Law students do not usually learn practical practice skills in law school, such as approaching a billable-hours-based practice. These daily practice skills are crucial to success in the legal industry and are a significant and unnecessary obstacle for new lawyers. Early-career lawyers without such guidance face a significant disadvantage when starting practice. Basic practice skills and knowledge, such as billable hour best practices, also help level the playing field for marginalized lawyers.
This billable-hour guide empowers new lawyers by providing information, insight, and best practices regarding billable hours. In addition, it provides action steps for users and guidance on advancing new skills learned as their careers move forward. The guide introduces the billable hour concept, examines issues with the billable hour model, discusses concrete numbers and examples, discusses tracking time, pitfalls, and best practices, and shares ideas for protecting and advancing yourself in a billable hours-based practice.
Please note: You may use this guide for educational purposes as a starting point in building your approach to a billable hours-based practice. It’s up to you to find a strategy that works for you and your practice. Please carefully review and follow applicable professional responsibility rules in the state(s) where you practice before implementing your approach.
This initial session introduces the author and the concept of the billable hour. We’ll discuss what you can expect from this guide and the roadmap we’ll follow as we progress through the other recordings.
We’ll start by discussing some issues with the billable hour to be aware of as you start your practice.
Next, we’ll get concrete, talking about how billable hours are usually measured, the concept and effects of billable hour targets, and a deep dive (with examples) into the day-to-day impact of those numbers.
In this section, we’ll discuss how to track your time, options that may be available to you at your firm, and best practices.
In this section, we’ll cover practical tips on how to be successful in a billable hours-based practice.
Building on the previous section, we’ll discuss the concept of describing your time and why it is important.
In this section, we’ll walk through an approach to making time tracking and descriptions easier and more manageable.
Building on our above discussions, we’ll discuss some billable hours best practices to help you see continued success as your career advances.
Finally, we’ll wrap up by zooming out a bit to talk about the importance of making good use of your time and the connection to billable hours.
These podcast episodes, from inside and outside the legal industry, provide interesting discussions of other ways to bill for services and get your wheels turning (these examples are referenced in context in the above recordings).
