A Guide for Solo and Small Firm Lawyers

by Janice Mucalov, LLB

Good, qualified support staff are critical to the success of every law practice. An efficient legal secretary can greatly improve your bottom line as well as helping to make your office a pleasant, stress-free place to work. Poor staff can cost you time and money, and negatively impact client relations and the work environment.

Large firms have their own human resources departments or can hire outside search agencies to assist them. But it’s different if you practice in a one-lawyer shop or small law firm. When should you hire a new assistant? Where do you find someone in today’s tight marketplace? Do you have to pay top dollar? How can you train your staff to be effective firm marketers and improve client service?

The Importance of Delegation
Sole practitioners, in particular, may feel that they can operate their practice without any support staff whatever. “Technology has conspired with traditional attitudes to make many sole practitioners believe they truly can go it alone,” says Edward Poll, the California-based president of LawBiz Management.

Most lawyers are passable typists, and word processing, billing software, voicemail and e-mail may make it easy to think you don’t need human assistance. Indeed, a sole practitioner without any staff could probably produce about 1,200 billable hours a year, working 50 hours a week and taking two weeks’ vacation, estimates Art Italo, a legal consultant with Italo Consulting in Georgia.

But it’s a mistake to try and do everything yourself. According to Poll, lawyers should do only two things – practice law and market to attract new legal work. Everything else should be delegated to somebody else, and in fact, can be done better by someone else.

Sure, there’s a cost to hiring a secretary or assistant. But if you leverage the skills of this person at $25 or $30 hour so you can bill out at $200 to $300 hour, your increase in profit will be substantial.

When Should You Hire?
So how much business should you have before you hire a new staff person? “Hire when you’re at the point that you can produce enough billable work to justify hiring that person, or when they can take work off your desk so you can do more billable work,” says Poll. Can you churn out enough billable work to match the new staff person’s $30,000 or $40,000 salary? Your break-even point is when the additional revenue generated or reduced strain on you equals the increased cost of hiring someone. “Anything above that is gravy.”

Start looking as soon as you foresee a need. If you come across a qualified person before then, hire them, as the work will come. If you don’t have enough work to justify hiring a full-time staff person, at least use a part-time employee, or sub-contract out the work as needed.

Small law firms may wonder when they should hire an office manager to handle the accounting, payroll, billing, purchasing of office supplies and personnel matters. Italo notes that “these are time consuming tasks that multiply with the number of partners and are often assigned to a managing partner (whose billable hours promptly go right in the toilet).” If the managing partner or other lawyers in your office are wasting valuable hours on non-billable administrative tasks, then it’s time to shift this burden onto a salaried employee.

Who to Hire? A Secretary or a Paralegal?
Both can assist with word processing and administrative tasks like dealing with the courts, private investigators, and process servers. But knowing what your specific needs are will help you hire the right person.

Generally, a legal secretary is more appropriate for typing, managing files, and reproducing work.

A paralegal (who commands a higher salary) is trained to help prepare and draft pleadings, contracts, and other legal documents; interview clients and witnesses; and conduct research.

Hire the Best Candidate
Hire the best candidate you can afford, recommends Lonny Balbi of Balbi & Company Legal Centre in Calgary, who has a special interest in law office management.

“There’s also a much better payback to getting someone experienced at the start, rather than trying to train a junior person,” he adds. A person with training and experience in a law firm environment should help your firm produce more revenue than taking the time to train a junior person (remember, large firms say it takes about three years for young lawyers to cover their costs).

If you practice in a high-production office, you can’t afford a person who makes mistakes, notes Poll. The higher the volume or greater complexity of the work, the more experienced a person you need.

It’s also important that the person you hire is congenial and will fit in with the culture of your firm.

Should You Pay Top Dollar to Hire the Best?
Paying a generous salary is key to attracting first-rate support staff (you usually get what you pay for). Legal consultant Art Italo estimates that a truly outstanding person can increase your billing capacity by one to two hours per day versus an average staffer. He therefore says it’s well worth your while to pay such a person $10,000 more a year in salary than you might initially be considering.

But a top salary doesn’t always guarantee the best candidate. Applicants may be interested in other benefits instead. Research has shown that if given a choice, many employees would prefer to have more time off than to earn more money. So consider offering flexible hours or a four-day work-week to attract worthy contenders. Lonny Balbi’s family law office closes every Friday at noon – and “the support staff love it!” says Balbi.

How to Find and Hire Quality Support Staff
Where to Look: Old-fashioned newspaper ads are probably your best search tool, says Balbi. Employee search firms are expensive (the fee is usually three months of the employee’s salary), and with so few good applicants around, they’re likely to refer all those that respond to their inquiries. Also seek referrals from colleagues and your local bar association. Balbi also suggests looking at the colleges and schools where paralegals and legal secretaries are trained.

Further:

• Write a Proper Job Description
• Prepare for the Interview
• Evaluate the Candidate’s Qualifications
• Check References
• Administer a Skills Test

Making a Decision: Understand that hiring the ideal staff person is a frustrating, time-consuming process. When Balbi’s firm advertised for a receptionist, they received 200 responses. But for a legal secretary – with the current shortage – you might be lucky to get two or three responses. Whatever the position you’re searching for, make sure you speak with a sufficient number of applicants to ultimately feel confident about the person you decide on.

Techniques for Working Effectively With Staff
It’s trite advice for bringing out the best in your staff – but worth repeating. Be respectful and polite, and treat staff in the same way as you would want to be treated. Beyond that, here are a few additional key pointers:

Make the Job Interesting: Employees want to be challenged, to learn new tasks, and to use a range of different skills. Give your staff more responsibility than simply cranking out documents.

Don’t Micro-Manage: The aim is to allow your assistant to handle assignments with minimal instructions, notes Paul McLaughlin, former practice management advisor with The Law Society of Alberta.

Communicate Instructions Clearly: McLaughlin provides this example: When you say, “Please see if John Smith can come in for a meeting,” do you mean, “Find out when the client is available; I will decide on the time for the meeting”? Or do you mean, “Arrange the meeting, send a confirming letter and put the time and date in my calendar”?

Give Approval: Positive reinforcement goes a long way to bringing out the best in staff. “Many lawyers seem to believe that it’s a sign of weakness to compliment an assistant for a good performance,” says McLaughlin. But approval is a more powerful motivator than disapproval. Time off or a simple gift, such as box of chocolates, are always appreciated too.

Janice Mucalov is a freelance writer in Vancouver. This article was adapted from the full article on CBA PracticeLink: www.cba.org/CBA/PracticeLink/WWP/supportstaff.aspx.

This article was published in the June 2006 issue of BarTalk. © 2006 The Canadian Bar Association. All rights reserved.