I love when I read an inspiring blog post like this great one over at Law 21 today. Like Jordan, I’m Canadian so I didn’t vote yesterday (but I did vote in the recent Canadian election!!) I did watch CNN a lot last night though and I really enjoyed Obama’s speech. That man is a powerful and inspiring speaker!

I think I value inspiration so much because sometimes this “change” thing is hard, really hard.  I know for me changing my mindset from employee to business owner has been hard. And trying to establish my virtual legal assistant business in an industry that is not exactly known for being innovative has been daunting, to say the least! But I do believe in myself, and I think Jordan’s right when he talks about how things that seemed impossible 20 years ago will be simply standard 20 years from now. I’m 33 right now and I can’t wait to see what the world will be like 20 years from now, when my children are grown and starting their post-secondary educations and careers. Will they think virtual businesses are just business as usual? Will they telecommute or co-work? How often will they stop by the local coffee shop for coffee and wi-fi?!

The future is uncertain, but bright I think!

Do you run a solo practice, but have more work than you can handle? Or do you have a full time in-house legal assistant that can’t keep up with your busy workload? Or even a practice that is just getting going and you need help ramping up so that you do have too much business?  A virtual legal assistant may be just the solution in any of these situations! That’s the beauty of virtual assistance, it is a flexible solution that can fit so many needs.

So for example maybe you are a lawyer who doesn’t think you need a full-time assistant.  Do you do all your own typing? Research? Email? How much time does it cost you every day? In a previous post I addressed this lost time cost and demonstrated the cost effectiveness of hiring a virtual assistant to increase your productivity.

Do you have a full-time legal assistant or paralegal already? Think you don’t need any more help? You know in my years as an in-house legal assistant the most effective practice I worked in was one with one lawyer and three assistants.  So much work got done!! That particular lawyer utilized dictation to his advantage because he realized he spoke far faster than he typed.  Isn’t that true of most of us? And with the digital dictation options available it is very easy to send your virtual legal assistant instructions via dictation or to have them transcribe lengthy memoranda, court documents or agreements.

And if you are just getting started you can partner with a VA who offers some marketing suggestions and works with you to grow your network. I bet she’ll suggest you try Twitter!! Or you can get a good working relationship established and have your VA work just a few hours a month to start and eventually add hours as your practice grows.

There are plenty of other ways to utilize a virtual legal assistant. You may partner with a VLA only for large files or projects, specific research assignments or even vacation or sick leave coverage of your in-house staff. I hope you’ll think about taking advantage of the wonderful resources offered by virtual assistants - and if you are thinking of hiring one, don’t forget to check out my main site!

I love working as a virtual assistant, but there are things I miss from my days in a law office environment.  One of these is the legal research I was sometimes able to assist with.  For me, it was a really fascinating aspect of my job.  Probably partly because I enjoy reading so much that I happily read anything and everything. I also enjoy puzzles and solving things, so reading caselaw to find the nuggets of information that could help or hurt our case was a very rewarding task.

Of course as a virtual assistant I can still do legal research.  I can access online legal databases like CanLii or NexisLexis.  I can search through decisions on some of the court sites (like the Supreme Court decisions). I just need someone who wants me to do it for them!  I even would enjoy going to the law library if the need ever arises.

I was on Twitter earlier today, checking out some new followers and I have to send a quick thanks out to a couple of the lawyers I noticed following me today (yep that’s you Stephanie Caballero, Gerry Riskin and Adam Dlin)!  It’s nice to think I’m starting to reach some of my target audience!  (**found out that my new followers are courtesy of this great post at JDScoop!)

Also on Twitter today I found this article about Twitter!  It’s a great read, especially if you are new to my favorite microblogging/social networking platform.  There is one point in particular I think we all need to remember when using ANY new tool, it takes time to see results.  As noted in the article:

many professionals consider Twitter pretty much worthless on first look. But those who stay for about a month start understanding the value. I didn’t think much of Twitter for 60 days, until my casual mention that I was in Boston landed me a dinner with a nearby friend who saw my post. Since then, I have been invited to speaking engagements in five countries and even get to write a guest column for a prestigious old media publication.

Remember that old, old saying - good things come to those who wait.  Twitter is definitely like that - you don’t get 1000 followers in your first week (not usually anyway!) and you don’t make sales left, right and centre.  But if you interact with your customers and have some patience Twitter will be good for business!

If you are interested check it out and feel free to follow me on Twitter!

Thanks to Jordan Furlong of Law 21, I found this recent article from the American Bar Association, which is very positive sign of the growing acceptance of legal outsourcing, including outsourcing to non-lawyer support staff such as virtual legal assistants and virtual paralegals.

Lawyers with concerns about the ethics should be reassured by the ABA’s opinion on the matter.  A couple of points noted in the ABA article:

U.S. lawyers are free to outsource legal work, including to lawyers or nonlawyers outside the country, if they adhere to ethics rules requiring competence, supervision, protection of confidential information, reasonable fees and not assisting unauthorized practice of law.

And this:

Outsourcing can reduce client costs and enable small firms to provide labor intensive services such as large, discovery intense litigation, even though the firms might not maintain sufficient ongoing staff to handle the work, according to a new ethics opinion issued today.   Ethics Opinion 08-451 details ethics obligations of lawyers and firms that do elect to outsource legal work.

With a recognition of the cost benefits to law firms AND approval as to the ethics of legal outsourcing I think more and more lawfirms will start to take advantage of outsourcing arrangements.  2009 may just be a real turning point in the outsourcing field.

I found this article recently on the CBA website - A to Z: 26 Trends for the Legal Profession.  It’s a fascinating read and it posed the question - which trends matter the most to you? If you give it a read I’d love to hear your opinion!

For me, a few of the mentioned trends really stood out as areas in which the contracting of a virtual legal assistant could help legal practitioners manage and grow their business.

B is for BLOGS

You need to write your own posts of course, but you can get a virtual assistant to help you with research, coming up with some topic ideas, proofreading, managing comments and spam and monitoring google alerts for mentions of your company and blog.

H is for HOME

Do you work from home or a small office? If you do, maybe you’ve realized you don’t have much room for office/support staff.  A virtual assistant gives you a lot of flexibility to get help when you need it, without worry about them invading your physical space.

O is for Outsourcing

Outsourcing your administrative and paralegal work to a virtual legal assistant is a tool I really think lawyers should start opening up to.  Save some money, some on carbon emissions by eliminating commutes, save your time since your VA is going to be ready to hit the ground running and get the work done!

Interestingly, the article I mentioned is not that recent, but most of the items are still applicable and often have not been embraced by lawyers.  There are opportunities for those who have vision - reach out and grab them!

Not too long ago I wrote this post on the financial cost of hiring a virtual assistant. In today’s post I’ll address a different kind of cost - the cost of time spent unnecessarily.

How much time did you spend on email this week? How many emails are sitting in your inbox? Have you struggled with formatting your documents in a time crunch or have you missed sending invoice reminders because you are too busy to get to them? Do you have a regular assistant but she too is overwhelmed with tasks?

Most of us feel like we could use more time in our days, but we rarely realize how much can be delegated if we find someone reliable, dedicated and trustworthy to take on some of the burden. The right virtual assistant will help you streamline the running of your business or your law practice and you will have more time in your day finally!

I read a great article today from Law Practice Today where one lawyer documented her first use of a virtual legal assistant and how quickly it lead to an ongoing partnership with a VA, as she realized the potential benefits were significant. One thing you might note in this article is that the lawyer needed assistance on an urgent basis - something a virtual assistant can often easily step in and provide. Virtual assistants each set their own working hours, but many of us are open to assisting after regular office hours, on weekends and on a rush basis.

I challenge those of you who think you don’t “need” a virtual assistant, but who are running a business, to document over the next few days how much time is spent on tasks that could be delegated - whether that is your email, document proofing and formatting, calling a client to schedule a meeting or doing a draft of court documents from your client meeting notes. Realize that if you gave clear instructions to a qualified virtual assistant that you could save all that time and put it to wonderful use - or you could just enjoy some free time!

I was supposed to go back to my office job this fall, after maternity leave with my third child. People asked me why I didn’t want to go back, after learning that I had no plans to return. It was hard to truly explain to them why options like flex time or part-time didn’t really help me enough to make it worth returning. I should send them this great post from Chuck Newton - I Don’t Want No Freakin Flex Time- it might help a little more!!

Flex time, part-time, job-share - these “options” sound great in theory sometimes. But a 6 hour day instead of 8, with a two hour commute total is still a long day away from my family. And it still requires full-time childcare, even though now I’d be on a part-time salary! Plus I would give up some of my benefits, get treated differently by my bosses and co-workers and miss out on choice assignments that require a full-time employee.

Working from home as a virtual legal assistant was definitely a better option! I can fit the work into my schedule and just the elimination of the commute buys me so much time in the day. If you are thinking about working part-time or flexible hours at your job, so that you can have more time for you in the day, consider working for yourself as another option -it’s got a lot to offer!

The rat race - aka the “real” world - is not all it’s cracked up to be. Commuting, meetings, contributing for yet another group gift - working in an office takes a lot out of us all. If you are thinking about getting out and starting a home-based or virtual business I highly recommend you check out The Rat Race Rebellion or the blog of the same name. The authors of the site/blog are the wonderful individuals who wrote the book The Two-Second Commute, a book I absolutely enjoyed and was critical in helping me decide to start my own virtual legal assistance business from my home.

Having said that, you’ll understand how pleased I was when my google alert this weekend turned up a notice that of a hit on my name from The Rat Race Rebellion Blog - on a post about how virtual paralegals are a great option but need more media attention to get lawyers to realize the value. Guess that interview with the CT Law Tribune was a great idea!!

I’m going to try and not work too much this weekend, we’re taking the kiddos to a waterpark and I need to finish getting organized for back to school (Sept 2!!) There’s always time for a little linksurfing and twittering though!!
Here are some links to peruse if you get a chance this weekend - and have a wonderful one!

From MasterMaq - where do we want free Wifi in Edmonton

Ooooh - just found this Alberta Blogs blog and I want to join - will be sending them an email!!

Good reminder from Gavin Craig at Minneapolis Business Lit blog

From Erin Blaskie - discussion of the VA Industry

Great post on capped fees from Law 21

Loved this one from Duct Tape Marketing on Social Media

Over at Build a Solo Practice, LLC is a great inspirational post about becoming an entrepreneur

Virtual Law Practice shares that virtual law offices are really catching on across several states now - yay!

Fluent Simplicity shares a great story about the power of Twitter

This video post from Freelance Parent over at Sparkplugging is a MUST watch

Create a Thriving Business has a wonderful post about how you MUST be online in to truly grow your business

Hope you enjoy some of these links and take care!