Month: September 2011

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Law School Applications Way Down

Whether you are thinking about starting a law practice or just hoping to get a legal job, you might want to reconsider whether the law is even a good field for you.  According to the Wall Street Journal Law Blog, law school applications are at a 10-year low.  Additionally, the article states that LSAT applications are at a 24-year low.  Recession anyone?

If you weren’t aware, the lawyer job market is not so good at the moment.  Heck, the job market as a whole is not so good right now.  For many newly minted attorneys, the loans and the lack of jobs has become unbearable.  For instance, it appears that one attorney was denied admittance to the Ohio bar – despite passing the bar exam – because he wasn’t repaying his large law school loans.  Ouch.

I don’t know if it is a good or a bad thing that law applications are down across the country. On the good side: the article does a nice job pointing out that now, perhaps many people are not going to law school as a “backup plan” or because they don’t know what else to do with their lives.  Both are not good reasons to go to law school.

Many lawyers may think this is good news.  In fact, many attorneys I know have made a comment that often goes something like this: “great, that’s what the world needs, another lawyer.”  I wrote a post a couple months ago about how I counted over 30 attorneys in the little town of Northfield, MN which has a population of a little over 17,000 people.  Seems like a lot of lawyers.

I do find it disconcerting that nobody talked about the bad job market that was coming at me when I started law school in 2004.  In 2004, the economy was doing quite well. The housing bubble had not yet burst.  In fact, some of my friends from college were doing quite well as a result of the inflated real estate market.  Did I join in on those shenanigans?  No, I went to law school.

I realize this blog is ostensibly about starting and building a law firm.  Therefore, it is a self-made job market.  But, when the economy stinks it is going to have an effect on any law practice.  I worry about that.  A lot.

I am hoping to be admitted by motion into the Minnesota state bar and move on with my life.  I don’t regret becoming a lawyer, but I do regret not knowing how bad the job market would be when I got out of law school.  I regret not being more informed.  So, if anybody gets to this post and reads it, I hope you think twice about whether law school is right for you.

At the very least, I know I made an effort to inform somebody about the job prospects and large loan obligations related to choosing law school.  If you read this, you can’t say somebody didn’t tell you so.

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“Above The Law” Seeks Solo Attorney Input

I wanted to let my readers out there know that one of the major blogs, Above The Law, is soliciting solo lawyers for worthy topics to be posted on its “Small Law Firms” section.

I don’t read their coverage of small firm matters often – mainly because their primary focus is on big law as far as I can tell.  However, I get some good chuckles from them now and again.  Also, providing worthy info on small firm practice or on starting a law firm to a major blog will do nothing but help publicize your blog or law firm website.

If you are so inclined, you probably couldn’t go wrong by providing something.

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Finding Your Writing Voice: Legal Blogging v. Legal Writing

Legal blogging has opened up new doors for me.  I just hope those doors don’t shut as soon as somebody starts reading this.  I’ll say this:  blogging has been one of the best things to happen to me as I set out on my own and try to start a law firm.

As an undergraduate English major at the University of Iowa, I would read and write often. Maybe not well, but often.  After college, I decided to go to law school for a variety of reasons; several of them being that I expected law school to be intellectually challenging and allow me to write on a consistent basis.   It was and it has.

Law school also opened new writing doors for me.  Learning to focus my writing so that it appeals to a judge or benefits a client has been a great source of personal satisfaction.  Writing well, as legal-writing guru Bryan Garner has stated, is a thing to be studied over a lifetime.

Being a lawyer has taught me how to write in a strict, formalized manner – otherwise known by the oft-maligned acronyms:  IRAC, CRUPAC, or (my favorite) CRAC. Some have even wondered if IRAC is good or evil.  I won’t speculate on that now – such weighty issues are the purpose of another post.

However, after writing some odd-hundred ideas, rants, thoughts, and opinions on this blog, I have begun to realize that this blog is extremely valuable to me to grow as a writer – legal or not.  I’ll also let you in on a little secret: it doesn’t always go so well.  Go read some of my old posts, they’re not so good.  I have thought hard about going back and making prior posts better.  However, I know that my later posts – like this one – are probably not going to look very good a few months down the road.  Why would that be?  Because, I am growing (ever so slowly) as a legal blogger.

Legal blogging is different animal than legal writing.  One can write about case law on a blog in a law-school-trained manner.  However, I would bet that many lawyers find that kind of writing a little tedious.  Lawyers are forced to write like lawyers every day, all day.  Why not let your freak-flag fly a bit?

In my humble opinion, legal blogs are not great vehicles for Issue, Fact, Application, Conclusion.  Isn’t it a bit tiring to read blogs that cite case law and then commence discussing the facts and issues before reaching an inevitable, preordained conclusion?  If I wanted to know about the facts, I would go read the case myself.

I am not, however, condoning sloppy writing.  I am discouraging boring writing.  In an effort not to sound overly hypocritical, I’ll admit that I’m guilty of boring and bad writing at times.  I may be writing poorly right now.   Beauty is, after all, in the eye of the beholder.

However, I know that trying to write on a consistent basis, keeping the topics timely and (I hope) relevant, has made me a better writer.  That is something that will only benefit my abilities as a lawyer in the future.  Furthermore, I believe that legal blogging allows lawyers to have a more of a personal, perhaps informal voice.   As I have discussed, I think I am having a sea change.  I have always been interested in blogging because it allows my inner English major to come out and play.  I know this:  I may not be playing the game well, but at least I am playing it.

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Bar Exam Results Being Released . . . . sloooowly

As Above the Law reports, not every state has released results; however, it would appear that if they haven’t done so already, most states will be reporting the results of their individual bar exams in the near future.  Thank you National Conference of Bar Examiners (NCBE) for slowly releasing the July of 2011 bar exam results to anxious future lawyers, experienced lawyers becoming licensed in a new jurisdiction, and law firm start-ups everywhere.

For me, the post-bar exam wait is over.  I just received my results for North Dakota and . . . . . . I passed!  Not to rub it in for those who might not have been so fortunate, but I also scored high enough to (hopefully) be admitted by motion into Minnesota.  Minnesota is one of several jurisdictions that allow attorneys who have taken the Multistate Bar Exam (MBE) to apply for admission by motion with a scaled score of 145.  I achieved that result – barely.  I scored 145.8 according to a phone conversation I had with the North Dakota Board of Law Examiners.   That is .8 good enough for me!

For those of you who may not read this blog, I am already licensed in Indiana and have been practicing there for nearly four years.  Now, pending satisfactory results on my character and fitness review, I will be licensed in three jurisdictions in the near future:  Indiana, North Dakota, and Minnesota. I haven’t decided on whether I will keep my license active in Indiana, but it would be nice to list licensure in three different states on my letterhead and business cards for flanderslawfirm.com.

In any case, I am very pleased with the results and glad that I can move on with my life.  I hope my readers experience the same relief.

Admission By Motion Rules

Every state has admission by Motion rules.  Here is a list of links compiled by the American Bar Association (thank you ABA!) for every state’s admission by motion rules.  (Is it me or is finding out information on admissions on each states rules on admission to practice terribly difficult?  Somebody (maybe the ABA) should make an effort to standardize many of the different rules and requirements for admission in each state.  Taking the bar exam, applying to several states’ bars, and navigating the myriad of timing, deadlines and other requirements for multi-jurisdiction practice is just way too difficult.)

From my review, states that allow admission by motion require either:

  1. practicing law in another jurisdiction continuously for a specified number of years (anywhere from 3-5), or
  2. applying for admission by motion due to a high enough MBE score (anywhere from 135-160).

I did not meet the first option for admittance into Minnesota by motion because I have only been practicing nearly four years in Indiana and Minnesota has a five year requirement for admission on motion based on years of practice.  Ironically, Wisconsin – twenty miles from my home – allows admission by motion based on three years in practice. Such is life.

Here are Minnesota’s rules on admission by motion as listed on the Minnesota State Board of Law Examiners webpage:

ADMISSION ON MOTION

Lawyers may be admitted to the practice of law in Minnesota without examination:

  • By years of practice–five of the seven years immediately preceding the application; or for house counsel, three of the past five years.
  • By scaled MBE score of 145 or higher.  The application must be submitted within 24 months of the date of the qualifying exam being used as the basis for admission.

I managed to achieve the second requirement.  What a relief.  As I posted before, taking the bar exam a second time is not any more fun than the first.  Now, I hope to be admitted by motion and I am awaiting the results of a character and fitness investigation.  I do not have any prior disciplinary actions against me in any jurisdiction. Still, having an investigation into your character is a little unnerving.  However, I understand the process and I think there is a good reason why character and fitness investigations are required.

In any case, I did it.  I’ll be applying for admission by motion to Minnesota and I hope to be licensed in the relatively near future there. Once I’ve done that I can move on with my life, my law practice, and this blog.  I hope to provide much more pertinent (and non-personal) information in the future on this blog about how to start a law practice; but, for now, I’ve met the initial hurdle that makes all that possible.  I hope you did too.

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Can Bad SEO Advice Support a Negligence Lawsuit?

Check out this post by Eric Goldman on his Technology & Marketing Law Blog about how bad SEO advice could support a negligence claim as seen in D’Agostino v. Appliances Buy Phone, Inc..  (As an aside, I found this article at Associates Mind – another blog that appears to be way better than this one and which makes me jealous).

According to the complaint, a small home appliances business and Google were sued by the business’s web developer.  As Mr. Goldman points out, the more interesting aspect of the complaint is the counter claim.  In the counter claim, the small business seeks damages for the web developer building a second business website that appears to have had duplicate content with the original website.  If you didn’t know, Google doesn’t like duplicate content.

Mr. Goldman does a great job explaining the nature of the counter claim:

On the negligence claim, Sigman argued that D’Agostino claimed to be an SEO expert but negligently triggered a duplicate content penalty. Finally, Sigman claimed that D’Agostino breached their contract by “jeopardizing defendant’s website, violating Google policies, and causing the interruption of defendant’s enterprise.”

I’ve been putting a lot of time and effort into my law firm website and to blogging.  There is a lot of information out there about “white hat” versues “black hat” search-engine-optimization.  As I concluded in a prior post, SEO is mostly bull shit in the respect that you don’t need a guru.  What you should do is focus on a niche and write authoritatively with good content.  Simple.

Anyway, as Mr. Goldman points out, there may actually be negative ramifications for asserting that you are some sort of SEO guru and trying to sell your wares to the next gullible buyer.  I can’t tell you how many SEO gurus have either tried to comment on this blog or sent me random, un-asked-for emails:  trying to sell me their SEO secrets to big, big money.

As I posted earlier, there is no trick to garnering tons of hits on a blog and free money.  It takes work, good writing, interesting topics, and time.  Furthermore, it would help to be like Lawyerist, Above the Law, or many other legal related blogs out there that have what appears to be an army of writers.  I’m not saying this is a bad thing – a lot of good content gets posted that way.  However, it is certainly hard for a small-fish like me to make headway when they are writing so much and so well.

In any case, this case shows why SEO gurus should be denied access to your wallet as you try to get your law firm marketing together and think about how to start a law firm.  There is simply no substitute for good work and good content.

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Advice From My Dad (tangentially related to lawyering)

I’d like to make this a regular post here on Solo In Minneapolis:  “Advice From My Dad”.  As this is the first one, we will just have to wait and see.

I’ve talked to my dad quite a bit about starting a law firm.  He is interested, but I can tell he is worried about me making it.  He started his own consulting business when I was younger (I’m thinking this was like twenty years ago).  It didn’t last.  He said he made good money for a couple of years, but he ran out of clients.  So, I worry about getting and keeping clients too.

He also told me that he may have made it but that he had more important things on his mind:  his kids.  Now, I should say that my dad and mom were divorced and, at the time, my dad was raising my two brothers and I.  The point is that my dad started a business and it didn’t work out for him for many reasons – a big one being that he had three little boys to raise.  As I just posted, I’m worrying about starting a law firm and  raising a little boy.

So, there is one lesson from dad.  Here is a second lesson:  my dad and I had a long talk a couple months ago about life.  Ok, it wasn’t a long talk, it was mostly fishing and baseball with some fatherly advice sprinkled in.  Is it me, or is that how everybody talks to their dad about important things?

Anyway, during this conversation he said to me that when he was younger he used to think he had to have “all his ducks in a row” – or something like that.  He also said that, now, he doesn’t care as much about the little things – life is too short.  I am paraphrasing but you get the idea.

What he was trying to say to me is that I worry too much about everything and that I try to hard to make things perfect.  Things aren’t going to be perfect – that is life.  I think about that a lot when I think about starting a law firm and practicing law full time.  I’m not going to be able to make everything perfect.  I might even fail.

But, that kind of advice from my dad keeps things in perspective for me.  It has given me a peace of mind.  I can’t do everything and I can’t make everything perfect.  I know it is cliche, but, hey, it’s from my dad.  When I think about starting a law firm, being a good lawyer, being a good dad, and all the other things I need to do, I try to remember that advice.

That is the whole deal there:  “you never have all your ducks in a row.”  Thanks dad.

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Of Babies and Lawyering

I posted a while back that I have a little son, Ben.  He’s eight-months old and he is beautiful.  This is my first time being a daddy and I must say that it is much more wonderful than I expected it to be.

I tend to be a bit pessimistic and over-analytical.  I keep blaming it on my law training but maybe it is just me?  However, when I look at this little bundle of joy (he’s crawling around my feet as I write this) I can’t help but think that the world is a good place.

I’ve also tried not to talk about him too much on this blog because he isn’t very relevant to lawyering or starting a law practice.  But, as I stated in my last post, I’m going to write about what I want to write about from now on and not worry about marketing my law firm through search-engine-optimization (SEO).  Ben is, however, relevant for talking about trying to have a career as a lawyer when you have little ones running about (he just climbed up the bannister by the stairs and is making happy noises at me).

So, here are the issues I am tackling right now with having Ben at home:  (1) he needs a babysitter and somebody to take him there if I am going to be able to work on anything, (2) my wife is a physician at a local hospital and she is busy (3) I’m waiting on Minnesota bar exam results so practicing law is moot at this point, (4) doing legal contract work doesn’t work with a baby in the house.

Only four issues?  Well, yes, but I’m not working full time right now.  Of course, the over-riding issue is that having children does put a damper on the old legal career.  It is tough to think straight when a little cherub is tugging your leg and wants to climb into your lap.

It is also difficult for me to say to myself that I even want to continue practicing in an adversarial field when all I want to do is keep my baby safe and away from harm.  Being with Ben has the effect of taking down the every day lawyer guard (you know, the straight-faced-sober, nothing-phases-me, death-stare).

I have also talked to a number of people who know I am a lawyer starting a law firm and they will often say things like:  “why don’t you just stay home and take care of Ben?”.  The answer: because I can’t.  I didn’t go to law school and practice for almost four years to stay at home.  I know my wife didn’t go to medical school to stay at home.

So, it is going to be a learning curve.  It is going to take some juggling – it already has.  But, so far, it has been worth it because Ben is one of the few things I’ve done in my life that I am unequivocally proud of.  I’ve made too many mistakes to count, but he is not one of them.

Now, I just have to figure out how to practice law full-time without missing him too much. I worry about that a lot.  I was just talking with his baby-sitter yesterday as I dropped him off in the morning, and she made a comment that having children “is such a short time in your life.”  That puts things in perspective, doesn’t it?

I know that I tend to work overtime and forget what time of day it is when I am really busy.  But, now, in the back of my mind all the time is Ben.  Will I miss something if I’m at the office?  Will I remember to say no to that petition I need to get out?  Will I go home to Ben, or will my clients be served a little better because I stayed later?  All difficult questions.

But, I will tell you one thing, I am going to enjoy the journey of being a lawyer-dad (or is it dad-lawyer?).  Ben certainly grounds me in a way that is elemental:  he is the top priority no matter what (he just got back to me and is pulling on my ear).

If anybody has any thoughts about what they did to raise children while practicing law full-time, I would love to hear them.

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Law Firm SEO B.S.

I think I may be having a sea change.  I enjoy being a blogger, I enjoy writing, I mostly enjoy being an attorney.  What I don’t enjoy is being a slave to search-engine-optimization (SEO).  SEO is crap.  You want to know a secret, SEO sort of works but it makes you evil.  There are no easy answers or simple solutions to starting an maintaining a law practice – other than to network and do good work. We are in a people profession.  Think about it.

My new thing is blogging on what I want to write about and, yes, mostly on starting a law firm because that is what I am doing right now.  If you like my thoughts/advice, great – I hope it helps you.  But, no more of this SEO crap.  Sorry for any prior posts on the issue.  I still believe in marketing and won’t apologize trying to market my law firm but certain kinds of marketing attracts the wrong kind of clients and people.

As an aside – blogging on a topic you enjoy and putting up a lot of quality content is certainly not going to hurt if you are trying to start a firm.  I’m not saying blogging is a bad idea – if you like it.  What I am saying is that you shouldn’t listen to all of the SEO B.S. that is out there.  Avoid the SEO gurus.  Seriously.

Blogging for legal business is fine.  It helps.  But, doing it just to make Google or some other search engine like your blog is silly.  Write good content – you would be surprised on how many hits you get on your blog when you do that.  Be an authority.  When you write well about something you are passionate about, people notice.  They come to your blog because it is witty, funny, informative – whatever.  So make it your own.  Blog about your practice area in a new and different way.  Don’t just throw mud at the wall to see if it sticks.  You will wear yourself out doing that and you will quit.

I believe Google has a moto of “don’t be evil.”  I feel like I’ve been a little evil.  Sorry.  But, mark my words, I don’t apologize for giving advice on starting a law firm.  Some of it is good, some of it is bad, you decide that for yourself.

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What Do Older Attorneys Actually Do to Teach Younger Attorneys?

This post is in response to a well-written but subjectively mean-spirited post written by respected blogger Scott Greenfield over at Simple Justice.  His post was a response to my recent comment on MyShingle.com about how to jump start a law practice.  My initial reaction to his post was anger, but I must admit that he makes some good points.  I wish he wouldn’t paraphrase me though.

After thinking about the issue of young attorneys giving legal advice and the danger that creates, I wanted to turn the tables and talk about what young attorneys may get out joining a law firm and what older attorneys actually do to teach us.

When I got out of law school in 2007 I knew I couldn’t start a law firm right away because I didn’t know what the hell I was doing.  I mean that:  I had no clue.  I knew I wanted to start a law firm eventually, but I had to try the firm route first because, if I didn’t, things could have been ugly.  So, I joined a firm.

Now let me tell you what my first six months or so were like at the firm:  no training, very little observation, clueless wandering, and mostly angry gnashing with my wife about why I was mostly ignored.  Then, I discovered something: the partners weren’t all that interested in helping me, they were more interested in me serving as a money-making vehicle.   I have no problem with that.  It is capitalism.  I didn’t say it was right, but what is?

Furthermore, in those heady early days, I often had discussions with my wife that the so called “training” I got at the firm was to be put in front of a telephone and told to make money.  People started to call and I met with them.  I wasn’t told how to screen a client, do a client intake, ask for a reasonable retainer, draft a competent pleading, or, basically, be a good lawyer.   The partners didn’t appear to care.  But, I did all these things and I, mostly, did them well.

Did I miss out on a lot of things because of that reach for money?  Yes, absolutely.  I’m still upset I didn’t get better training.  But, guess what, I did what I did in law school: I taught myself.  I did three civil trials, many evidentiary hearings, and had many court appearances in 3+ years of practice.  It isn’t an overstatement to say I was in court every day.  I am trying not to brag, but I got a lot of experience by being in court.  I also made a lot of mistakes and learned from them.

But, that is not the point.  The point I am trying to make here is that I didn’t get trained by law partners who were mostly interested in me as an associate making them money. No, I was trained by myself, my peers who I practiced against, and the judges I practiced in front of.  Being at a law firm didn’t make me a better attorney – I did.

So, my question for older attorneys like Scott who make efforts to dissuade young attorneys from “giving advice” or starting a law practice is this:  what training do older lawyers actually give to their young brethren?  Any?

Here are some other pertinent questions:  Are we there to look at?  Are we there to make you money?  Should we be automatons?  Should we kill all lawyers under 40, stop the law schools from accepting applicants, and let all of you wise-souls have more work to do?

I posit that the answer is no.  Being upset about young attorneys giving legal advice is understandable – even laudable.  Castrating all young attorneys for trying to start a law firm and talk about it is another thing all together.

So, I’m throwing down the gauntlet:  I want you older attorneys to stop being negative, start being positive and do something to help any young attorney you can.  This profession is difficult enough without aimless negativity.

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How Much Internet Marketing is Too Much Internet Marketing?

I’m feeling a little down about all of my social media/blogging/website-optimization efforts to market and start a law firm.  I’ve been focusing almost exclusively on legal internet marketing for near four months now and it has become all consuming.  To be honest, it is exhausting.  I have begun to ask myself:  to what end?

The easy answer to that question is that I am doing this to have a career, feed my family, and feel good about myself because I have marketed my law firm which has enabled the right people to hear me and, of course, hire me.

But, then there is another question: does all of this internet legal marking work?  Well, yes – depending on what you mean by the term “work”.

I have gotten a lot of hits on this blog.  I have gotten more traffic to my website than I otherwise would have without my marketing efforts.  However, a lot of this feels empty. I’m doing my best to give solid advice on here but one begins to wonder what solid advice is.

I think my point is that I worry that young attorneys will take me too seriously and fail to do a good job as lawyers.  I’m afraid somebody will think legal marketing is more important than being a good lawyer.  Believe me, if you have practiced law for any time at all, you know it’s a jungle out there.  You know that being a lawyer is difficult for many reasons. I hope you know that practicing law takes hard work, long hours, and plenty of difficulties and possible malpractice lawsuits.

Additionally, I hope you know that getting clients is not terribly difficult.  However, being a good attorney is.  If you don’t know what you are doing, don’t start a law firm.

There, I said it.  Don’t start a law firm unless you have some legal experience and can represent your clients with a high standard of excellence and zeal.  If you came here for advice and read this silly little piece of internet cheapery, I hope that message hits home.

Now that I’ve gotten that off my chest, I wish all of you the best of luck.