Two Ways to Increase Law Firm Profitability
You either sell more stuff or you cut costs!
Busy solicitors are constantly under pressure to split their time between meetings with clients and stay on top of their administration. A typical eight-hour working day has to include all those very important meetings, especially with first-time clients, attending court hearings, making phone calls, dictating and/or typing up correspondence and filing lengthy forms and documents at court.
Family lawyers typically have an extra burden because a lot of the work is bespoke to that client. There is very little in the process that can be standardised, so working with these clients is time-intensive. Many family lawyers therefore rely on good quality support staff to help them with their administration so that their time is freed up to earn fees.
Bluebird is revolutionising admin support so that lawyers have more time, energy and focus to increase revenue.
To sell more stuff, more time is needed
Any marketing and nurturing of client relationships takes a lot of time. For small business owners, it’s a constant 'feast or famine' cycle of being overloaded with client work with no time to get out marketing … and vice versa!
It’s difficult to manage staffing resources in these situations because nobody want to pay for staff to sit and wait for busy times. And pushing staff to high levels of stress with too much work is not what anyone wants either!
If a small law firm of ten lawyers has three support staff, and one person is on holiday, it only takes one sickness day to cause a backlog of work, with the risk of missing deadlines and potentially upsetting clients.
If it is difficult building a legal practice in today’s climate, it is even harder to run an efficient and profitable business in those circumstances.
The lawyers get caught up spending their valuable income-generating time with admin tasks and managing staff. Wouldn’t it be helpful if some of those elements could be dealt with differently?
You can read one story here of how a law firm overcame those challenges.
Who really works 9-5?
When your income is based on the value of relationships, then client care is your highest priority. Very often, family lawyers work well beyond a standard 9-5 day.
Those smart phones that we can’t live without have changed our world and will continue to do so. Instant information, accessibility, and the flexibility to work from anywhere at any time have all changed how we live our lives.
Yet, how many small law firms employ support staff to work outside office hours?
Solicitors will meet with clients at their homes, on weekends, and they will dictate and send typing late in the evening. The secretary will arrive at her desk at 9am sharp to a workload that may already be in a long queue.
So, is the fee earner really free of the 9-5 office if work can only be produced during those hours?
What our customer say ?
Using Bluebird's services we now have a more streamlined, agile working environment and an immediate return on productivity. Bluebird's information security management system matches our own requirements for the Lexcel practice management standard and gives us the assurances we need that all data is protected. The system is easy to use, convenient and requires very little, if any, training. Bluebird have removed stress from our teams when we have had occasions to manage unforeseen sudden absenteeism.
Helen Pittard
Our client files are efficiently managed and my PA is now involved in a more administrative role, managing the workflow and client files. I'm now able to delegate more effectively and take the time to mentor and train our team to undertake the complex tasks required.
Bluebird is now an essential and fully integrated part of our business. I would highly recommend their services.
