Eight Hour

Eight Hour

By making this law is really not work at least ten hours between an eight hour shift?

Thank you!

I do not think your question is very clear. Are you talking about overtime? Most of the state or employers limit the # of time a person can work a week. No law stating that you have to work 10 hours a day.

The Billable Hour - A Bad Business Model for Lawyers

Lawyers still earn their keep by billing for their time by the time live in the past. The "billable hours" is a bad business model which opens Also you check the criticism better get to your profession.

A fundamental problem with the billable hours model for determining the value to the client - there is little to no relationship between time spent resolving legal problems of a client and deliver value. In fact, the opposite is usually true. The more experienced to a particular legal specialty, the better you will be solving the problems of the specialty and the less time it takes. The model of billable hours either punishes your growing expertise or lead to the temptation to cheat. Remove model billable hours from your business model and not just remove the ethical dilemma but you get paid for value delivered.

There is a flawed premise on the basis of time charges for legal services. The foundation is the "product" that lawyers sell time. Sometimes it is said that, "All we sell is our time."

This is wrong. The minimum wage workers to repair a grocer's shop floor is selling his time. He is trading time for dollars. He is a tool to easily change the next time workers wanted to trade for dollars.

Are you a business? Do you go to law school and attend all the (mandatory) seminar to deliver a commodity?

Dependent I do not.

We sell ideas, and creativity, in large part, the ability to solve human problems.

May, I wish to propose, little or no relationship between time spent addressing a client's needs and desires and the amount of time. Important, the better we get our shipping, more is true. Not find that you can better solve people's problems with legal specialty than you were a year ago? How about ten years ago?

I hope it. If not, what you been doing with your life?

Thus, the lawyer made the business Valuing mistakes of his expertise in every minute is a doubt. The better he gets to his welfare, the less time it takes, yet man the greater value he delivers to clients. Improving the ability to solve the problems that come with learning and experience can hardly paid by the incremental increase in the rate charged per hour for your time. It can not keep up!

A smart lawyer who learned about the business finds a way to be paid for value delivered. The reasonableness of the "value" of what the attorney delivers can be measured only from the view of the client and not by any comparison to what other attorneys are charged for work.

Let me give an example:

A client comes to you a $ 100,000 problem you are able to resolve. For your knowledge, experience and problem solving ability, you have the ability to deliver of the solution. Know from experience that the total "investment" of time for your particular project is two hours. (You will, however, invested in a life study to get to this point.) It is included in a short form of the court. You have documents that you prepared in the past and know that you will begin to document and edit them for the client. You know how to edit them because you are an expert. No risk to you that you are not paid.

Quote a client a $ 10,000 fee and he was thrilled. He was thrilled because he must make a $ 90,000 income in the transaction. He was thrilled because she looked around and he knows you the expert in his problem. In fact, he is thrilled that you made the decision to accept his case. Clients careful with your payment to be fair. You was thrilled because you are paid $ 10,000 for two hours and, in contrast to many other ways that you can use that time, you judge it to be just.

This is a good business transaction too difficult to replicate only the model you know is the trading hours for dollars "model. How you are going to quote and collect $ 5,000 each time? The legal ethical theorists will attack. It is, after all "more than any lawyer in your community charge per hour, and (heaven forbid) documents recycle "to take less time to deliver great value and service to clients. Do not have any incentive to "pad" your time for the value of your services are not measured by minutes.

Bring the situation step further: If the client is looking for, he has a deadline. He wants to solve the problem in three days, but you have problems. You are left with long planning family vacation in two days. The only time the judge will be available on the third day.

You and the family are, however, prepared to rearrange your vacation at a certain price. So, instead of quoting the client $ 10,000, the price for your problem solving skills and inconvenience now is $ 20,000. He was thrilled still. He have seen a $ 80,000 profit. He was thrilled because she looked around and decided that you are the expert in this field. He was thrilled for the value to him of what the delivery is huge still lower than what you are actually charged. You are thrilled because the fees are fair compared to time how will be used in other ways (ie, keeping the family happy).

Some legal ethical theorists, on the other hand, is apoplectic. It is not, after all, "taken any more time," yet your payments are doubled!

Now, say by excellent marketing skills and your experience and reputation of three clients like to show your door at about the same time. Since you "recycle" documents and go to court but sometimes, your total time for all three clients are only three hours, yet you quote each is the same: $ 20,000 apiece. Received assuming that each believes is in their own interest to hire you, and make choices free, you will earn $ 60,000 for your problem solving skills and the fact that your family will delay his vacation by a day.

It would almost impossible for the lawyer who only business model is to bill by the hour to charge and collect $ 60,000 in fees for his expertise for three hours. Charging time - and therefore potentially subjecting the fees earned both a comparison with fees charged by other attorneys the community for "reasonableness" and an audit of time really spent on documents per client - is bad business.

In a free and open to market, the reasonableness of the fees charged to clients who pay fees and who have the ability to make decisions for himself whether to accept your offer should never be compared to an "industry standard" or the time actually spent on the project. This is bad business.

The "billable time model "survives the legal profession only because it is one of those things" that we have always done "and most lawyers have never either questioned the foundation where the model is built or not taken time to think about a better way.

About the Author

Ben Glass is a personal injury attorney in Fairfax Virginia. He is the author of numerous consumer publications, including The Truth About Lawyer Advertising. He runs mastermind and coaching groups, and conducts marketing seminars for attorneys, teaching "Effective, Ethical and Outside the Box Marketing" through Great Legal Marketing, LLC. You can follow his blog
Solo and Small Firm Marketing Blog.