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Law Office Retreats The Really Add Value
Smith & Same, a hypothetical general practice law firm with five partners and a total of 15 lawyers, has been in existence for 30 years serving clients throughout its regional area. John Same, the managing partner, makes many of the firm’s day-to-day decisions, but significant decisions are made by all of the partners. Three partners

Having Difficult Conversations; The Do’s and Don’ts
I am often asked about how to have “difficult conversations” in which one person tells another that what he/she is doing is problematic and needs to change. This is feedback. If you can give, receive and digest feedback well, difficult conversations will become much easier. Typically it is easy to give/receive/digest “positive” feedback, but “negative”

Coaching Teams So The Whole Is Greater Than The Sum Of The Parts
My friend Donella Meadows, who started an intentional community in Vermont many years ago, once said “Living in community is neither as good nor as bad as you might think”. The same can be said about working in teams. Unless you really do practice law alone, you are likely to be part of a team

Building a Practice AND Building a Profile
No doubt, you know what it means to build a legal practice. Do you have as clear an idea of what it means to build a “profile”? Consider the following. Peter, a barrister, specialises in certain types of litigation. He is bright, capable, hard-working and has practiced for15 years. Early on, Peter identified his speciality

Beyond Future Proofing; Lockdown Lessons That Matter
Karen “Toast“ Conger (toastchanges.com), is an Auckland based consultant and futurist specialising in individual and organisational change. Recently she said “The Covid pandemic represents only the first of many existential challenges humanity may face in the near term. The known unknowns are so significant that they make typical ‘future proofing’ (that is, preparing now for

Microsoft Word Styles for Lawyers
An issue that affects almost every organisation that we have worked with is formatting of their Word templates. In most cases they are consistently inconsistent and terrible. It not only reflects badly on the organisation and how the substance of the document may be perceived, but it’s a huge cost as it takes