As a solo attorney, you have to be driven. You’re bright, you’re good at what you do, and you want to grow. But you also have operational expenses, you may still have student loan debt, and you want to scale at a manageable pace.
When you’ve started on your own, everything feels possible. But without the right pacing or support, busywork, a heavy case load, and administrative tasks can eventually suck the joy and energy out of your career. And without a good financial strategy, you simply won’t be able to prosper and save the way you’d hoped.
What steps can you take to plan for financial success as a newer solo attorney? We’ll walk you through some of the simplest and most sustainable ways to save, grow, and ensure your workflow stays manageable.
This one is significant, and too few newer lawyers even consider it. You’ve likely grown up with your parents’ generation urging you to plan for a rainy day and save more than you spend whenever possible. It’s great advice, but it’s easy for this counsel to get lost in the noise of client intake, winning cases, and the excitement of success.
Always, always set money aside for slow seasons. As the economy shrinks, grows, and responds to global and national events, prospective clients may be more or less willing to seek legal help. They may shop around for the cheapest options, which, in most cases, is not typically the best option. You can’t control the public’s willingness to spend money, but you can control how much you put away into savings.
To start, be sure to have at least four months’ worth of personal living expenses set aside. That’s money for office rent, your mortgage, groceries, utilities, gas, and anything else that you and your family need.
This can help you survive, instead of folding, should you find yourself in an especially dry season. Remember, pay yourself first, look ahead as well as around, and make sure your workflow is something you can manage, not feel buried under.
Far too many solo attorneys say “yes” to impossible amounts of work. You’re energetic, on your own, and feel that handling everything yourself makes you a better lawyer. But being busy 24/7 doesn’t make you more skilled or valuable. To be frank, it simply sets you up for exhaustion.
There are two tactics that can help set you up for success as you take on new cases:
Know when to say “no”.
You may not be able to take on every case. If you’re staying up until 11 pm every night and working weekends, you simply have too much going on.You either have an excess of cases on your desk or not enough help with the smaller, administrative tasks. If you already have support, you may have to work through current cases until you can take on more. If you don’t have any help around the office, that brings us to tactic number two.
Get help with smaller tasks.
Billing, document drafting, e-filing, legal research, and file organization. You should not be handling this all on your own. Your 9-to-5 hours are getting chewed up by work that a competent, trustworthy assistant could easily handle.This is why we offer solo attorneys ILAs. They’re fellow lawyers who work when you work, and who can handle these tasks for you for a manageable, flat fee.
When your work week feels manageable, you’re free to dig into representation with renewed energy. You’re also free to take on new cases, earn even more, and set yourself up for real, long-term financial success.
Next, you’ll want to make sure the support you hire is within your budget. If your current profit margins are on the lower side, you may not have the $70,000 or more that in-office paralegals now expect. And while those rates are understandable (nothing has gotten cheaper in the last 10 years, and rent won’t dip any time soon), you simply may not have the revenue to cover it.
That’s where DocketWorks can be especially helpful. We’ll pair you with an accredited attorney who can save you 10 to 40 hours per week for half of what a US-based paralegal would cost.
These aren’t law students; they’re lawyers with clients, trial experience, and case work of their own. This means you can hand off anything from e-filing to legal research with confidence. Save money, take on new clients, and delegate a week’s worth of administrative tasks with a single hire.
This is also significantly less risky than automating everything with AI. While AI can be great for some organizational tasks, it consistently hallucinates on more involved projects, especially those related to legal research. Allow a careful, trained fellow professional to handle this for you, instead. There’s infinitely less risk to your firm, your reputation, and your clients’ cases.
For smaller solo firms, success matters. It matters to your bottom line, your firm’s growth, and your reputation, too. The simplest way to make this happen? Save for a dry season, make sure to take on case numbers that match your availability, and take on trustworthy administrative support that can win you back hours per week while respecting your budget.
This is exactly the kind of long-term planning DocketWorks was built for. Helping you understand your bottlenecks, strategize for more efficient work, and partner you with a budget-friendly, highly qualified ILA. In turn, your ILA can help you take on even more case work, reclaim your weekend, and prosper in the years ahead.
Interested? Reach out to us for a simple, no-pressure Discovery Call and learn what an ILA can do for you.
Grace Singh is a writer and editor for DocketWorks. She enjoys bridging services and client needs in ways that are meaningful, memorable, and human-focused, even as technology continues to change. When she’s not at her home office, she enjoys nature walks, reading, and brewing coffee.