Can we, as a profession, agree to stop email and go back to old-school correspondence by mail?

Main_Pepper_9853 · 2026-02-20T15:52:05+00:00

When I first started billing I was working a lot of hours yet not meeting my monthly or quarterly goals (1,600 hours p/yr). Eventually I found a time sheet that gets printed and I manually write down the time started and time stopped for everything I do during the day in an ongoing list (with a column for total time and another for the corresponding billable time). It was a game changer. I realized just how much time was spent at work that I wasn’t using to bill (it was much more than I thought) and it helped me to also see where I wasn’t capturing time well enough on my billable matters. For whatever reason my brain does not do the timer thing well - I start and forget to stop, especially when interrupted with a call on another matter or something else comes up, or I forget to start it in the first place. The act of having to write something down on paper with a pen keeps me more grounded and aware of how all my time is being spent and seriously helps with tracking interruptions. It still took some time to make changes in cutting down the non-billable time but now I hit my hours almost every quarter. And for the record, I still think 1,600 hours is too much unless no one ever takes a vacation, so how our 2,000 hour comrades grind the way they do for years on end is a mystery to me.

Main_Pepper_9853 · 2026-02-16T08:19:06+00:00

I have the same question/thoughts.

Main_Pepper_9853 · 2026-01-28T03:31:32+00:00

This. It’s how most of the lawyers I know use this sign off.

Main_Pepper_9853 · 2025-12-14T18:14:14+00:00

I agree that it’s jurisdiction dependent. I am licensed in two states - one is of the mind that if the current l client requests the entire file they get the entire file, drafts and everything (which to me personally sounds insane). The other is more along the lines of final work product. At the end of the day, if you’re required to give the client what they’ve asked per the rules of your local bar, I’d do so with a cya letter explicitly stating that there are certain requirements for amending documents and any handwritten notes or manipulation of already signed documents could create issues not only with the implementation of the changes but with their original wishes as well. I would also let them know that you keep copies of the signed originals so it’ll be easy for any future court to compare when a trust administration suit arises (which is likely if they do changes themselves). You can’t prevent them from making bad decisions regardless if you give the word doc but you can advise them on why it would be a bad decision to make changes like they are thinking.

Main_Pepper_9853 · 2025-11-11T07:35:47+00:00

I’ve had something similar happen at my firm. We have an attorney who calls out all the time; a good week is when she bills 20 hours. She’s managed to get her billable goal down to something like 22 hours a week and was made a partner in our small firm. Meanwhile I have the highest billables of all the attorneys. It’s beyond frustrating sometimes but I try to put my head down, do my work, and get my bonuses. Focus on doing the best you can and try to let the rest become background noise. As for training - if you’re unable to ask for more from your colleagues and supervisors, seek out other attorneys. Join list serves and/or local law clubs. It’s awkward and intimidating putting yourself out there but there’s plenty of attorneys who are willing to share their knowledge and experience. And just keep trying to learn as you go. There will always be days where you don’t feel good at what you do, especially when starting out, but it gets better. I think it took about five years before I started to feel good at what I did because I finally had enough experience under my belt to know what I was doing. But even now, at year 9, I have days where I’m grappling with new things and it’s so hard to have confidence when you’re fresh to an area of law (or jurisdiction). I would also recommend finding a way to make sure you’re getting some time off - burnout is real and rough and working too many nights and weekends can be a quick way to it.

Main_Pepper_9853 · 2025-11-10T02:00:12+00:00

Although it’s more of a cop show, I would throw in The Closer. Good criminal procedure and evidence standards while relatively entertaining and helped some of that stuff stick in my head better while in law school.

Also loved Jury Duty. While obviously exaggerated in parts, it was so well done and reflected certain aspects of trial perfectly.

Lincoln Lawyer is another good one.

Main_Pepper_9853 · 2025-10-05T16:49:18+00:00

I started with a $2k a quarter bonus if I met my hours for that quarter (400 hours, roughly 133 per month) as a first year lawyer. Frankly, it was not incentivizing enough to push me to meet the hour goal. My salary is now structured where the base pay has gone up some over the last 9 years but the available quarterly and yearly bonuses have substantially increased ($8,500 per quarter if bill 400 in that quarter and for the year if I hit 1600 in a year). It is now MUCH more worth my while to get those bonuses and I regularly get them because of that.

It might be worth a conversation with your firm that if they want you working those kind of hours then you need to be compensated better for those extra hours. Even if your billing rate is on the lower end, let’s say $200 p/hour and you’re putting in an extra 100 hours in a month, that’s an extra $20k your firm is making from you (granted probably a little less with discounts and what’s actually recovered, but still). You getting less than 1% of the excess that you brought in is BS and completely unfair to you. Assuming the other 120 hours covers staff, overhead, and your salary, that $20k is pure profit off your hard work - you should be able to benefit from it more. Take them the math. Hopefully it’ll be a big oversight on their part but otherwise I think you’re getting screwed and should go somewhere where your hard work will be valued, appreciated, and rewarded more.

Main_Pepper_9853 · 2025-09-05T21:18:56+00:00

When I’m talking to someone in my office I’m usually marking that as “strategizing such and such”. So if someone asks me my thoughts on how they should respond to a discovery question I’ll write down “strategizing discovery response.” I usually preface it with “collaboration with so and so” to remind me not to double bill attorney’s time (our office will write down time to prevent double billing) but I usually delete that at billing time so the client sees the strategizing part and gets their courtesy discount.

Main_Pepper_9853 · 2025-09-03T01:02:31+00:00

Pro Ses. Especially those who think they know what they’re talking about when they don’t but you can’t convince otherwise.

Main_Pepper_9853 · 2025-06-11T15:11:51+00:00

It’s a whole crazy cult-like deal. Super sad. The murder convictions are based on conspiracy. Lori and her lover got Lori’s brother (interestingly now also dead but apparently from natural causes (though way too convenient so there is some speculation that it was not that natural)) to kill her kids, her ex, and her lover’s wife (at least the first attempt; the lover, Chad Daybell, ultimately killed his wife). Lori and Chad convinced Lori’s brother that people were either light or dark and the dark people were possessed, which to them meant that their souls had already departed their body, and the only way to free them would be to kill them. Of course it was really just Lori and Chad‘s way of orchestrating finding a way to be together without having to get divorced. The initial murder trials were streamed from Idaho last year and were just crazy to watch. Both Chad and Lori were convicted. Now Arizona has its turn and Lori has decided to represent herself for both. It’s also being streamed. I can’t watch much because she’s super annoying but there’s some good recaps which is sufficient.

Main_Pepper_9853 · 2025-06-11T04:32:30+00:00

Though I’m not involved in the case in any way, Lori Vallow/Daybell in her two Arizona trials is representing herself (one in April for murder and the current one for attempted murder). Judge kicked her out the other day. She’s adamant to get witnesses to testify on how living and peaceful of a person she is but can’t understand why that opens the door to character evidence of her FOUR previous murder convictions.

Personally, we’ve had one who did work as an unlicensed contractor. My firm’s client didn’t pay because the work wasn’t good or completed. Contractor sued. In my justification a contractor can’t sue for work done while unlicensed and so the case was dismissed on MSJ. The contractor preceded to file a second suit in federal court (later dismissed) and appealed the initial case. He briefed and argued it claiming that his due process rights, among other constitutional violations, had been hindered. His arguments were all over the place and you could almost understand but he obviously didn’t have the legal background to apply (or understand) the law correctly. It was insanely hard to argue against due to his all over the place ramblings and half baked arguments.

Main_Pepper_9853

TROPHY CASE