In each of the previous articles with regard to getting clients, keeping clients and making them happy, we have put a small box in each of the articles entitled: “Today’s Homework.” We explained to you clients were just the first category to address with regard to the five things that make a successful business thrive. We also asked you the question: “How well is your office implementing tried and true tips on law office marketing, management and economics?” After reading the column each week, you should assign yourself five points for each “tip” that you are utilizing on a day-to-day basis and a running total of your score. Now it is time to total up your score, and see how well you are doing!

Now that you have totaled up the points from doing things the “tips” we have suggested on a week-to-week basis, make up your own list of those things that you currently do in your office to get clients, keep clients and make them happy that we have not discussed. If there are things that you are doing in your own office that are tried and true activities for getting clients, keeping clients and making them happy, assign yourself five points for each of those items that we haven’t discussed.

If you have any additional client “tips,” please send them to me so that I can incorporate them into an article and discuss ideas other than the ones that have been talked about in my articles so far. I am sure that your “tips” are as creative and imaginative as the ones that I have discussed in these articles, and that other lawyers would like to hear about them as well. Just like we have been doing in these articles, “share the wealth,” and collectively we can make the practice of law better, more fun and more rewarding both financially and personally.

If you have kept track of your score, totaled it up and seen where you are with regard to the chart below, you now need to ask yourself the question: Now that I know where I am with regard to doing things that make my business thrive in the area of clients, what can I do about it?

Points:

   90-100: On the Cutting Edge

   80-90: Getting There

   70-80: Coasting

   60-70: Need of Help

   50-60: Inert

   Under 50 In the Stone Ages

You will remember in an earlier article I talked about how these check lists can be used not only to do an audit of your firm, but can be used at firm-wide meetings to be sure that everyone understands what you are doing and why you are doing it. It can also be used to implement tasks in order to make your firm thrive. Additionally, these topics are good as agenda items for firm retreats and to stimulate conversations about what lawyers do and in particular about what makes your firm thrive.

If you scored: “On the Cutting Edge,” I would like to ask you to be a guest columnist in the near future. There is no substitute for paying attention to the details in any business. Not only is law NOT an exception, the practice of law, because of the personal nature of our relationships with our clients, is one of the best examples I can think of where paying attention to the details, paying attention to the people, both inside and outside your office, will reap huge benefits. “The devil is in the details,” but so is the gold!

If you scored: “Getting There,” you should be proud of your efforts, and should figure out a way to keep up the good work. You will want to start noticing what other tips you can add to make your practice thrive.

If you scored: “Coasting,” you are probably comfortable for now. What you need to understand is that anybody out there who is trying to get ahead is not doing it by just being “comfortable.” You need to create a set of circumstances where you force people to operate outside their “comfort zones.” You need to get your staff and yourself to stretch. You need to make the effort to try to get clients, keep them and make them happy. Remember, the competition never sleeps. If you snooze you lose.

If your scored: “In Need of Help,” I hope that these tips will put you squarely on the path to making progress towards having a thriving law firm that will give you great satisfaction both financially and personally. If you are not doing very many of these things, start now! “He who hesitates is lost,” bye bye!

If you scored “In the Stone Ages,” you may want to start thinking about another career.

I am reminded of a story about a relative of mine who was a doctor. This doctor had a very thriving practice in Kansas City and was very well known. When he reached a certain point in his career he found that all of the doctors who had been referring him patients over the years were either retiring or had died. All of a sudden he was faced with a crisis. He had to reinvent himself and figure out a way to get a steady flow of patients, or his practice would simply wither and stop. Luckily, he was able to achieve that by becoming connected to a local hospital that gave him a steady stream of patients.

When thinking about this set of circumstances that happened to my relative, I realized that there might be some similar “institutional” jobs for lawyers, but not many! There are only so many positions that a person can get involved in with the Prosecutor’s Office, Legal Aid or various governmental organizations. In-house counsel positions are not that plentiful, and teaching positions are even less so. The long and the short of it is, if you do not get on and stay on a track to get yourself as far along on the scale as you can towards the “Cutting Edge,” you are going to be left behind by those who are able to achieve success in the area of getting clients, keeping them and making them happy.

Remember, you can be the greatest lawyer in the world, but without clients, you will always be beholden to another. When that other person’s practice changes, you may not be the first to go, but eventually if their clients go, so do you. I have heard the phrase that “clients are king.” I think that phrase is very true in that we do what our clients want us to do. Remember my comment about the platinum rule: “Do unto others as they want done unto them!” But, think about another concept that dovetails into that very thought, and that is: If clients are king, then the lawyer who has clients is also king. All you need to do is to look at any thriving law firm in your area, and you will see that the lawyers with the clients are the ones that lead the firms, control the firms and control the law firm purse strings as well.

Feel free to use these tips to getting clients, keeping clients and making them happy in any way that you would like. The only request that I make is that if you ever come up with a “tip” that you think will be helpful in this regard, pass it along to me. I promise that I will promptly evaluate your tip, and if I think it will work, I will immediately implement it into my practice, and pass it along to everyone who I can.

I am sure that after having read all these “tips” that you will not be surprised that I espoused the following philosophy with regard to sharing this information: if you are alive, be enthusiastic! If you live in a community, make it better! If you are involved in a profession such as the profession of law, get involved and give back! When it comes to making the profession of law the best that it can be for clients and lawyers, I am reminded of another saying that I use quite often: “If you are not part of the solution, you are the problem!”

Next week we are going to start talking about the next area in the five things it takes to make every business thrive: administrative procedures. I can almost hear the collective moan, because you are probably saying how could that possibly be interesting? I have taught a lot of seminars in this area and have set up a lot of procedures that make the “work flow process” much easier in my practice. I think that you will find the “tips” in this administrative area very interesting, and hopefully I can present them in such a fashion that makes the articles fun to read. Remember, the whole concept here is to give you ideas for implementing tried and true “tips” on law office marketing, management and economics. The whole purpose of all of this is to make your life more fulfilling both financially and personally. It’s also a fun autobiographical adventure for me! Come on along as we take on the next area that makes up every business and together we can make our practices thrive and be happier doing it!

Jim Wirken is a civil trial attorney and the Chairman of the Board of The Wirken Law Group in Kansas City.