics

Being able to make predictions is crucial for lawyers. Let’s explore the nature of judicial prediction-making by attorneys and see how the latest in artificial intelligence-powered legal technology comes into play in this altogether ubiquitous, yet highly formidable task.

Oct 3, 2022 9:56 AM CDT

How law departments can survive or even thrive in the event of a coming recession

The pandemic’s global economic and human impact has created new challenges for in-house legal teams. Supply chain disruptions, sharp increases or decreases in consumer demand, and the impact of uncertainty surrounding remote work options have pushed in-house legal teams to rethink the work they are doing and how they are doing it.

Oct 1, 2022 2:20 AM CDT

Reimagining the OCI Process: What we learned from the pandemic

On-campus interviews have long been a staple of law firm recruiting. But when the pandemic hit, law firms, like everyone else, had to adapt by taking this time-honored tradition virtual—in many cases with great success.

Sep 6, 2022 8:30 AM CDT

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