Susan Guthrie的动态

The billable hour may not be dead (yet) but it is important to know as you start, or grow your legal/dispute resolution practice, that clients overwhelmingly prefer a flat-fee or value-based billing. In fact, the billable hour model has, I believe, greatly contributed to the negative perception of lawyers that in many ways permeates our society. Has anyone been called a shark before or heard the complaints that we are over-priced and under-performing? There's a reason why most lawyer jokes are focused on how ridiculously expensive they are. But wait you say, it's not fair to lawyers to work on any other model since we don't know at the outset of a case just how much work will be involved. While that may be true to an extent, we also need to acknowledge the fact that at least some of what we will do on a case is fairly pre-determined. We will have a certain number of meetings with the client, draft pleadings and do customary discovery. Should we at a minimum work off of a modified flat fee basis? Set a reasonable flat fee for the pre-determined work we will do, and either build in an additional amount to cover an estimated hourly for the remainder of the matter, or bill hourly beyond the flat fee? Those are just two ways to be more mindful and accommodating of the client's preferences, a mainstay of good marketing, while also continuing to protect the value of our time. Food for thought . . . (share yours in the comments) Tune in for next week's The Make Money Mediating Podcast when I will dive deeper into this topic and share more insights and tips on how you can harness the value of a more predictive fee model to increase your client base! #mediation #law #practicebuilding #practicedevelopment #makemoneymediating #podcast #susanguthrie #fees #flatfees #billablehours