For the first 22 years of my career in big law firms, I ignorantly declared that solo or very small law firms (“S&SF”) were full of lawyers who couldn’t/wouldn’t work well with others. Rugged individualists. Now I is one!
The question is, what have I learned since January 1, 2000 when I hung out my own shingle? Lots! But you can be the judge of whether or not I’ve become the Sage of S&SF. I cannot claim to have attained fantastic “success” – whatever that means – but I believe I have learned some things that might be worth passing on to you, the reader.
One thing I can say is that I am doing exactly what I want to be doing at this point in my life and practice (being 69) and I am doing OK financially. Maybe I’ve set the bar too low, but I think survival as a S&SF for this long is the foundation for declaring success, and the second part might be avoiding Law Society of Ontario (“LSO”) and client embroilments. Nothing good is easy, and everything seems to be more onerous every year (maybe it’s me getting older). Big likes big, and the entire world for S&SF is getting increasingly difficult.
Anyhow, here goes with some survival tips for a business law S&SF.
Please log in to read the full article.