Another necessity, Ms Limmer continues, is marketing the firm correctly to attract new clients at a time in which an injection of funds for cashflow are critical.

“We are seeing a shift with firms using a philosophy of client-centred service as a differentiator from competitors. It is important that new firms have the focus and capacity to properly advise and service their clients on their legal matters. Providing this quality service is a significant feature of successful and profitable law firms,” she suggests.

Beyond these two crucial considerations and steps for new firm owners, Ms Limmer went on, is the inextricable need for well-implemented technology.

“Having technology which supports practices in meeting their professional obligations as well as their business priorities is a key feature in what we see in successful new firms,” she says. 

“The LEAP Legal Practice Productivity Solution becomes this technology support, aided by quality content, features and the guidance of experienced consultants and Legal Practice Advisors.”

In the provider’s experience, Ms Limmer muses, no two firms are exactly alike. 

“For example, what compliance and client-centred service looks like for one practice can be totally different for another.” 

“This is why LEAP technology and support is geared around the fundamentals and a deep understanding of the professions and the lawyers within it,” she posits.

For Lav Chhabra, who is the principal of Melbourne-based wills and estates boutique Perpetuity Legal, it is “much easier these days” to start and operate a firm with the help of technology. 

“With the changing landscape in provision of legal services and client interactions, there is a real opportunity for new practices to offer a more flexible and modern approach to legal services,” he insists.

Like most other business sectors, Mr Chhabra notes, the global pandemic affected the legal profession as well. 

“Firms and clients have learnt to be flexible with use of video conferencing and work from home arrangements. Most firms now aim to be paper less. I believe flexibility in dealing with changing circumstances to reduce disruption in provision of service is important.” 

“So, in my view it is prudent to consider what tools can be used to incorporate that flexibility into the firm’s practices,” he surmises.

Achieving ‘practice productivity’

As part of these non-negotiables, and the ever-increasing need for flexibility, new firm owners have to take a bigger picture view of their utilisation of technology. Gone are the days where a business leader should simply consider investing in a practice management software: they must, moving forward, have a practice productivity solution.

LEAP sees, Ms Limmer explains, successful practice owners approaching productivity as an “essential component” of not just firm business but also professional standards. 

Productivity is, therefore, the “binding element” of the firm’s business processes and legal professional service delivery, she says.

“Our clients have informed us of increasing their client numbers simply by being competitive on client service alone – an indicator of productivity. Getting back to clients faster and ensuring accuracy are key outcomes of good practice productivity,” she details.

“How this comes about is through approaching both process and productivity solutions in a comprehensive and firm-wide way. New firm owners have the refreshing opportunity to ask at every turn what would be most effective at accomplishing their goals.” 

“We are seeing practices revisit traditional models with renewed insight and asking themselves, ‘Is this still working for my clients?’, and never accepting ‘This is the way we have always done it’. Flexibility and the openness to change and improve are key to ensuring practice productivity.”

When asked for his advice to new firm owners about achieving practice productivity, Mr Chhabra said that, from his perspective, the most valuable asset of a legal practice is its staff, and the second most important its practice management tools. 

“Personally, in starting my practice, LEAP offered me a streamlined and cost-effective solution to manage my workflow, accounting and integration with other relevant applications, which has proved to be one of the best decisions for me and has enabled me to manage and develop my practice very well over the past few years,” he mused.

Lessons from observing firm owners across the board

The lessons learned from legal practices across the country, Ms Limmer submits, can be placed into two categories: what providers like LEAP see from successful new firms, and what   they don’t see in successful new firms (at least initially, which often then comes later, she adds). 

“These are important distinctions as there is always a finite amount of time and capital that principals have to build on their business,” she says. “we've been fortunate enough to have helped on average over 200 start-ups each year and have observed that focusing on the right things has the biggest impact on overall success factors for new firms.”

One element, she says, is how firm owners develop an understanding of their business. 

“Through reporting and well-maintained data informing the reporting, new firms can get accurate snapshots of their position across a range of key performance indicators. This is important, because success can be subjective. Focusing on the parts the principal wants in their own practice to succeed is highly relevant.”

Then, after taking snapshots of the current position, new firms are well placed to determine their strategic focus on where they want those performance indicators to move, Ms Limmer outlines.

“Having a Legal Practice Productivity Solution which captures a range of different performance areas, is therefore ideal.”

Following this, what LEAP sees in successful new firm clients, Ms Limmer says, is a focsus on their processes and how they can bring about their firm’s success at scale. 

“Increasing capacity and knowing not only when to onboard staff, but what type of role the firm requires, is a natural result of effective systems and processes supported by technology and not the other way around. Successful law firms start as they mean to go on,” she proclaims.

Elsewhere, the provider has also seen a trend “that has become typical of the state of the world we now live in, where working remotely has become popular”, she adds. 

“The practitioners predominantly starting their own law firms are of a generation that has embraced technology as part of their lives so the ‘switch’ to taking advantage of technology in their businesses is not a giant leap.” 

“The notion of outsourcing legal work has also become more attractive to new firms to allow them the capacity to service their clients in the areas that count,” she says.

Lessons in starting one’s own firm

Mr Chhabra makes similar observations, noting that most new firms have limited staff and, in addition to ensuring that the firm is providing quality service, there is also pressure to secure new clients and maintain cashflow, as the referral base at such a stage is generally not very broad.

““For me, it was important that I use my time and resources available to me efficiently and cost effectively to manage the client service, marketing and cashflow, so I can have a viable practice for years to come,” he says.

— Lav Chhabra