Justin Paul Caulfield. Remember this name.
Rarely does anyone come up with something truly innovative in the practice of law. Paul Caulfield has done just that. I had a drink with Paul yesterday, and he explained to me his concept. Not only am I impressed with his ideas, but I am persuaded that he’s right.
The idea of a lawyer without an office was an impossibility. We needed our big desk, our library fully of books and our ego wall with all our certificates to prove our worthiness. We needed a big office to impress our clients and adversaries alike. It was de rigor, and its absence bespoke a struggling lawyer. But times change.
Paul Caulfield has found a niche that fills a huge gap in the availability of legal services, while simultaneously enhancing the quality of life for attorneys. How so? By eliminating the concept of law office, and replacing it with the alternative concept of house counsel on an as-needed basis.
This new idea offers two major benefits: First, businesses and individuals who neither need nor can afford full-time house counsel (meaning, a lawyer who can provide general legal services and who has an in-depth understanding of the business, the individual and their needs) can now have complete access to real legal services without the burdens that would otherwise force them to forgo legal advice unless the situation absolutely demanded it. Think about how often a business could use a lawyer, but neglects to consult one because of cost, inside-knowledge and availability.
Second, by eliminating the overhead associated with a typical law office, the lawyer can charge substantially less without sacrificing his net income. The client saves. The lawyer earns. There’s nothing wrong with that. Moreover, if one considers the expense needed to maintain the “Taj Mahal” that most medium to large law firms call home, this savings can be huge. Thus, the client saves and the lawyer earns more than he was earning before. There’s nothing wrong with that either.
But can a lawyer maintain his dignity with over-stuffed leather chairs and a big mahogany desk? Inquiring minds want to know. The reality is that these accouterments of our profession really aren’t absolutely necessary. As it turns out, clients are really more concerned with the quality of legal services than with the paneling in your office. With online research capabilities, cellphones, PDAs and the plethora of technological advancements that have changed the face of the law in the past decade, the concept of a law office may well be obsolete. But being lawyers, most of us just haven’t figured that out yet. We lawyers tend to get stuck in our ways.
Paul figured this out. More importantly, Paul did the unthinkable. He tried the concept, and found that there are many clients who are more than happy to trade off our fancy offices for their cost savings and access to a lawyer. It turned out to be a win-win.
So what about the quality of life issue? By unchaining the lawyer from the desk, Paul found that his time was now his own. No billable hours issue, nor time clock to punch. He can schedule around his family, meaning that he actually has a family life. How many of you can say that? Be honest. Nobody told you in law school that you would never be able to have dinner with your family again, now did they? This no longer has to be the case.
So some day, when you tell your grandchildren about the good old days when lawyers had their own offices, remember the name Justin Paul Caulfield. And remember that you heard it here first.
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Hey! I do the same thing!
I’m of counsel to a firm and operate out of a home office. Out of that same office I write law-related stuff, such as articles for the local legal newspaper and books and updates for Thomson/West–all of which I get paid for.
And I can stop what I’m doing and attend ballet recitals, pre-school events and the like in the middle of the day if I so choose.
Remember my name too;)
Ah, Nicole, if only it were the same. While working out of a home office bears some similarity, it misses the gist of what Paul Caulfield is doing by a wide mark. In fact, his operation has nothing to do with a home office at all. This is a fully conceived, sophisticated approach to legal services, where Paul represents numerous significant corporations in a general counsel capacity. It really is completely different.
But I will remember your name.
SHG
I disagree. My practice is equally sophisticated and well thought out. I have 3 online presences (4 if you count the soon-to-be-added profile at Fiandach’s web site), a dedicated business telephone line, and business email.
1.5 years ago, I was just finishing my hiatus from the law.
Now I’m of counsel to a thriving practice, have a regular column in a Dolan media newspaper, have well-traveled blogs, and am working nearly f/t, but on my own terms and my own schedule.
All this created from nothing.
I assure you, my plan was well thought out and sophisticated.
I simply work from a virtual office and perform some of the work for my clients from my home. I also have the option of working on site at the firm for which I work.
My clients are equally significant to your friend’s. My clients are individuals charged with DWI, Dolan Media, and Thomson West. Notice the two large corporations thrown in there….
It’s interesting that the concepts of “home office” receives such a stigma while “in house counsel on an as needed basis” is perceived so differently.
We do the same thing-perform services for clients on an “as needed basis.” We get compensated for those services and have minimal overhead and costs.
The big difference is that I have little client (ie. lay person) contact. Some might think that was a good thing.
For some reason, the “in house w/ no office” appraoch–nearly always performed by men–is considered “sophisticated” and cutting edge, while my approach appears to be viewed as a haphazard, fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants, second class citizen/attorney approach.
Needless to say, I respectfully disagree. And then some.
Scott,
Many thanks for the kind words. I appreciate the time you spent with me yesterday and hearing my thoughts on things. Plainly, you get it. As for Nicole’s comments, I think they are well taken but a little off the mark as they pertain to my practice’s current and future intentions. Without getting into it, I am not satisfied with what it is I, as one lawyer, provides for clients. It is why I founded the practice as a firm with an eye toward something more (much more) beyond my skill sets. That is where the difference lies, and I’d rather just leave it there for the time being. Scott, I think this might be where you and I agree that the model is/will be unique.
Very Best,
Paul
Hi Niki,
What Paul is doing really has nothing to do with a home office. There’s nothing wrong with working from a home office, but this is a very different concept, and since I have no desire to say anything to demean those attorneys who work from home, it’s really best to leave it at that. It is by no means intended to suggest that your practice is any less significant, but there is a huge difference.
SHG
Paul, Scott:
Any thoughts about how the model would work in a criminal practice or other practice focused on representing individuals rather than corporations?
Mark.
I am well aware of the concept of “virtual in-house counsel.” It’s been around for a while now and lots of lawyers are doing it. Just run a google search for that term and you’ll see what I’m talking about.
Many solos do the same thing with all sorts of types of practices, from criminal law to family law to real estate to employment law to business law.
Bottom line, the lawyers forgo a traditional office setting and meet with potential clients at the client’s office, at a room at a court house or at a coffee shop. Lawyers work from their laptop and utilize efax and other virtual online services, such as virtual receptionists or voice mail, in lieu of actually renting office space.
These lawyers–in particular, virtual in-house counsel–work on an as needed basis, sometimes for a flat fee, for their clients. The company calls them to research a business or employment issue or draft docs or come up with a plan of some sort depending at the need. The lawyer then performs that function and then waits to hear from the client again.
I do the same thing–billing nearly 30 hours per week, working nearly 40. I work of counsel to a firm and research legal issues for them and draft legal documents. I meet with other attorneys, and when needed, clients of the office, at the office. I also communicate with them via email and telephone quite frequently.
As another aspect of my practice, I spend a substantial amount of time writing about legal topics and issues, something I greatly enjoy. And, I have a number of ongoing and new projects in the works that will substantially further that aspect of my practice.
Offices are largely unnecessary in this digital age. Lawyers can do everything that they need to do from just about anywhere as long as they have a laptop and wifi.
Working from home or elsewhere is no different from working in office. I’ve done both. In civil and transactional practice, you sit at a desk, uncomfortable, dressed to the nines, rarely if ever interacting with anyone other than your secretary or lawyers in the firm. A few times per week you actually meet with clients.
90% of legal practice is done at a desk, even in criminal defense. The rest is pretty much spent standing around chatting in court until your case is called.
I do the exact same thing now, just from a different location and communicate with support staff via email or phone and clients via phone.
Finally, there is nothing to say that could demean those with home offices, since with the state of technology, a home office is no different than a “real” office. You just waste a hell of a lot of money on overhead with a “real office”.
A “lawyer without an office” does a lot of work from “home”, I can assure you. S/he just doesn’t call it a “home office.”
Tomato, tomahto.
Mark,
Since I learned about what Paul is doing, I’ve struggled to find a way to make it applicable to a criminal practice. Try as a might, I don’t see it. While there is potential to have a referral relationship for those ocassions when defense litigation is required, there can be some synergy. But nothing directly in criminal defense. This is also true for the related work I do, such as SOX compliance and crisis management.
SHG
What happened to Justin Paul Caulfield? He had a good concept and then he just disappered. I went to his previous webaddresses, but could find nothing. Is he still practicing. How can I reach him. I am a fellow attorney starting out and want to ask him about his concept of outside inhouse counsel.
Paul had a corporate client who was so beloved of his services that they made him an offer he couldn’t refuse. I can try to reach him and ask him to get in touch with you. Send me an email if you would like me to try.
Scott (Kerry) – I was testing research software on my name today and saw this response. Back in October ’07, I wondered if I had made the right decision abandoning my practice…not yet 2 years old. I’d like to say I was prescient, but while a softening to my practice had begun that summer (of ’07 subprime fame), I had no idea of what things were to come through ’08. To this day, I’m grateful having made the jump at that point. I had no burn rate, so I “ate what I killed”, is the oft used phrase. While I had increased revenue every quarter (save one…my own mistake taking too much time off when my 3rd child was born), I still had to plan for future risk. I’d like to think I would have survived the changes that came but not likely. The percentages in favor of start-ups failing within the first few years supports that I would not have made it. That the offer from my former client was a good one helped immensely. So, that’s where I am. (And I’m immensely happy.) Work during ’08 kept me offline quite a bit (I work at a bank). I have seen a number of people doing what I did. Despite some comments above – working out of the house just wasn’t it. I can’t tell you how much time I spent “servicing clients” – visiting them and commiserating over their particular issues. It was truly an “us” attitude with the face time behind it. When I worked, it was rarely from home. ABCNY, Hofstra Library, and my public library were my favorite spots. An encrypted flash drive and a blackberry were crucial. But, here was the main difference, I submitted RFPs rather than force the client into my own billing regime. Of the 20 or so clients I had, each had a tailored billing arrangement. The time I spent with them during initial discussions and during the RFP process was on my dime. No small investment of time. Their reaction to my acting like any other vendor was disbelief, in a good way. While the “typical lawyer” response was one of superior attitude, it was also refreshing to speak with more experienced and older attorneys who loved the idea.
(Scott – I hope all is well.)
This does sound like a refreshing concept, and I like the notion very much of actually passing on overhead savings to your clients (as opposed to the “value pricing” concept that cost and price should be unconnected so as to keep the price higher).
As for a criminal lawyer working out of a car, don’t forget Michael Connelly’s character Mickey Haller, in “The Lincoln Lawyer.”