Imagine locking your house but leaving your key in the door. Any thief could instantly walk in and steal your valuables. Locking your door alone does not protect your home. A similar security failure plagues law firms. Keep reading to learn more.

Managing a law practice is about much more than representing clients. One of the biggest challenges for law practitioners, especially true solos and small firms, is maintaining an accurate trust accounting system. Read more to learn tips for keeping an accurate trust accounting system.

Do you speak the same way in a job interview as you do when you’re at a concert with your friends? Probably not. Is your interaction with a police officer similar to how you behave with a family member? Again, unlikely. We tend to adjust our style based on our circumstances and company; and often we do so unwittingly. But in the practice of law, with words as our tools, it’s not enough to simply convey thoughts. We must have a deeper awareness of how we are communicating.

Think back to the last time you took a flight. Depending on the airline, boarding your plane was either a breeze or a scramble, and the experience may have shaped the rest of your trip. The same is true for new clients, specifically once you have taken on their case. A client’s introduction to your practice can affect the entire course of the representation.

For most legal professionals, days often move quickly, or at least that’s how it feels. With everything that’s happening—court appearances, drafting pleadings, and client meetings, to name a few—it’s no wonder many people have never paused to understand the importance of taking notes or to find what works best for them. Great notetaking isn’t just administrative clutter: It’s an essential skill that can make or break your effectiveness as a practitioner.

Fee sharing is a common part of doing business for many law firms. When handled well, this practice not only leads to better client outcomes but can also open new revenue streams and improve efficiency across the board.

This video shows you how to create your own pleading template from scratch. PLF Practice Management Attorney Monica Logan walks you through each step of the process, including creating the caption, line numbering, footer, and saving as a template. This step-by-step guide is perfect for attorneys and staff looking to streamline document formatting and avoid errors.

As lawyers continue to rely on the cloud to store, share, and sync client files, questions around data security are more important than ever. Services like OneDrive, Box, Dropbox, and Google Drive may be convenient—but are they secure enough for confidential client information? The short answer: not always.

Have you ever felt like your client files are out of control? Client file materials are often scattered throughout various locations and saved in multiple types of formats. Gone are the days of a single paper file stored neatly in your filing cabinet. Read on to learn more.

If this is your MCLE reporting year, the deadline to complete all credits is April 30. As we approach the deadline, remember that the PLF maintains a comprehensive library of free OSB-accredited CLEs covering a wide range of topics!

For any building project, a construction crew relies on a blueprint to outline the foundation and materials. This document ensures that the final structure aligns with the architect’s vision. Similarly, a business plan serves as a blueprint for your law firm. It defines your firm’s purpose and operations, helping you make strategic decisions to bring your vision to life.

Is your firm optimizing email marketing strategies to achieve the most impactful results? This article discusses considerations and strategies for unleashing the power of email marketing and leveraging this versatile marketing channel to create unique opportunities for engagement.

To support aspiring and current firm owners, we've refreshed our practice management book series, complete with our latest malpractice avoidance tips, general guidelines, and practical forms. The new design format enhances readability, while the trio of covers embraces the essence of the Pacific Northwest. Whether you're planning to start a firm or already managing one, this set from the PLF reveals valuable insights to guide your journey.

Opening and managing a law firm is an exciting venture that also comes with significant financial considerations. Creating and maintaining a SMART budget is crucial and will increase your potential to become profitable more quickly.

Conflicts may arise from an associate’s prior legal work, which can be imputed to the new firm. In such cases, the new firm must implement an effective ethical screen or “wall” to exclude the associate from involvement in the matter. The sheer volume of information can make it difficult to establish a consistent and effective ethical wall. To improve the screening process, firms should develop clear, detailed procedures for managing each type of storage.

Legal professionals spend an average of 66% of their day on email, according to Dashboard Legal. With the daily flood of emails, saving them to client files often gets overlooked. To prevent pitfalls, it's crucial to understand your ethical obligations and establish a system for organizing and saving emails efficiently.

In today’s connected world, attorneys can work virtually anywhere. Smartphones in particular have transformed the way lawyers operate, essentially allowing them to carry their entire office in their pocket. However, this convenience also comes with significant responsibility: protecting the confidential client information now stored on your phone.

Poor client communication is one of the most common factors in malpractice claims and bar complaints. To avoid these issues and enhance your legal services, consider the following tips.

Calendaring is a fundamental task for legal professionals, yet calendaring errors remain a leading cause of malpractice claims. In this post, we discuss Microsoft Outlook, a popular option to enhance productivity and organization, and lessen your chances of committing malpractice.

As a leader, it's essential to keep the team running smoothly by providing resources and support to proactively address morale issues, burnout, or other de-motivating conditions.

In today's legal market, digital marketing is essential for attracting new clients and growing your practice. Consider the following tools, technology, and techniques to expand your digital presence and track the effectiveness of your marketing strategy.

As any legal professional can tell you, there’s a lot to know when it comes to practicing law. Thankfully, organizations like the American Bar Association exist to help. With a long history and plethora of information, “[t]he ABA works to promote the best quality legal education, competence, ethical conduct and professionalism, and pro bono and public service work in the legal profession.” Consider joining and take advantage of all that a legal-specific national organization has to offer.

Venmo, Zelle, and Cash App are peer-to-peer smartphone applications (P2P) that streamline money transfers by linking user credit cards or bank accounts to rapidly move funds between users. In the legal field, client interest in P2P apps is rising. While undoubtedly convenient, lawyers must assess their security and suitability for their practice.

The ABA TECHSHOW, held in Chicago from February 14-17, 2024, was a melting pot of insights, innovations, and imperative discussions on the intersection of technology and law. As legal professionals met to explore the latest trends and tools, our PMAP team identified several overarching themes that emerged from the diverse array of presentations and discussions. Here are some key takeaways.

If you find yourself grappling with the responsibility to safeguard original client documents, consider the following tips.

When current resources are stretched to their limits and you need help meeting demands, hiring staff can become essential. If you want someone who can work from wherever, a remote staff person is often the first thought.

Clear communication with pro se parties can help prevent misunderstandings and allow you to better work with them and obtain the information you need to represent your client competently and diligently. Focus on building a professional relationship with them that clearly defines roles and interests. Consider the following tips when interacting with a self-represented litigant to help avoid potential ethics or malpractice issues.

The holiday season is in full swing, and many attorneys are taking some well-deserved time off to relax and recharge or travel to see family. A break from work during the holidays is a great way to prevent burnout and reconnect with friends and loved ones. It can be difficult, however, for lawyers to truly disconnect due to billable hours and client demands.

To lessen the risk of malpractice and ethical violations, legal professionals need to understand the different types of AI so they can make intelligent decisions about which programs they may want to integrate into their practice.

With the sheer frequency and variety of notifications, meetings, and other commitments that legal professionals have, it can be hard to keep track of your to-do

Navigating legal practice can resemble sailing on a stormy sea. An iceberg may threaten the strength and journey of a ship, similar to malpractice. By understanding the makeup of the iceberg you can better avoid it, and the same can be said for malpractice claims.

The email domain that Oregon’s circuit courts and the Oregon Tax Court use to send notices has changed. Here are instructions for how to add a domain name to your Safe Senders List in Outlook.

No two firms will likely have the exact same file management procedures, but file management best practices apply to everyone. Understand your storage options and best practice tips to ensure that your client files are being managed properly.

The PLF is excited to announce we have completed the biennial comprehensive review of our in-house practice aids for Oregon legal professionals, including checklists, sample documents, and resource materials. We have also added a few new materials we hope you will find helpful.

Whether anticipating retirement, making a career change, or just looking to leave private practice, law firm owners must decide how they want to transition. As you begin this process, review your options by asking yourself these three key questions.

There is no one marketing algorithm that works for all legal professions, because each firm is unique. There is, however, one free and easy tool that everyone can use.

Profitability can be boiled down to increasing income and decreasing expenses. It’s about understanding your firm’s financial benchmarks for performance, finding new or better ways to get paid, and engaging your staff to meet the firm’s goals. To keep things simple, let’s look at the three “P”s of profitability—Performance, Payments, and People.

Check fraud, particularly “check washing,” has increased significantly over the past year. Here are some tips to protect yourself from this scam.

How many hundreds— or thousands — of emails are in your inbox right now? At what pace is that number growing? Are you confident that an urgent message isn’t lurking in your queue? Does your computer constantly ping and pop up notifications? If these questions speak to the current state of your email account, you may have a problem. These are all telltale signs that a destructive dragon is living in your inbox.

Top takeaways from the ABA TECHSHOW

These days, video and audio calls are the new standard. Consider incorporating audioconferencing into your practice if you haven’t already done so.

Lawyers often take on too much. Regardless of how much we want to help, there are only so many hours in the day that we can dedicate to our jobs. Try some of these ways to better manage your calendar before things get out of control.

The new year is a perfect time to reflect on and improve your office and its systems. A simple and efficient exercise called the 'Design Matrix' can help you identify the vital first steps to take.

If you want to improve your meeting management skills, take your inspiration from the conductor.

Discovery can be a major headache for law firms. The proliferation of electronic data makes it challenging for lawyers to efficiently manage all of this information. The typical discovery process can be complicated and expensive, especially for solo and small firms. Managing electronic discovery used to be seen as necessary only for large firms in complex litigation. Now, law firms of all sizes need to be able to handle eDiscovery.

A brief conversation with PLF Claims Attorney Bradley Tompkins about common malpractice risks and how to handle them

Finding the right associate to join your firm can feel a lot like fishing. There may be plenty of fish in the sea, but you are searching for a star. Your job description is the first connection potential applicants have with you. You want that first contact to capture their attention and interest while also conveying your values and the benefits of working with you.

The Professional Liability Fund offers a wide variety of resources to educate and assist lawyers and law office staff. As part of those resources, we maintain and update a library of over 300 forms consisting of checklists, sample letters and pleadings, and other helpful documents. We recently added four new checklists to our website that we encourage you to review.

Law firms have always been plagued by the 'knowledge drain': the loss of knowledge when experienced employees retire or leave. They take not only their accumulated knowledge but also valuable relationships. Firms must find a way to capture and retain institutional knowledge and make critical knowledge accessible to their teams if they want to ensure business continuity, provide quality legal services, and stay competitive.

If a picture is worth a thousand words, a one-minute video equals 1.8 million words. This article will discuss three ways to use video to run a better practice, reduce potential malpractice, and improve your bottom line. It will conclude with a step-by-step tutorial on how to make videos for your staff in Microsoft Teams

Meeting with a potential client may sometimes feel like walking a tightrope. It can be difficult to end the intake without any misunderstandings or unintended promises. When someone believes an attorney-client relationship has formed but you do not, a real danger exists. As the attorney, it is your role and responsibility to clearly communicate when an attorney-client relationship is established and when it is not, no matter the marketing medium.

How we choose to communicate as a society is an ever-evolving process. With the rise in digital media, trends have seen more consumers turn to text, video calls, and emails as their preferred forms of communication. Is your firm doing everything it can to reach potential clients?

To prevent mishaps and errors, you may need to evaluate how cases proceed through your office. Having a smooth process can avoid inaccuracies and save time. You can be more efficient if you have a well-defined and planned workflow for you and your staff.

See a few takeaways from the 2022 ABA TECHSHOW that you may want to incorporate into your practice, particularly regarding evaluating your technology, software for managing new clients, and virtual receptionists.

Many malpractice claims arise from a client

To best manage your lawyer trust account, think of and care for your trust account the way you would take care of your dog. You attend to its particular needs, such as physical and mental stimulation, dietary monitoring, and health check-ups. These steps for owning a happy and healthy dog reflect similar methods for maintaining a sound trust account.

The last couple of years have been challenging for many people in different ways. While it can be difficult to look back on this time from a

The type of program you use to track your time and calculate your bills will vary depending on your specific practice and firm goals. In focusing on software for billing, you have your choice of options, but you should consider the variety of features available when making the decision which to use for your practice.

We are delighted to welcome Monica Logan

If you have received an emailed hearing notice from an Oregon circuit court or the Oregon Tax Court since Monday, October 18, 2021, please double-check the time of the hearing.

On April 29, 2021, Oregon Governor Kate Brown issued Executive Order No. 21-10, which was the seventh extension of Executive Order No. 20-03 and the COVID-19 State of Emergency since her original order declaring an emergency on March 8, 2020. On June 25, 2021, Governor Brown then issued Executive Order No. 21-15, which extended Executive Order No. 20-03 and the state of emergency to December 31, 2021, unless extended or terminated earlier by the Governor.

The PLF recently presented a CLE on potential malpractice risks for bankruptcy practitioners. PLF Claims Attorney John Berge and Julia Manela from Watkinson Laird Rubenstein PC explored how the pandemic could generate an uptick in consumer bankruptcy filings after emergency governmental financial assistance ends and eviction moratoriums expire.

In our recent CLE on on “Avoiding Malpractice Claims When Filing and Serving a Complaint,” PLF Claims Attorney Amy Hoven and Hillary Taylor from Keating Jones Hughes PC discussed how the process of filing and serving a complaint can be fraught with errors.

Settlements have always been common in the legal world, and they

An attorney, his spouse, and their child stayed a few nights at a hotel for spring break. At one time or another, we all have been at hotels, airports, coffee shops, and restaurants and used their public Wi-Fi to check our email and use the internet on our laptops, tablets, or smartphones. But the risk of exposing our client and personal data is not a trivial or benign matter.

Although some courts are moving toward holding more appearances in person, certain court appearances will likely continue to be held remotely for some time to come. While the future of court system operations remains uncertain and will continue to evolve over time, below are some resources to improve your remote hearing experience:

On February 25, 2021, Oregon Governor Kate Brown issued Executive Order No. 21-05, which is the sixth extension of Executive Order No. 20-03 and the COVID-19 State of Emergency since her original order declaring an emergency on March 8, 2020. Based on this latest extension, Executive Order 20-03 and the COVID-19 State of Emergency will be extended for an additional 60 days, through May 2, 2021, unless extended or terminated earlier by the governor.

It’s fairly easy for clients to fire their attorney. Some clients might issue an overt announcement like “you’re fired!” Others might just make a polite statement that sounds more like a request such as, “Would you please give me my file so I can find another lawyer?” On the other hand, it’s not always easy for lawyers to fire their clients.

Law firms are known for their high turnover of associates, who leave to join a different firm, take a job as in-house counsel or government lawyer, or depart the legal profession altogether. Some of the reasons include demanding hours, unbearable pressure, a toxic culture, and a lack of work-life balance. But the reason we shall delve into here is the terrible boss.

Financial industry leaders expect that many people, both consumers and business owners alike, will continue to favor mobile banking options over traditional banking post-COVID. Take some time to learn the mobile options offered by your bank so you can make optimal use of their features.

2020 was a very tough year. Instead of reciting a lengthy laundry list of all the bad things that happened last year, I

The traditional legal employment model of hiring a full-time lawyer to work as an associate attorney or in-house counsel is not always suitable for certain law firms and organizations. Temporary projects or legal work that have limited duration don

As business continues to dwindle for some law firms, they are laying off associates and staff, imposing pay cuts, and taking other measures to minimize the financial impact caused by the pandemic. The pressure to stay afloat may tempt lawyers to relax their billing practices, ramp up fee collection efforts, and even hoard billable hours. Working from home can also lead to careless billing practices as the line between work and family life begins to blur.

If you feel uncomfortable and unconfident marketing your law firm or yourself, you are not alone. Many professionals feel that it is unseemly to advertise, even though it is ethically permitted under the Oregon Rules of Professional Conduct, as long as it is neither misleading nor false.

In my previous blog post,

Regardless of the practice area, many attorneys are now facing the dilemma of losing track of their clients. The pandemic, and most recently wildfires on the West Coast, has upended many people

We understand that these are very difficult times, and we want to remind you that the Professional Liability Fund is here to help and has numerous resources available to assist you.

Criminal law has historically been viewed as a low-claim frequency and severity area of practice

At the start of this pandemic, many businesses had to close their doors. A few businesses were able to switch gears and continue employing their workers to do something else. For example, some distilleries and wineries started using their own alcohol to make hand sanitizer at a time when it was in short supply. A pizza shop in Chicago that could no longer serve pizza by the slice started using its ovens to make plastic face shields for frontline workers.

Many of us are more reliant than ever before on the stability and speed of our internet connection, now that the pandemic has forced us to work from home and many children are engaged in remote learning. If your home internet connection is not performing at the level necessary to support your needs, consider the options below to make it work for you.

COVID-19 has pushed many lawyers to quickly transition to a remote work environment and digitize their law practice. The swift and drastic transformation of the legal profession has created new risk management challenges for lawyers as they navigate different ways to run their business and deliver legal services. This blog post will explore some of the risks lawyers face when trying to get new clients and retain existing ones during the COVID-19 era.

The pandemic has forced us to reexamine how we connect with others. Thankfully, technology has allowed us to create new virtual networking opportunities with colleagues, friends, and family. It is important to maintain those connections and establish new ones; otherwise it has been shown that social isolation can have damaging effects, both personal and professional.

Notarization in Oregon became a bit challenging when COVID-19 forced people to stay home and keep a physical distance. Many lawyers came up with clever ways to notarize their clients

As we move forward and adjust to the changing infrastructure due to the pandemic, it is a good time to think about what type of phone system works best for your law firm. Phone calls remain a very popular form of communication, despite other methods such as email, video conferencing, and client portals, and may be the preferred method depending on the circumstances.

We are now three months in to what is, for many of us, this brave new world of remote work. For some, it has been a resoundingly successful experiment. Some lawyers who previously worked out of traditional law offices have made a smooth transition to working out of their homes

With this blog post, let me pose the question, is there a

It doesn

With the spread of COVID-19 and resulting changes in how we conduct business, we need methods for exchanging information in different ways. In particular, attorneys need secure methods to collaborate on Word documents with both their clients and colleagues. This collaboration could include simply gathering information from clients with an intake form, review and approval of a document by a client or supervisor, or more complex collaboration involving multiple versions and tracked changes.

The COVID-19 pandemic may mark the end of an era of hesitation or resistance from lawyers about the use of cloud services and products. We are all now forced to rely on remote access programs and other technologies to help us do our work from home.

Switching to a Work From Home (WFH) law practice is a big adjustment for lawyers and their colleagues, staff, and clients. To help support your efforts to make this go smoother, we have created a new practice aid,

At times like these, the amount of information available on the topic of COVID-19 can be overwhelming. With the vast number of unknowns and quickly changing landscapes, it can be difficult if not impossible to feel any sense of control. I

Most law offices are operating with a skeleton crew onsite to receive, sort, scan, and deliver mail that is important for lawyers to continue practicing law by working from home.

In light of the spread of COVID-19, many lawyers are looking for ways to continue meeting with their clients and other parties while keeping some distance from them. Fortunately, we are in an age where technology makes it easy to implement social distancing efforts that many individuals and businesses are now undertaking. This blog post will cover two tools that will allow lawyers to work and maintain social distance: (1) video conferencing and (2) remote access.

Client portals allow lawyers to interact with clients in a secure environment to accomplish tasks such as gathering information, sharing documents, and making payments for services. They can be a valuable tool for lawyers, so consider implementing them into your practice if you haven't already.

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