A new Lawyers Best Friend – Pre drafted legal forms
October 31, 2006
A newly admitted lawyer to the Massachusetts Bar, has several options upon receiving his or her license to practice law. They can apply for an associate position with a big firm, and conduct research for the next five years; they can apply to work in a small firm and do all the work the senior lawyers do not want to deal with; they can hang their own shingle. This article will take the perspective of the later, i.e., a recent law school graduate with an entrepreneurial spirit, a little cash on hand, and a desire to start his or her own practice.
Forget about the fact that marketing and obtaining clients is going to be the most difficult aspect of the new venture. Forget that the new attorney must choose an area of practice, for even a general practitioner can’t work in every field of law. Once the client walks in the door and the attorney wants to accept the case, the flood-gates of paperwork will open.
The first document a new lawyer must draft is a fee agreement. There are several internet sites out there that have these types of legal contract, as well as other legal forms, but those legal documents are very general in nature and likely do not satisfy the Massachusetts General Laws. However, a quick look in any Lawyer’s weekly will show a host of legal software companies who have created word documents drafted specifically for Massachusetts, or what ever state your practice requires.
Next is the whole process of filing a complaint or answer if a law suit is involved, drafting HUD statements if real estate is the issue at hand and so forth. One new Massachusetts Probate Attorney, recently said, “I didn’t know where to start before I had the direction of my document generation software and my online research tools”. She went on to state that, “but for the form generating software, I would have had to consult for hours the Massachusetts Practice Series and other form books”.
Once a case has been filed, the real onslaught of paper work and forms hits the fan – DISCOVERY. There are interrogatories, request for production of documents, requests for medical records, requests for police reports, subpoenas’ for depositions, etc. There are motions for summery judgment, motions to compel, and so many more. A new lawyer who has never drafted these documents has virtually no where to turn, but to the form books for hours and hours of unbillable research time.
The biggest problem for new lawyers is they did not learn how to try cases in law school. Rather, they are more equipped to argue an appeal in front the The United States Supreme Court then they are to handle a simple will contest, or personal injury matter. The bottom line is, in order for a new attorney to be efficient, they can either purchase one of these up to date, form generating software packages, be lucky enough to have a mentor, or put their dreams and aspirations on hold for two or three years, while working for a small practice. In the case of the young probate attorney, she decided to purchase the software, and was lucky to have one of the premier real estate and probate attorneys in the state as a mentor. However, not all new lawyers are so lucky, and if you are going to spend 30 hours a week researching what forms are needed to follow procedure, you will be hard pressed to find time to actually represent your clients, let alone conduct legal work that can be justified as billable hours.
The gist of all of this is that it would be highly advisable to look into the technology that is available today if you are a new lawyer, and in fact, even if you are an experienced lawyer, this technology allows you to stay current with any changes in the law and procedure for state courts in your document library.
The following article was drafted by Michael Goldstein, Esq. who writes select articles about technology for TurboLaw, a Massachusetts legal form software application.
Do it yourself marketing – finding great images.
October 17, 2006
Do you, your staff or a family member or friend create your own marketing materials? If so, read on. This short article will give you some great resources for fantastic images and photos that are completely legal to use and either free or very inexpensive.
It used to be the case that finding engaging images and photos for marketing purposes that were weren’t copyrighted or extremely expensive was quite difficult – at least in my experience. Below are some of the resources I use on a daily basis to create the materials we use here at Promethean.
http://www.sxc.hu/
This is a site with thousands of free images you can use. Registering is free and gives you access to the larger file sizes.
http://www.stockxpert.com/
This is spin off of the site above. The images may be considered “more professional” and are very inexpensive to download.
http://www.shutterstock.com
This is our newest find for image sites. It is $159.00 for one month with up to 750 downloaded images – still a fantastic deal for what they offer.
Next month I will write a little bit about the program we use for creating our marketing pieces and free software classes online.
Hope this helps you!
Danielle
Director of Sales & Marketing
Promethean Software Corporation
The makers of TurboLaw Software
danielle@turbolaw.com
(800) 518-8726 x112
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