Sandra‘s office was piled high with files, her work-life was spent putting out fires and her dog was feeling so neglected it had taken to chewing the couch.

Jeremy felt like it had been a long time since he had a life. Days and weekends were spent at the office, he’d gained 20 pounds in a year, and his wife had gone on vacation to Mexico with her best friend Gary the hairdresser – again.

Sandra and Jeremy are not alone. These days it seems like the standard answer to “Hi, how are you?“ has become “Busy, and you?” Having a successful professional life and keeping the plants alive and your partner speaking to you requires a whole new set of disciplines.

The higher we climb in our careers the more projects we juggle. Our work becomes increasingly complex. The deadlines are just as short as ever. To survive and thrive under these conditions it is critical to develop new skills and strategies for mastering the demands. In my work as a professional coach I have come across ten simple practices that have made a significant difference for me and for my clients.

They are called practices – because they are simply routines and approaches for you to try out in your work day. Implement them one at a time and observe the effect each one has on your performance. I shared these last week with the attendees at the CBA Women Lawyer’s Forum Annual Conference in Vancouver and was delighted to discover this approach to work is catching on and some of the senior women lawyers were applying practices like these successfully in their work.

Over the next month I will be posting the series. Let me know how they work for you.

Practice One:  Morning Ritual

Open the day with a planning session. Review priorities and upcoming deadlines. Plan the work schedule for the day. Take a short break followed by focused work on the top priority for the day. Try not to spend any time on your email until later in the morning. If necessary have an assistant review the morning email for any urgent messages requiring attention.

Practice Two: One Thing at a Time

I remember back in the 90’s when I had “skilled multi-tasker” proudly highlighted in my resume. Now I would have to say that I am a multi-tasker in recovery. I guarantee this post was written without stopping to check email.

Multi-tasking is over-rated. Once paraded as a virtue, it is now getting known for what it truly is – a time-waster and productivity killer. The human brain can’t multi-task attention. In Brain Rules neurologist John Medina clearly indicates why multi-tasking doesn’t work: “Studies show that a person who is interrupted takes 50% longer to accomplish a task. Not only that, he or she makes up to 50% more mistakes.”

Create zones for intense and focused work during the day. Turn off the email. Close the door. Focus on just one project for up to ninety minutes. Observe how this time for uninterrupted concentration impacts the quality of your work.

This post is for those readers who were not born with organization in your DNA .  If your office is filled with piles of paper, if your contact management system is made up of a collection of business cards gathering dust in a drawer, then I want to direct you to an article from the Saturday Guardian this week: How to Create a Home Filing System.   (Thanks to Mary Childs of Ethos Law for sending along the link this weekend.)

The author introduces the C.R.A.P method of filing.  C.R.A.P stands for chronological, random ascending pile. This method of document storage can be effective for those with a highly accurate memory for linking documents to moments in time.  For example, say I have a pile in my office that I started in November last year. (And please know I have no such pile as I completed a thorough reorganisation of my office in early January!) I need to pull out the invitation to a charity event that was mailed to me in early December.  Using the C.R.A.P filing system I can move through the strata, and given the pile has risen to about a foot high in 3 months, the December document is likely to be found in the bottom half.  In about 5 minutes I will have found the document in question.

Problems with the C.R.A.P. system?  Pets.  Children. Other people.  It is all too easy for innocent furry creatures to knock over a pile; a child to enjoy playing in the piles like leaves in the fall; or a well-meaning partner who puts the chronology into disarray.

Another problem with the system? The aging brain.  As people age all of a sudden they find they cannot remember which pile is which, and when did that letter arrive anyway?

The truth is, at some point most of us most migrate to a better system.  There are numerous options.  My preferred method is the simplest.

Filing A to Z.  Get yourself boxes of hanging file folders and plain manila envelopes, a labeller, and a shredder.  (The David Allen approach.  For more on this read Getting Things Done.  His system is complex, but if you choose not to adopt it in its entirety there are many chunks that can be scavenged into your own personal system.)

Assure yourself that Rome was not built in a day and allot yourself a scant 5 minutes at a time for filing. (While I advocate the five-minutes at a time approach to catching up on filing, I never practice it.  I am an all at once, spend the afternoon up to my elbows in paper, and wrestle it to the ground kind of person. If that is what works best for you, go for it!)

Slowly but surely work your way through the pile.  Either keep it and file or throw it away. And if you can’t decide, put it aside and keep filing.  Read Julie Morgenstern‘s post Weed Out Papers  and then get started.  If you are hunting for an organization road map to follow try her book Organizing from the Inside Out .

Allocate one manila folder to one hanging file folder.  Use the labeller to make nice neat labels.

When in a year or more time the file cabinets are full – purge to make room.

For the digitally-advanced get one of the latest scanners and quickly scan rather than file your documents and store on your hard-drive.  I am a big fan of this idea but this would require purchasing a more state-of-the-art scanner than my current version.  Also, I know that I cannot divest myself entirely of paper files so this would be half-way measure.

To tackle collections of business cards the simple answer is get on Linked-In.  Here’s a step-by-step guide to getting started.  First step is to set up a simple profile.  This takes between 5 minutes to an hour depending on how detailed you want to get.  Next, using the handy application on Linked In, connect it to your Outlook contact list and select those people you wish to connect with and send them invitations.   This takes about 5 minutes.  Now it’s time to turn to the pile of business cards.  Sort through the pile and pull out those people you actually want to be connected with.  Throw out the rest.  Then look the people up on Linked In and invite them to connect with you.  The beauty of Linked In is that each individual keeps their own profile updated and you receive alerts when they have a new job, address, or other related news.

Bottom-line, getting organized is worth the time spent for the energy it frees up and mental clarity it brings.

If you are feeling like you would like you would like to get better at business development here are five steps to get you started:

1. Update your contact list. This contact list will include your clients, past-clients, contacts and referral sources. Once you’ve updated it, review the list and develop your “A” list of contacts. This is a short list of the most important people in terms of new business opportunities.  While there are many people we care about and we would like to invest time in, the “A” list simply helps us to prioritise.  In many cases people on the “A” list will be clients and past clients.  In some areas of practice such as commercial litigation they may be referral sources.

2. Make yourself a weekly connect with list.  Many of my clients develop the habit of setting aside some time on a Sunday afternoon or evening to think about who they want to take action to connect with in the coming week.  It helps to have at your fingertips your short list of priority contacts. Action for a local contact may be to set up a face-to-face coffee or lunch meeting.  Or it may be to connect with them in some other valuable way.  Is there a legal update you can send them? The guiding question to consider is “how can I add value?”

3.  What gets scheduled gets done.  This past year has been about schedule mastery both for my coaching clients and for my own practice.  Get your commitments into your calendar.  Block off time for them.  AND respect the time you have blocked off for these commitments by not scheduling over it.  Schedule time for connecting with people.

4. Focus on listening.  This is one skill that seems easy and yet is surprisingly difficult.  The more our minds are filled with deadlines, the more our blackberry buzzes, the harder it gets to listen.  In your business development meetings put the emphasis on listening and learning about what’s going on for your contact personally and professionally.  What challenges are they facing?  What are they most excited about?  What’s most important to them?  Seek out opportunities to help and to add value. 
Put your blackberry away so that you can turn your full attention to the conversation.  A key step in business development is “discovery”.  That means asking open ended questions and learning all that you can over the course of one meeting or many about your contact and his/her business.  This is how you discover where the opportunities lie.

5.  Track your actions and your time.  Make a commitment to invest a set number of hours weekly on business development.  If you want to dabble then give it 2 hours a week.  If you want to make a serious effort then set aside 4 or more hours.  (This includes time spent planning, emailing, lunching, attending networking events – everything!) Keep a running list of who you are connecting with and what you are learning.   Review your notes to ensure you are following up when and where you need to, and to evaluate what’s working and what is not.

And here are some other great resources to explore:

When you have listened and uncovered opportunities it is time to talk about the benefits of you or your firm’s services.  Here’s a helpful post from Theda C. Snyder that explains features and benefits.

Check out Susan Van Dyke’s post on 10 tips to revitalize your practice with healthy legal marketing habits.

And finally, don’t miss Paula Black’s recent post tip Be yourself.

Experience lists are a crucial part of a lawyer’s on-line profile because they provide clients and prospects with concrete examples of work that has been done.   I just came across an elegant approach to experience lists from legal and business writer Doug Stern.  What he recommends is shifting  the emphasis from the work done to the client served.

BEFORE (1)

Acted for a clean energy company in multiple rounds of venture capital led financing.

AFTER (1)

A clean energy firm engaged [FIRM’S NAME] to help the start-up through multiple rounds of venture capital-led financing.

BEFORE (2)

Representing a health sciences company and its European subsidiary in an action for infringement of two European patents for evacuated, plastic blood collection tubes brought against members of a competing health sciences group in the Patents County Court.

AFTER (2)

A health sciences company and its European subsidiary engaged our firm to assist them in an action for infringement of two European patents for evacuated, plastic blood collection tubes brought against members of a competing health sciences group in the Patents County Court. 

By shifting the primary focus to the client and away from the law firm the experience bullets are more interesting to read and less repetitive.  Next time you revise your practice group or personal profile on the web I recommend you read Doug Stern’s post on and try out his recommendation.

Ever feel like you were falling behind in all the important areas of your life? As the pace of work shifts into high gear in autumn it is all too easy to get trapped in survival mode – just working to make it through each day and pushing aside your own personal priorities and objectives.

I have had many lawyers tell me they feel they are failing at both their jobs in life – as parents and as lawyers. One thing I know for sure is that this feeling of falling behind and of failing at those things that are most important is shared by many professionals.

To be the best we can be, it is essential to parcel out time to take a deep breath, let go of stress, and return to center. I have two friends who are currently balancing busy professional practices while mothering children who are living with life threatening health challenges. The way these mothers survive is they schedule regular time each day to do those activities that provide them with stress release and re-charge their spirits. For one it is a daily yoga practice. For the other it is taking a long walk with the dog each day. What these woman both know is that these activities are not selfish breaks from their work. These are essential coping strategies that allow them to be at their best for their families and with their clients. Every day counts.

Don’t wait until you are faced with life-altering challenges. Develop a habit of taking care of yourself and matching your actions to your values and priorities. My October column for Slaw.ca is about taking action in three ways:  First, put the oxygen mask on yourself. Second, take time for some reflection to connect your values with your actions.  Third, automate and create processes to support you in making time for what is most important.

Here’s a question I get all the time when I am running business development training courses:

“What do I do when the person I am speaking to is boring?” 

In essence, business development for lawyers is all about building trusting relationships. The quickest and most sure-fire way to build trust is to spend more time listening than speaking. To be a good listener you need to be a good questioner and learn to ask about things that get people interested and speaking about subjects that matter to them. 

Or, as Mark Hunter commented in his Slaw column last week: ”ever notice that people do business with people they like?” Being a good listener is the fast track to being likeable. 

So what happens when you can’t listen? What do you do if you find your client or important contact boring?

Faking interest never works.  And just imagine being on the receiving end with someone looking at you with boredom. The natural reaction is to feel insulted and to then judge the person to be arrogant, aloof and yes, unlikeable.  

The answer:  It’s up to you to find what is interesting about the person. Push aside your judgemental inner voice and place your focus firmly on the other person. Everyone is interesting, your job is to uncover this.  Use questions to get the person speaking about things that are important to him/her.  Follow your curiosity. The goal here is to listen and discover, not to prove how interesting you are.  Some sample questions that can open up a conversation are:

• How did you get into being a …. ?
• What are you looking forward to this weekend?
• I’m curious, what made you decide to… (go to that school, travel to Palm Springs, etc.)

Another approach is to ask for advice when the opportunity arises. The majority of people enjoy teaching. 

Take me for example. I don’t golf. I have never held a golf club. What do I do when faced with an avid golfer?  Instead of getting bored and shifting the subject, I dig into it. I confess my general ignorance and then ask to be enlightened.  What are the best golf courses in town? Has it been good for business development? What’s the best age to start kids in the sport? What have been the best golf courses they have ever played on? What I discovered is that while I am not interested in the sport  I am interested in what people like about it and get out of it. 

The bottom line: it’s up to you to turn it around. It is in your power to turn boring into interesting. 

When you show you are interested and really listen to the person you will distinguish yourself from the majority of people who do not.  The end result is that the person will then likely become interested in you and it will be your turn to tell your story.

My favorite resource on all things to do with listening is Just Listen by Dr. Mark Goulston.   He reminds us all that we are responsible for our own degree of interest with this quote: 

“Boredom is what happens when I fail to make someone interesting.”  Warren Bennis, Founding Chariman, USC Leadership Institute