Are you a first year law student in or around the Atlanta area?

2010 First Year Law Students Workshop: Preparing Today’s Students for Tomorrow’s Success

Location & Time

The workshop will take place at Morris, Manning & Martin, LLP on Saturday, March 20, 2010 from 10:00 am to 1:00 pm.

Following the workshop (from 1:30 pm to 3:30 pm) the Gate City Bar Association will present:

Brother to Brother: Mentoring the Next Generation of Great Lawyers

There is no cost to attend these events. I know that’s music to your ears.

Interested?

If you want to take advantage of this opportunity, you must RSVP with Cmize@mmmlaw.com by 12pm EST on Monday, March 15th.

If you have a chance to  attend the workshop, please come back and tell us all about it.

If you’ve been known to confuse the two terms, you are not alone. This is something I’ve discussed with several lawyers and legal professionals.

Although the two terms are often used interchangeably, their meanings differ.

And, I want to make sure you’re aware of the difference before you invest another minute (or dollar – since time is money) delegating your legal work.

Legal Outsourcing and Offshoring Defined

Wikipedia does a good job defining both terms, so I see no reason to reinvent the wheel.

“Legal outsourcing refers to the practice of a law firm or corporation obtaining legal support services from an outside law firm or legal support services company.”

“Offshoring describes the relocation by a company of a business process from one country to another — typically an operational process, such as manufacturing, or supporting processes, such as accounting.”

In essence, offshoring is a type of outsourcing.

When you contract with a freelance paralegal, virtual assistant and/or contract attorney outside of your firm, you are engaging in legal outsourcing.

When that individual or company is located outside of your country, primarily overseas in countries like India and the Philippines, that is considered offshoring.

Is Offshoring a Good Move for your Firm?

It depends. What type of projects are you outsourcing?

When it comes to offshoring, you can expect language and cultural barriers. That’s pretty much a given as English is a second language for most companies overseas. However, that may not be a game changer for you depending on what you choose to outsource. (*gasp*)

Although I’m a virtual paralegal that advocates domestic outsourcing, I’m not an offshore-basher. I’m sure it has its place in some law firms and legal departments, particularly when it comes to technology-related services.

Your decision to send your work offshore should be based on what’s best for you and your clients.

If you’re looking for technology support for your firm, offshoring may be an attractive option.

But if you’re looking for a paralegal to prepare legal documents and place telephone calls to clients, local courts or opposing counsel on your behalf, the language barrier can be too much and outsourcing domestically may be the best move for you.

The bottom line is: It’s your decision to make and it should be based on what’s best for you, your firm and your clients. Take a look at the projects you want to delegate and see if you’re comfortable outsourcing them domestically or overseas.

Are you outsourcing or offshoring your legal work? I’d like to hear about your experiences.

Done reading? Great!

I figure my “confession” may move some of you to let go of more as well. Just in case, I want to share 3 simple steps that can take you from control freak to delegating diva – or dude.

The 3 steps are simple: Evaluate, Sort, Prioritize. Lets take a look at each.

Step 1: Evaluate

One of the first steps you should take when trying to decide what to outsource is evaluate your daily responsibilities. What projects, tasks, etc are you responsible for? What’s on your plate?

Spend some time listing every project you have to complete, and make sure you note every task that is related to each project. When you begin outsourcing, you may find it helpful to delegate related tasks and/or outsource an entire project to the same provider.

Step 2: Sort

Once you have a list of your responsibilities in front of you, you can review each task and decide what you need to handle, and what you should delegate to someone else. As you review and sort the tasks, make sure you take into consideration the complexity and due date, as well as your strengths and weaknesses. You will notice some things are more suitable for outsourcing than others, and guess what? That’s fine.

At the end of this step, you should have the responsibilities from the first step sorted into 2 lists. Label the list of tasks you plan to handle “In-house” and the list you will delegate to someone else “Outsource.”

Step 3: Prioritize

It’s now time to prioritize! Lets start with the “Outsource” list. Again, you will need to pay close attention to the due dates in this step. The tasks that require immediate attention should be at the top of your list. As you begin to outsource, you can delegate the high priority tasks until you work your way through the entire list.

The fact that you’re ready to delegate more is a wonderful thing. My recent decision to let go of a lot has certainly freed up a considerable chunk of my time.

But, before you jump out there, make sure you spend some time on each of these 3 steps when deciding what you should handle and what you should delegate.

Do you have any outsourcing tips or tricks to share? If so, I’d love to hear them in the comments section below.

It is amazing how much clarity you gain when you take a moment to evaluate the way you’re doing things. If you haven’t done that in awhile, you may want to.

I’ve been in business for 3 years now. One of the biggest mistakes I made at the beginning is I totally under-estimated the growth of my business. I bought into the “It’s a recession…It’s hard to find clients…” idea.  Because of this, I didn’t plan for growth at the rate that it came.

So, as a result, I’ve spent a significant amount of time during the last 3 years working like a crazy person – oftentimes, 12 to 16 hours each day, 7 days a week.

It’s time to get real! I’m trying to handle too much. It’s affecting my business and my family, and it doesn’t have to be this way.

While my habit of trying to be everything to everyone isn’t anything new (my mother was is the same way), it’s a habit I have to get under control, and I figure now is as good a time as any to do just that.

I’m letting go of some things so I can FOCUS only on what I’m most passionate about.

Just in case you’re at the same point in your business, I’m going to share the first two steps I’m taking to better balance my workload.

1.    Delegate more

For starters, I’m delegating more to my team members. I’m blessed to have a handful of sub-contractors that I work with on various projects, but I’m not delegating nearly as much as I should. They are more than willing (and capable) of handling many of the projects I have on my plate. I just need to let go and give them an opportunity to put their skills and experience to use.

2.    Outsource to others

Every now and then, I’m presented with a project that’s either not ideal for my business or I have no real interest in taking it on. In those instances, I’m going to outsource those projects to others. Actually, I’ve already started doing this and I can tell you, it feels really, really good!

By letting go, I will free up more time to focus on creating, reading, writing, practicing, learning, and growing!

Do you find yourself trying to do it all – saying yes when you should say no? Are you ready to start delegating and outsourcing more?

Did you feel like the person was speaking directly to you – as though he/she understood what you were going through at that very moment?

Well, I don’t know about you but in the past week that has happened to me not once or twice, but several times.

Within days of launching my personal blog, it seems I began to  stumble upon post after post (many through links I followed on Twitter) speaking on some of the same issues I am dealing with as I revamp my business.

Let me first say: I’m reluctant to assume these posts were written “for me” as I’ve never met any of the bloggers. They have built successful businesses, and are probably busier working on projects than I can imagine.

But, it sure feels that way as it seems many of the posts I read takes me (and whoever else is experiencing the same thing) to task on everything from branding to blogging for business, to the ways social media tools are used to promote business.

As I spent time dissecting the posts, I saw a common pattern. They were authored or shared by some of the most respected in the blogging community. They weren’t aggressively hurling attacks or insults as I’ve noticed from bloggers before.

They were teaching and relating through their blogs and YouTube videos. Yes, some were stern (I wouldn’t expect anything less), while others were sarcastic. Who cares?

The bottom line is: These bloggers took time out of their schedules to share their thoughts and expertise, shedding light on their personal experiences and putting themselves out there, to point their readers (me included) in the right direction.

For that, I am grateful for each and every one of you!!

There is no way I’m going to ignore what you have shared. I plan to keep reading, blogging, growing and evolving.

I’m embracing the criticism and I’m hungry to learn more. And to make sure I have time to make it happen, I’m extending my waiting list (and referring potential clients to other providers). This will allow me to focus solely on my current clients and on growing as a business owner and blogger.

“Now that I know better, I will do better.”

Thank you all for your selflessness!