January 2007 | e-Newsletter

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In this Issue

Billable Hour® Luxury Line Watches Now Available Julie Fleming Brown Joins as Regular Timesheet Work/Life Balance Columnist Feature Article: Passing up Good for Great Cartoon: Stu's Views Humor: Networking is Notworking for Me More Great New Greeting Cards and Gifts Coming Soon! Cartoon: Juris Comic Humor: End of (Sales) Days Book of the Month: Beyond the Bottom Line: The Search for Dignity at Work Daily Legal Toon

Billable Hour® Luxury Line Watches Now Available

Last month, we told you that we would soon be introducing a line of luxury timepieces and fine jewelry featuring the patent-pending Billable Hour® dial. As reported in New York Newsday (Long Island Edition), the Luxury Line launched in mid-December.

We currently offer a Luxury Line version of our Classic model. The Luxury Classic model features a 14 carat gold Italian-made one piece case with a sapphire crown and a scratch resistant crystal, housing a Geneva Swiss movement. The strap is black padded lizard-grain leather. This men's size watch has a 25mm dial and is presented in a polished woodgrain box with a leather pillow.

In the future, look for a tank style (rectangular case) model watch, as well as tie clips, cuff links and money clips featuring the patent-pending Billable Hour^® face.

Julie Fleming Brown Joins as Regular Timesheet Work/Life Balance Columnist

We are pleased to announce that Julie Fleming Brown is now The Timesheet's regular work/life balance columnist.

Regular readers know Julie from her articles in The Advance Sheet—our occasional supplement to The Timesheet—as well as from her stint as guest columnist in last month's issue. When she's not writing for The Timesheet, Julie provides professional and personal coaching for lawyers on topics such as client and professional development, job searches, career transitions, and work/life balance.

We'd also like to take this opportunity to thank Cheryl Stephens, our outgoing work/life balance columnist, for her insightful articles over the past year. We wish Cheryl the best of luck in her new ventures!

Passing up Good for Great by Julie Fleming Brown

There’s a key skill for balancing work and life, and it’s one that doesn’t come naturally to many of us. Cheryl Richardson, author of Take Time For Your Life and Stand Up For Your Life (among others) calls it "passing up good for great."

As children, we’re taught the old saw that a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. While that’s a valid saying under some circumstances—when we have something that’s perfectly good but are tempted to get greedy and to try for more—it can also be a limiting belief that actually does us harm. Sometimes, we need to release the bird already in hand so that both hands are free to grab the two in the bush.

It is difficult to hold onto mediocre while reaching for greatness. So, for instance, if you’re applying for new jobs and you get one offer that’s ok but not great and a response from the other potential employer saying that you’re a terrific applicant, you’re on the very shortlist, but they haven’t yet decided . . . . You cannot accept job #1 and have any expectation of later accepting job #2. By the same token, if you’ve been saving for a vacation, you can’t spend your vacation fund to go away for a weekend and still expect to go to Europe as originally planned. Another saying fits: you can’t have your cake and eat it too.

Right. What on earth does this mean for work/life balance in practice?

Work/life balance requires surrender of part of one area—whether it’s time spent on work or time spent on personal matters—in favor of the other. You may choose to work less and play more, or vice versa. You may decide to arrange your children’s school, activities, and transportation so you can be at work between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. You may decide to forego a vacation this year so you can be on a prestigious trial team. The catch is that whatever decision you make will require you to give up something so you can have something else.

We humans don’t generally like giving up anything we want. We want it all, and we want it all now. Maturity requires us to recognize that perhaps we can have it all (though that too is open to question), but we certainly can’t have it all at the same time. The single most useful skill for deciding how to arrange this work/life balance is the ability to pass up good for great. Learning that skill requires that we be able to recognize what’s good and what’s great, to identify appropriate time frames to help with the good/great evaluation, and to guard our decisions zealously.

Recognize what’s good versus what’s great.
This judgment will be different for each person. I might decide that being able to attend my child’s soccer games regularly is good but having a prestigious position that will pay enough to let me easily pay for their private school is great. I might decide that having a $200K income that requires 70-hour workweeks is good, but having time to volunteer 20 hours a week in my community is great. Each good/great decision informs a life decision, because if I accept good and forego great, I will be unhappy.

When you look at a decision—be it the big ones I’ve mentioned or small ones like whether to go out for dinner or to stay in and relax—you can recognize what’s great by the internal voice that says "Yes!". When you consider an option and get an "eh, that’s fine" gut response, that’s your sign that you haven’t yet found great. Good versus great is more than a pro/con list; it requires you to engage your values, your priorities, and your desires.

Decide what standards will guide you. These standards must honor your values and ensure your integrity. Although these standards are intimately related to your values, they’re more like facilitating principles. For instance, if one of your top values is family, you might have a standard that says that you will not accept any work situation that intrudes on your Sundays.

Identify appropriate time frames when evaluating good versus great.
Sometimes what’s good versus what’s great will depend on duration. For instance, you may decide that the opportunity to chair a bar section for a year is great even though it requires you to cut back on business development activities and to stop singing with your church choir. If your commitment to the bar would be three years, you might decide that it isn’t a great opportunity.

When considering opportunities that are not time-limited by their own terms, good decision-making may require you to put some time limits on them. For instance, you may decide that you’ll accept a demanding position for a year but no longer or that you’ll try a new networking group for 6 months and then reevaluate. The key is to determine the length of time that an option is great, or at what point it may slide back to just being good.

Zealously guard your decisions.
Once you’ve identified good versus great, and especially once you’ve begun to act in conformity with that decision, do whatever you must to put boundaries around your decision. You will have an opportunity to revisit your decision; while reevaluation is often worthwhile, be sure not to fall into the trap of accepting good when you’ve identified great.

When you decide to pass up good for great, you accept quality over quantity; you develop a high degree of selectivity about what you allow into your life and how you choose to spend your time and energy; and you refuse to settle for less than what’s best for you. It takes practice to give up something that’s good, especially when great isn’t immediately in front of you. Practice with small decisions (if you’re tired, is good vegging out in front of the TV, or is it getting extra sleep?) so that you’re well-trained when the big ones present themselves. Spend some time deciding on what your guiding principles are. Finally, think about other areas of your life or your practice where you might pass up good for great. If this skill seems conpletely foreign to you, consider requesting support, whether it’s from colleagues or from a coach. Difficult though it is, the skill will serve you well.

Julie Fleming Brown provides professional and personal coaching for lawyers on topics such as client and professional development, job searches, career transitions, and work/life balance. She is also certified to provide the DISC® assessment. Please visit http://www.LifeAtTheBar.com/ for more information and to arrange a complimentary coaching exploration session.

Stu's Views by Stu Rees

©Stu Rees. All rights reserved.

Like this cartoon? Send it to friends, clients or colleagues on greeting cards. To order, visit The Billable Hour Card Store. )

Networking is Notworking for Me by Sean Carter

As a self-described "legal marketing guru," I recently decided to practice what I preach and attend a networking event after giving a speech in Atlanta. As a general matter, I avoid mixers and cocktail receptions as if they were one of my wife’s family reunions. Now, I must confess that my dislike of these events largely stems from the fact that I am the world’s worst networker.

Despite the fact that I am a dynamic, insightful, witty, enthralling and unbelievably humble public speaker, I am a terrible conversationalist. For one, I am slowly beginning to learn that, in a conversation, the other person might actually like to speak from time to time. Even worse, this "chatterbox" might actually want to talk about something other than me. And while his involvement in the conversation makes for a more enjoyable experience for him, I always find myself quickly losing interest (and sometimes, even consciousness) throughout the entire ordeal.

Even worse, during those few occasions when I actually engage in a bilateral conversation, it’s always with someone who has absolutely no need for my services. Nor can I do anything for them. As a result, for networking purposes, our conversation is about as pointless as the mid-term elections. That being said, I was actually looking forward to this particular function because it was a wine tasting event. After all, I like wine as much as the next person and I was sure I would enjoy these particular wines because that they all possessed the one quality I look for most in a wine—they were free.

Our sommelier for the evening was a gentleman named "Rick" who, like all sommeliers, had an unusual fascination with rotten grapes. His eyes lit up as he explained in awe-inspiring detail the process by which each wine was produced. "This chardonnay comes from a small winery in the south of France exactly 22.8 kilometers southeast of Nice. The grape is pulled from the vine with the left hand at a 45º angle and stored in an oak barrel for precisely 366 days, 22 hours and 16 minutes."

Even more fascinating was the sommelier’s love for each vintage. As he introduced each new wine, I couldn’t help but to think that I have lifelong friends that I can’t describe with such love and affection. "My friends, it is my distinct pleasure to introduce you to this particular pinot noir. It’s a spunky little pinot from Napa, full of body and freshness. If you take a moment to enjoy the bouquet, you will notice a slightly musky odor that symbolizes the rugged and self-sufficient nature of this particular pinot."

After more than an hour of "enjoying" wine and trying to figure out how to take the sommelier on the road with me to give my introductions ("Your next speaker is from the South Central Valley of Los Angeles and is a amusing, yet playful humorist . . ."), I must confess that I was starting to feel slightly tipsy. Who am I kidding here? I was more smashed than a car driven by Lindsey Lohan.

Here is where my networking excursion turned into a shipwreck. Now, in my defense, it wasn’t all my fault. I was simply trying to be a good conversationalist. After all, up until that point, Rick had done all of the talking. I decided to make the conversation more "bilateral."

Me: "Hey, Somalian! I have a question."

Rick: "It’s suhm-uhl-yey! And what’s your question . . . I’m sorry I didn’t get your name?"

Me: "Oh, I’m Sean, pronounced ‘see-ann.’ My question concerns this bottle of caberet I’ve almost finished. Would it go better with a Big Mac or a Filet-o-Fish?"

Rick: "Well, assuming that a Big Mac actually contains beef, the ca-ber-ney would go better with that. Do you have any more questions, Sean?"

Me: "Just one . . . can someone drop me off at the nearest McDonald’s on their way home?"

Sean Carter, Humorist at Law, is a syndicated columnist and popular speaker who presents Comedic Legal Education programs for law firms, in-house legal departments and bar associations across the country. Sean is also the author of If It Does Not Fit, Must You Acquit? Your Humorous Guide to the Law.

More Great New Products Coming Soon!TM Greeting Cards

Here at The Billable Hour^® Company, we have big plans for the new year. This month, we'll be introducing a Lawyers in Love greeting card line, featuring Lady J, the symbol of LawyersinLove.com, an internet matchmaking service just for lawyers and other legal professionals. Keep your eyes peeled for more additions to our Poetic Justice line, featuring haiku and senryu by David Giacalone, lawyer/poet and author of f/k/a, recipient of the Blawg Review 2005 Creative Law Blog Award. And we have another (top secret, for now) greeting card line in the works.

We're expanding our product line as well. Though we can't share the details yet, we can tell you that we're adding whole new categories of gifts to our offerings. So keep an eye out for issues of The Advance Sheet, featuring special offers just for our customers and subscribers.

Juris Comic

End of (Sales) Days by Robert Pladek

December was one of those months where so much went on, you’d be hard-pressed to find a group not represented.

We had Forefather’s Day, Solstice, Boxing Day, Drunk and Drugged Prevention Month, Hand Washing Awareness Week, Spain Becomes a Democracy Day, and the grandaddy American holiday of them all, the anniversary of the founding of NASCAR. But all these truly remarkable and socially responsible celebrations were subsumed in the acrimonious debate over use of the word "Christmas,”" the debate becoming a tradition itself in the season of peace, joy and feigned tolerance.

A left jab at major department stores for using the offensive language was met with a right cross against the denuding of same. Last year we had a boiling pot of positions: Sears, Kmart and Kohl’s not using "Merry Christmas" in their advertising. All the other major department stores saying they would. Wal-Mart didn’t. Costco didn’t. Ditto for Target.

This year, Wal-Mart removed even the word "Holiday" from its website, though its left navigation bar lists the following under "What’s New":

Christmas
Hanukkah
Kwanzaa
Elmo T.M.X.

So Elmo is now a recognized religion. Though only if you are a true T.M.X. believer.

(Meanwhile, folks at Montgomery Ward just want to go on record saying they still exist, and beg you to check out wards.com for their post-whatever specials.)

For retailers, bless their bountiful wallets, the question is pure Americana: Do they drive away fewer people using "Merry Christmas" or "Happy Holidays"? The "Have a Happy Holiday" hopefuls are betting their play of the non-religious card won’t put off Christian pursuit of 2-fer sales and will attract those lefties who appreciate a good religious cleansing. The "we love Christmas" sellers hope to attract folks who love Christmas, as well as the even leftier left intellectuals who find the Xmas/Not debate silly and beneath them. Both groups are pretty confident that most of us barely intellectual quasi-religious semi-practicing believers of both Darwin and Reasonably Intelligent Design don’t care, so long as PS3s were still available Dec. 24, the lines not too long, the parking lots not too crowded, and other people’s children not too loud.

We’ve yet to see judicial intervention in the Battle for Mall Traffic, but I think an argument can be fashioned: companies utilizing officious tax incentives should abide by whatever legal strictures the tax-incenting authority chooses to impose. To wit:

"You in the Urban Enterprise Zones: You’ve got 48 hours to remove your Clauses."

And so, yet another holiday tradition gets updated:

"Is there really a Santa Claus?" Virginia asks. "Yes, honey," replies mom. "Just not where we shop."

Bob Pladek is Special Sections Editor for New Jersey Lawyer. This article is reprinted with their permission, which wasn’t overly begrudgingly given. Bob’s views, thankfully, are entirely his own. You can reach him at Robert.pladek@njlnews.com.

Book of the Month: Beyond the Bottom Line: The Search for Dignity at Work

Although Beyond the Bottom Line isn't focused specifically on law firms, its analysis nevertheless illuminates much of the malaise in the legal industry. From the book’s inside flap:

Why, at a time of unprecedented national prosperity, do so many Americans feel that their live are less than they could be? Any why do so many Americans—working harder and longer and with less security than ever before—question the price of success demanded by today’s hot-wired economy?

Can you work and still have a life?

The answer, Paula Rayman says, is yes. In this timely book, she offers a powerful blueprint for transforming the world of work—and for dealing with the disconnect between work, family, and community that’s the downside of our relentlessly competitive culture.

Speaking to everyone who feels both overworked and underemployed, Rayman reminds us of the reality behind the facade of the global economy—from deepening wage gaps to 60-hour work weeks, from chronic job insecurity to inadequate health care. People at the margins still don’t share in America’s enormous wealth. Middle-class workers live frantic lives, running faster and faster just to keep in place. At the same time, increasing numbers of men and women feel that caring for a family is more important than money, power, or prestige.

In this much-needed wake-up call to corporate America, Rayman shows why companies must go beyond the bottom line to survive and thrive. Drawing on her experience as a leading advocate for a more responsive workplace, she demonstrates how companies can organize for profit, productivity, and the desire of workers for a more rewarding quality of life.

In a win-win agenda for changing outmoded organizations, she demonstrates convincingly that all successful transformations share the same commitment: creating workplaces that respect the need for security, self-respect, and the time and freedom to care for family and community. In other words, dignity. It is the search for dignity, Rayman shows, that drives employees to reorganize their workplaces and their lives.

This book is filled with stories of hope. Rayman reports on the way firms in two benchmark industries —biotechnology and banking—try to meet demands for dignity in the workplace. She gives many examples of courageous change, from airline pilots organizing to fight mandatory overtime to the portable health and insurance plans that can protect the millions of Americans who don’t work full time. We can—and must—go beyond the bottom line, Paula Rayman says, to create a new world of work where security, self-respect, and social responsibility are not seen as costs but accepted for what they are: essential elements of success.

Daily Toon Click to enlarge
Lawyer Cartoonsby Andertoons

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