How To Manage a Small Law Firm - August 2025

Take a look at our August newsletter!

What if the Problem Isn’t Effort, It’s Direction? NEVER GIVE UP … ON THE RIGHT THINGS

Aug. 18 is Never Give Up Day. That sounds like great advice, doesn’t it? Never give up.

On the other hand, there is such a thing as trying the wrong thing too many times. Here’s an example.

I love the image of the frog being swallowed by the bird, where he’s grabbing the bird by the throat, and the caption underneath says, “Never give up.” I love Winston Churchill’s quote, “Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never — in nothing, great or small, large or petty — never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.”

Say the biggest problem you’ve got in your law firm right now is cash flow. You’ve got a bunch of cases close to being resolved or resolvable. You’re sitting on a bunch of outstanding accounts receivable that are just a few phone calls away from being collected, collect ible , and maybe you've got some bills you haven't sent out.

“Never giving up is great, but you've got to be strategic in choosing what you're focusing on.”

This sounds like such great advice — and usually, it is.

Never Give Up!

But instead of switching focus on collecting payment and shoring up your systems and policies so you don’t continue to accrue even more A/R, you'll see the owners of too many struggling law firms “never giving up, never giving up, never giving up, and never giving up” on a new marketing thingamababby they're trying to figure out so they can keep bringing in new cases (which will probably have the same issues). The point is that ”never giving up” is great, but you've got to be strategic in choosing what you're focusing on.

So, have a great Never Give Up Day! Here's wishing you the good judgment to decide when it's time to focus on not giving up ... or when it’s time to make a new choice.

You need repetitions. Too often, we see owners of law firms try something once, or try something twice, or try something three times, and when it doesn’t give the instant gratification they were emotionally hoping for, they quit. Whereas, if you had just tried a few more times, maybe iterating this time, applying what you learned that time, and trying a little bit different the next time or the time after that, you would finally figure out how to make it work.

MEET RON POLLACK

MEMBERS PAYING IT FORWARD

When personal injury lawyer and owner/president of Pollack Law LLP, Ron Pollack, rejoined How to Manage a Small Law Firm in 2020, he needed to rebuild his business from scratch. After a painful breakup with his business partner, over a year and a half without income, and losing his team during COVID-19, Ron was disillusioned.

Ron rebuilt his business and found a supportive group of peers, mentors, and friendships that will last a lifetime. He launched his VIP Program to help other personal injury lawyers increase the value of their cases. “What helped me the most, and what I recommend to everyone who wants to grow their firm fast, is to really study the 7 Main Parts

“Financially, I was hit pretty hard because of what happened,” he said. “I had to put a lot of goals and dreams on hold.”

Back in 2015, he joined us with a clear goal: To shift his mindset from just practicing law to running a business. Years later, when the full weight of the business ownership landed on his shoulders, he knew exactly where to turn.

Ron didn’t just want to get out of the financial hole and manage his firm more effectively; he wanted to make things better for other attorneys and spend more time with his family. He focused on the Seven Main Parts of a Law Firm™, especially on having a mindset of “constant growth” and “abundance” — and that changed everything.

of the Business™. They are all interconnected and interrelated. You cannot focus on one and neglect the others, though I would say that the seventh part (the business owner’s mindset) is the most essential. The more you focus on aligning the seven parts of your business, the more successful your law firm will be.” “Being a member of How to Manage helped me get through a really difficult period,” he said. “I’m starting over to a certain extent, but I think this will be the best years of my life. Now, I see where this firm can go and how it can afford me the lifestyle that I love, but even better.”

“It doesn’t matter how savvy you are with sales and marketing. If you don’t take care of your mindset, everything else falls apart,” he said. “The more I focus on my mindset, the more I discover about myself, and the more I grow. I don’t want it to stop!”

CALENDAR OF EVENTS

“My name is Alan San Mig We’re based in The Woodlands, assets so their 90- LOOK

8/12

Small Law Firm Business Plan Bootcamp (Remote)

8/18–8/21 Quarterly Business Review (Internal) 8/28–8/30 Workshopalooza (New Orleans, LA) •

Foundational Business Plan Workshop led by Tania Music • Advanced Business Plan Workshop led by Stephanie Luongo • Dead Lead Workshop led by Jennifer Dudley • How To Train Your Dragon led by James Tsikerdanos • Lead the Damn Team: A Leadership Workshop led by Erika Ferenczi • Cash Flow & Budget Workshop led by Evelyn Aucoin • An HR Workshop: Paper, Policy, Protection led by Candice Saltzman • SKUTOPIA led by Tracey Sherwood

“Last quarter, we hit a major milestone: our first revenue; it’s allowed us to expand and for me to experienced lawyer, a legal assistant, and a fi “This helped me pay off two credit cards, but the biggest w It’s been a personal dream of mine to help my son receive

9/12–9/15 Unleash the Beast Mastermind led by Erika Ferenczi (Dallas, TX) 10/17–10/19 Live Quarterly Meeting (San Diego, CA)

“I grew my team and boosted our pro

ALAN SAN

KARLI MADE HER MOM’S DREAM COME TRUE WHAT’S NEW WITH ME AND MY OWN

By the time you read this, Karli will have been back for five months after her family vacation in Europe earlier this year. Some of you know she took her mom to Europe as one of her bucket list experiences after her mom was diagnosed with a rare and life- threatening illness, and we all bought cookies Karli’s family made from scratch to help support her. We’re all so proud of Karli for having the courage, tenacity, and initiative to make one of her mom’s dreams come true for her. She created Cookies for Karli’s Mom and earned enough to make this trip a reality. Thank you, everyone, for all of your support and for buying all of those delicious cookies. Please remember, every single one of your employees and independent contractors has something going on and has some kind of challenge they’re facing in their personal life right now.

They have someone in their life whom they care about, or they themselves are going through something.

You can either say, “Not my problem,” “separate church and state,” “their personal life is their personal life,” or you can be smart about it and realize that no one really leaves their personal problems at home. Everyone brings their personal problems to work. If you’re not taking an active interest in what’s going on in the lives of the human beings helping you make your own dreams come true, you will be at a severe disadvantage as you try to build a culture of people who give a shit about your business. Please take the initiative. If these words resonate with you at all, please take time this week to ask one or two of your employees, “How is it going?”

How do I know this? Because they’re human beings. They’ve got a mother, a father, a sister, a brother, an aunt, an uncle, a friend ...

And really listen and pay attention to their answers.

-DAY KBACK

guel, founder of San Miguel Attorneys, B.C. , Texas, and we protect Hispanic business owners’ families can have a better future.

telling themselves this is just “how it is” — do them a favor. Send them here. They don’t need more sacrifice. They need to learn how to build a real business. We can help with that.

t $2 million run rate. This exciting level of growth isn’t just about our o achieve a dream. Because of this momentum, I was able to hire an finance specialist who is a whiz at coding and programming in Excel. win of all is that I was able to pay for a year of college for my son at Baylor University. e an education debt-free, an opportunity I didn’t have when I immigrated to the U.S.

ofits, but nothing compares to what I was able to do for my son.”

N MIGUEL SAN MIGUEL ATTORNEYS, B.C.

3109 Grand Ave. #188 Miami, FL 33133

PRST STD US POSTAGE PAID BOISE, ID PERMIT 411

This spring, Karli was able to take her family on the vacation of a lifetime — all thanks to cookies! Find out how on pg. 3

INSIDE THIS ISSUE 1 When Persistence Meets Purpose 2 How Ron Chose Growth Over Survival Calendar of Events From Debt to Dreams: A $2M Milestone 3 What Are You Doing for Your Team? 4 The Assessment Every Law Firm Owner Should Complete

I’m Evelyn Aucoin, the financial strategy and literacy expert at How to Manage a Small Law Firm. I specialize in helping our advisors become financial experts as they help law firm owners. When I started at How to Manage, I realized we had incredible data from law firms, including financial information, metrics, and financial statements. I looked at 50 consistently profitable firms and 50 that weren’t across all billing models and practice areas, looking for fundamental things they were doing differently. RESOURCE OF THE MONTH FIX THE 3 PROFIT LEAKS COSTING YOU MONTHLY

That search revealed key areas where there was “daylight” between the metrics. About 95% of the time, the profitability issues were tied to one of three key metrics. That’s how the three profit leaks concept was born. So, I created a free resource that introduces how to think about these metrics, helps you examine your performance, and defines the healthy ranges we see in consistently profitable firms. It’s like a blood test; it doesn’t tell you everything, but illuminates where to start if there’s an issue. I took this type of assessment into a law firm doing over $2 million and, within six months, got them their highest revenue month and highest profitable month ever. We bumped their profitability up by an additional $400,000 in a year. I did the same thing in a law firm doing $20,000 a month. The beauty of these leaks is that the methodology has proven itself, fixing profitability issues in hundreds of law firms. If your net operating profit is less than 10%, you are doing a disservice to yourself by not investing the time to figure out what

is happening. Anything less than 10% is operating at a subpar performance level. Your target should be an operating profit of 20%– 25% and a total owner benefit of 25%–30%. If you look at your revenue number and multiply it by 25%, and that’s not what you’re earning as the owner, invest the time to figure out where your opportunity is because it’s costing you time and money. You’re potentially wasting dollars that could be reinvested in your firm or invested in your future. The faster you invest the time and energy to do this assessment, the sooner you will understand where to focus to improve things. The profit leak assessment is the first step in addressing the issue and taking the ownership you need as a business owner to