Inspiration

Blawger Survivor

Posted by Laurie on Aug 10, 2009 in blogging, Inspiration | 2 comments

I have not been great about posting on this blog lately! It’s good in a sense, because I’ve been busy actually being a virtual legal assistant, not posting about it!! Still this blog was one of the first things I did for my business and it is a valuable tool well worth spending my time on, so I’m taking up the Blawger Survivor Challenge for the next three weeks and hopefully I’ll be able to post every weekday during the challenge.

One of the best aspects of this challenge is that it includes a component to link to the other competitors. What a great reminder that really, we aren’t competitors in the blawgosphere, but rather a community where interaction and inspiration come together to create a whole that is better than the individual parts.

So check out the other competitors (like Only 3 Years, TaxGirl or Hope and Change or any others listed over at Sean Carter’s blog in the right sidebar), then come back here every weekday for my posts about the law, virtual legal assistance, community and working from home (plus whatever else I can come up with to write about, lol!)

Home Office Inspiration

Posted by Laurie on Jul 17, 2009 in Family, Home Office, Inspiration, virtual legal assistance | Comments Off

It’s been a hectic week here at Halo Secretarial and I know when things get hectic here a little inspiration is in order to help me take some deep breaths and remember why I started my virtual legal assistant business! So here’s my inspiration tip for today: find a quotation (or two!) and post them somewhere around your desk and read them in moments when you are feeling stressed or unhappy or you are simply lacking motivation. You can write the quote on a sticky note, or frame it or whatever idea your creativity finds!

I bought some cool wall rub-ons that are inspirational and this is the one in my office (I love that it is huge-makes you really notice it!):

Perfect for a day when the kids are running a little crazy and you haven’t been outside in days even though it’s sunny and you stayed up late one too many times this week! Not that I’m saying my week was like that or anything

Hope my little inspiration makes you smile or motivates you to do something similar!

Searching for Inspiration

Posted by Laurie on Jun 17, 2009 in blogging, Inspiration | 2 comments

I’ve been perusing my google reader tonight searching for inspiration for blog posts. I’ve been (happily!) so involved in the actual “doing” of my virtual legal assistant work, I’ve spent little time blogging about it or even reading about it. Whenever I need inspiration I turn to my lovely google reader and the many, many legal blogs I subcribe to. I almost always see something within the feeds that inspires me or motivates me. Reading someone else’s exciting blog post can definitely be a great way to get the creativity flowing!

Tonight I came across so many interesting posts, for example, loved the idea for a regular Twitter Column from Donna Seale’s Human Rights in the Workplace Blog. I definitely post more frequently on Twitter than I do on my blog! Might as well make sure those tweets are “duly recorded”! I was inspired by the most recent post on Scylla’s Law & Motherhood Blog – a good reminder to those of us who are self employed!

I actually saw, and posted, about this amazing post on Twitter a few days ago, but it caught my attention in my reader tonight nonetheless and is well worth sharing today: The best and the brightest comes from Jordan Furlong at Law 21 and is in my mind a truly thought-provoking post that I wish could be required reading for anyone thinking about applying to a law school – ever. Yes, I liked it that much.

Linsey Krolik had a post from earlier in June  on her Me Too You blog that I only just managed to catch up on. School isn’t out here for a little bit yet (7 days of school left actually!) and I totally can’t wait. Just found out about yet another school activity for the very last week, a grade one garage sale. I need to send both items and money, fun, fun!

Loved PHAT Mommy’s blog post about her Life/Blog Happiness Project. What a great idea!!

You can see why I find so much inspiration in my reader now, right?! I have a huge variety of blogs that I subscribe to, although many have a legal slant, I also of course follow tons of interesting mom bloggers, general business or entrepreneurial blogs and blogs that just fascinate me regardless of their “niche”.

So what’s in your reader that you feel like sharing?

Practice Management

Posted by Laurie on Mar 30, 2009 in Home Office, Inspiration, Legal Practice, networking, virtual legal assistance | Comments Off

As usual I was spending a little time after dinner tonight catching up on some Twitter. I read this tweet from @SamGlover which sent me on over to the recently re-launched Lawyerist. There are tons of interesting posts to read there, but the one that really caught my eye tonight was one that talked about what applications, software etc Sam uses to run his law practice.

I not only enjoyed reading what Sam uses for his legal practice, but also the different choices made by the commentors. So I decided to put together a quick post outlining the various applications/software I use to run my virtual legal assistant practice.

• Calendar: Google calendar/wall calendar combo
• Tasks/to-dos: Teamwork PM
• Contacts: Gmail
• Email: Gmail/mobile Gmail from smartphone while on the go
• Word processing/documents: Word 2007, Open Office, PaperPort
• PDF Creation: Adobe/CutePDF
• Timekeeping/billing: Quickbooks
• Bookkeeping/accounting: Quickbooks/accountant
• Backup: External hardrive and SugarSync (love how SugarSync securely lets me access all from laptop/desktop/mobile phone)
• Client/Project Management: TeamWork PM (256 bit SSL)
• Blogging/Website: WordPress self-hosted

Like Sam and several of his commentors I’m a big fan of cloud computing. I like to be able to access my work from anywhere – my main computer is a laptop for that very reason! And while I know not everyone trusts “the cloud”, I research applications quite carefully before choosing them and feel pretty confident that I’ve made choices that will protect my clients information and my own.

So how does your office run? Does your work live in the cloud at all?!

Solo Attorneys See This

Posted by Laurie on Mar 9, 2009 in Inspiration, Legal Practice, virtual legal assistance | 4 comments

I just read the tuition announcement from Solo Practice University (courtesy of founder Susan Cartier Liebel via Twitter).

I’ve been keep an eye on all the amazing faculty announcements and developments happening over at SPU recently and I have to say it sounds like such an amazing concept! I can’t imagine a better way for new lawyers to learn about running a solo law practice. Topics that will be covered include blogging for your law practice, business strategies, virtual law practices, marketing for attorneys, technology, along with many in-depth courses on specific legal areas like accident law, trial law, entertainment law, estate planning and so many other great topics!

I also was so impressed to see that a virtual legal assistant will be on the faculty. Aretha Gaskin is the owner of The Virtual Legal Assistant and a respected member of the virtual assistant community. Having a professional virtual legal assistant educating new solo attorneys on the benefits of utilizing virtual legal assistants and virtual paralegals can only be good for our industry.

I think Solo Practice University is a model for virtual education and I personally would love to see something similar in the virtual assistant industry! There are plenty of learning programs, books, and certification processes available, but most are over-priced and several offer little value at all. There are definitely some good (and reasonably priced!) books available, but to have an interactive community of learning and support like what SPU is offering would be amazing. And if the legal community can provide it at such a reasonable price, the virtual assistant industryshould be able to offer it at a price that is affordable to those just starting out or considering their options.

Anyway, if you have recently hung your solo practice shingle, or if it’s a move you are considering, I highly recommend you check out Solo Practice University!

Generation Labels

Posted by Laurie on Jan 21, 2009 in Entrepreneurial, Inspiration, work life balance | Comments Off

I’ve never tried to embed a video on my blog before (I need to do this more often!!) but I was so inspired when I saw this video called The Lost Generation over on Susan Cartier Liebel’s great blog Build A Solo Practice, LLC.  Thank goodness she posted the link on Twitter – I haven’t gotten to my reader in a few days so I don’t know when I would have seen this! You really have to watch this video – the WHOLE thing!! It’s under two minutes and well worth your time!

So what generation are you all from anyway? Does it affect your behaviour, your morals, your desires? Personally I’m at the tail end of Gen X, born in 1975.  I don’t really know how this has affected my life specifically – I tend to think simply of how my family, my upbringing and specific cultural factors have influenced my life and work ethic. I know I’m much like other women of my age – I want a family and a career, I want an equal partnership with my husband and I happily embrace new technology as quickly as I can. Ok, that one seems common here in my blogging and Twittering world but I’m ahead of the curve technologically speaking in my immediate circle of family and friends. Half of them don’t even know what a blog is – shocking as that is to me!!!

I know that all these factors, combined with things like the cost of childcare here in Canada have lead to me choosing the entrepreneurial path. Owning a virtual assistant company and offering my legal assistance services on basically a “freelance” basis allows me to achieve (most days) that elusive balance so many women of my era are seeking. So according to this definition of Generation X, I guess am pretty typical of my generation!