Beyond Bunny Slippers: 3 Reasons Savvy Lawyers Embrace Working Virtually
Does the concept of a virtual law office conjure up visions of attorneys lounging in bunny slippers while catching episodes of Judge Judy between conference calls? If so, you need to change your mind set.
Here’s the reality: Breaking the chains of the traditional office can have significant benefits to your firm.
- Virtual law offices support work-life balance
For Michael Moradzadeh, a lawyer who launched the virtual law firm, Rimon PC, that means two more hours with his family instead of two hours commuting every day. 1
When overworking is too easy, any time gained for yourself will enhance quality of life. That’s important when you look at the alarming rates of depression and substance abuse which made headlines with a 2016 Hazelden Foundation study of attorneys. A happy, healthy lawyer is, obviously, a more effective one. - Virtual law offices reduce overhead
“Remind me again – why do firms need expensive office space?” asks Zach Abramowitz in his article, “Will All Law Firms Eventually Go Virtual?” 2
During his tenure as a corporate attorney, his employer’s big office in a prime location bothered him “to no end” because the lawyers there communicated mostly by phone or email. Plus, he’d end up working remotely anyway because “legal work has a funny way of heating up between 5:30 p.m. and 2:30 a.m.” - Mobile law offices improve service
Alex Jadin, a partner with Roeder Smith Jadin, a Minneapolis-based boutique law firm, is proud of how much more effectively his firm is serving clients thanks to working virtually.
“I can access the entirety of my office from anywhere, and that gives my clients more accessibility to me and ultimately drives down costs,” he says. “When you’re efficient at your work, you’re ultimately saving that client money by spending less time getting the same amount of work done.”
It’s no wonder the firm has quadrupled its size in just three years since improving mobility at their firm.
If these real examples aren’t quite enough to convince you to take the virtual law office plunge, you can take a partial approach by making your law office mobile with cloud-based legal practice management software. At minimum, you should contemplate it if you want to take your client service up a notch by:
- Completely releasing the constraints of geography. You can securely converse with clients, and exchange, sign and store documents anytime, anywhere. You don’t have to wait until they – or you – get back to the office.
- Enhancing professionalism. What looks better to a judge? Rifling through files or instantly pulling up the information you need on your laptop? Cloud-based practice management solutions index your files online so you can find what you need in a click. And when your client calls unexpectedly for an update, just click on their case file to get a complete, chronological update of activities.
- Communicating with the utmost security. The most secure law practice management solutions are far more challenging to breach than most law firm servers. The best solutions have multiple third-party security certifications and data encryption which many small firms don’t have in place.
For lawyers who are committed to advancing their practice, working virtually is virtually a no-brainer. If you want to explore joining their ranks, Jared Correia, lawyer and law firm management consultant, goes into more detail about why it’s worth it and how to begin in this white paper: Mobile in Practice: The Benefits of a Virtual Law Firm.
1 Abramson McMullan, Leigh. “Do Lawyers Need Offices Anymore?” The Atlantic, October 9, 2015.
2 Abramowitz, Zach. “Will All Law Firms Eventually Go Virtual?” Above the Law, July 18, 2017.
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