My Shingle

March 2012

Don’t Let Not Having An Office Deter You From Your Dream of Starting A Practice

March 28, 2012 by Carolyn Elefant

After reading the recent posts and ensuing discussion on the perennial question of home office versus rental office over at Lawyerist and Above the Law , feels like it’s deja- Foonberg all over again.  Because just like Foonberg, both Tannebaum at ATL and most of commenters on Josh Camson’s Lawyerist post uniformly maintain that Renting [...]

Read more Office Options 7 comments

Cash Mobs Put the Hype in Hyper Local Lawyering

March 27, 2012 by Carolyn Elefant

This past summer, I twice spoke about how hyper-local lawyering can save solos from the demise-by-automation predicted by Richard Susskind in the End of Lawyers. The long arm of technology may be powerful but it lacks the dexterity to crack local markets as effectively as personal relationships. Plus, lawyers have traditionally acted as pillars of [...]

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Take My Advice: Look Before You Advise

March 27, 2012 by Carolyn Elefant

A lawyer’s advice may be his stock in trade, to quote a famous solo, Abraham Lincoln. But today, the reverse is apparently true: “legaladvice” is nothing more than a trade name (and a generic one at best) for aspiring lawyerpreneurs to stock up on.At least, that seems to be the view held by two lawyer-preneurs [...]

Read more Mistakes/What NOT To Do 0 comments

Is It Really Sayonara to Biglaw This Time?…

March 26, 2012 by Carolyn Elefant

It’s been at least eight years and counting since I first started documenting the Biglaw to Small Law trend. Seven years of preaching over and over and over again, about the benefits that solo and small firms can bring to big firm clients, from lower costs to fewer conflicts to more personalized service to superior quality [...]

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MyShingle Follow Ups: Tech Choices & Business Cards

March 26, 2012 by Carolyn Elefant

I’m looking forward to the 2012 ABA Tech Show where I’ll be covering various sessions relevant to solos, including cloud choices for solos and how solos can build a virtual team. If you have any other sessions that you’d like me to summarize on Friday or Saturday (I’ve got a conflict Thursday), please let me [...]

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The Start Ups That Give Access to Justice Are Already Here

March 22, 2012 by Carolyn Elefant

Initially, I was excited when I saw this headline, Meet the startups that are giving everyone affordable access to justice. Great, I thought — an article that finally recognizes what solos — who are, after all, start-up lawyers – are doing to ensure that meaningful access to justice isn’t reserved for deep-pockets. But after a [...]

Read more MyShingle Solo 3 comments

Book Review: The Freelance Lawyering Manual

March 21, 2012 by Carolyn Elefant

I wrote the foreword for Kimberly Alderman’s new book, the Freelance Lawyering Manual in the hopes that law firms on one hand, and unemployed attorneys and re-entering parents on the other will take a fresh look at freelance lawyering in the 21st century. Unlike most things in law — and life, freelance lawyering, represents a [...]

Read more Legal Research and Writing 1 comment

MyShingle Update on the Virtual Fishbowl Project at Pinterest

March 6, 2012 by Carolyn Elefant

Last week, I launched the virtual fishbowl project at MyShingle, essentially, an opportunity to submit your business card online and have it posted. The first batch of cards, received through mid-day last Friday have been posted, but there are another dozen or so on hold due to issues with the Pinterest upload application. As soon [...]

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The Solo Lawyer Tax

March 6, 2012 by Carolyn Elefant

Sometimes, it just plain sucks being a solo. (Yes, you actually read that at MyShingle!) Not only must solos suffer the indignity of getting paid less in cases where they outperform their big firm colleagues, but in many instances, solos also pay more for products and services than larger firms. Call it the solo tax. [...]

Read more Legal Research and Writing 5 comments

Get in On the Ground Floor With Clients By Providing The Ground Floor

March 6, 2012 by Carolyn Elefant

Want to get in on the ground floor with a start up? One law firm, albeit a large one, Foley, Lardner is doing just that. According to the Chicago Business Journal, a new co-working space for entrepreneurs called Catapult just launched in Chicago, and its secured a home free of charge, courtesy of Foley. In [...]

Read more New Marketing Ideas 4 comments

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