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How can lawyers maintain a healthy lifestyle amid their chaotic schedules? It starts at the firm level.

One way corporate legal teams can provide a maximum return is to take on the responsibility of being strategic business advisors. Unfortunately, taking on these additional responsibilities is causing a resource crunch, forcing teams to run their legal function as a business. Some legal teams have turned to point solutions like Trello, Dropbox, or Google Apps to meet their immediate needs. However, those are not nearly as efficient, productive, or scalable as legal practice management platforms.

You’re in the market for a new legal practice management solution for your firm: You scour the web for options, try to determine how the 347 providers that appear in your search are different, sit in on a few demos, and then narrow down your top picks. And then comes the issue of price…

What does it take to advance in your law career? We sat down with Joe Hughey, a former law-firm marketer working in the legal industry for 16+ years, to find out. Along with his marketing responsibilities, Joe specialized in the professional development of the firm’s attorneys. He let us pick his brain about this topic and gave us valuable insight into how attorneys can make partner or join the bench.

“A-B-C. A, always; B, be; C, closing. Always be closing! Always be closing!”

Next week, legal technology providers from around the world will come together in Chicago for ABA TECHSHOW. It’s always an exciting time of year with big feature announcements being made in the days leading up to the event. At CARET Legal, we don’t just make product updates to get in the headlines before the conference. In fact, last year we made 983 updates to improve our platform. In our offices, we care less about the “splash” and more about the impact of our software on our clients’ efficiency and profitability.

When you’re in the groove, business seems to flow smoothly. Everyone’s on the same page, people get back to you without a follow-up call, and things work how they’re supposed to. Who doesn’t love those kinds of weeks? The ones that go by without any fires cropping up. Unfortunately, there are three common problems often experienced by lawyers that are notorious for causing hiccups in workflow, curbing progress, and inducing headaches:

Inspired by the latest Netflix binge craze, “Tidying Up with Marie Kondo,” millions of Americans are decluttering. In the series, organizing expert Kondo travels to homes of stressed-out Americans to help them discard items that no longer spark joy and organize their living spaces in a meaningful way. Kondo contends that having little time or energy to organize can lead to anxiety and tension. As she explains in her best-selling book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing: “In essence, tidying ought to be the act of restoring balance among people, their possessions, and the house they live in.”

The practice of law is complicated. A single case can involve multiple attorneys, dozens of files and hundreds of interactions among a law firm, clients, opposing counsel and courts. Given the vast scope of moving parts and operations of a legal matter, it is ripe for business process optimization.

The New Year is the perfect time to reassess how you’ve been doing and make adjustments. Have you thought about cleaning house and moving to paperless? Running a paperless office has never been easier. With the advances in legal technology, the days of large scale cabinets filled with files in disarray are gone. Now, with legal practice management software like CARET Legal, you can digitalize your entire office’s case files and communications. Going paperless will save you time, money, and add appeal for potential clients.