The worst days are the ones where you run around like a madman, going from one meeting to another with no breaks. Although it may look nice on your calendar to have no “empty spaces” in between events, buffers can help make life a lot less stressful.

Client meetings

I am guilty of trying to schedule back-back-back client meetings in the morning just to make sure my afternoon is empty. Great in theory, bad in reality. Sometimes clients are late, or meetings take longer than expected, which overlaps into the next meeting. There is nothing fun about feeling rushed or behind all day. Scheduling 30 minute buffers in between meetings has done wonders for my productivity.

Returning from vacation

Scheduling a meeting the morning you return from a prolonged absence is not fun. Your mind is probably not back in work mode and likely focused on your undoubtedly overflowing inbox. Blocking off the morning or even first full day you are back will allow you catch up and put things in order so you do not feel overwhelmed.

The beginning and of the week

Blocking off early Monday morning and late Friday afternoon to prepare for the upcoming week is a great idea. Friday afternoons are perfect for winding down and eliminating little tasks. Monday mornings are great for revving up and creating a task list for the upcoming week.

(photo: Joe Lanman)

Buffers in Your Schedule Make Life Easier is a post from: Lawyerist

Gmail is my preferred email interface for lawyering, and I also use Google Apps to maximize my productivity. Although my Gmail account has never been hacked, here are some tips to keep your accounts secure, and if they do get hacked, what you need to restore security.

If you are using Gmail as your business account, take the extra 2 minutes and create a password that is more complicated than usual. Elementary advice, but still a precaution worth taking.

If your account does get hacked, having the following information is extremely helpful to regain access and control of your account:

1. Month/year you created the Google account.
2. If you were invited to Gmail by invite, the email address of the person who invited you.
3. Your top 5 most frequently contacted email addresses.
4. Names of custom labels in your Gmail account.
5. The dates of when you started using other Google services.

It might seem like a pain to keep track of this, but if you are using Google services with client information, the faster you can regain control of your account, the better.

Lessons Learned from a Hacked Google Account | Lifehacker

(photo: jasoneppink)

Protect Your Google Accounts is a post from: Lawyerist

Use the power and ease of the internet to let your clients book appointments with you online.

Setster places a tab on your web site that lets client book consultations online—no phone call needed. You can also set up Setster to accept Paypal payments. The service also integrates with both Quickbooks and Freshbooks to keep your books up to date. Setster is free for an individual user accepting less than 10 appointments per month. If you have more than ten, the cost is $9.95 per month.

Visually, the service looks fairly nice. It adds a tab on the left side of your site “Appointments,” and a window pops up if a user clicks on the tab. You can preview what it would look like on your site by visiting Setster’s home page.

Our office allows clients to book appointments using Google calendar and pay through paypal and it works fairly well. Some clients, however, have difficulty using the interface. Setster does appear to be a bit more user-friendly than Google calendar.

I also talk to clients who only want to make appointments over the phone—do not think using an online calendar will eliminate the need to answer the phone. At the same time, integrating an online appointment book/calendar can make life easier for both you and your clients.

Add Hassle-free Appointment Booking to Your Site With Setster | Web Worker Daily

Book Client Appointments Online is a post from: Lawyerist

Google Calendar is very user-friendly, and very good at helping you manage your days. If you already use another calendar, consider switching over. If you do not already use a calendar—start using GCal immediately—it is that good.

5 Reasons Why GCal Rocks

1. You can invite people to events or allow them to view your entire calendar with the click of a button. You can also easily make certain events private.
2. It syncs easily with most popular smartphones.
3. Even if GCal is not on your phone, you can tell it to send you SMS reminders of events.
4. The quick add feature lets you add events as easy as “lunch with Randall Ryder at noon on September 23, 2009.” GCal will interpret your language and add it to the right day and time.
5. It is free.

HOW TO: Stay Organized With Google Calendar | Mashable

Google Calendar Rocks is a post from: Lawyerist

I first talked about the software and tools I use to manage my own practice last April. I have changed a few things since then, so here is an update.

As most readers know, I do not use case management software. This is partly because most case management software is pretty awful, and partly because I like being able to use the best tool for each need. That way, I can change one tool without changing everything. If I were using a typical, monolithic case management solution, I would be stuck, or I would have to change the way I manage my whole office.

So here are the tools I am using now.

• Calendar: Google Calendar/Google Apps. Google Calendar is a fantastic tool, and I use Google Sync to keep my online calendar in sync with my Blackberry. You can sync up Google Calendar with Outlook, Evolution, and Sunbird/Lightning, as well. I also use Google Calendar to embed a free/busy calendar in my website to make scheduling easy.
• Tasks/to-dos: Remember the Milk, paper and pen. Nothing new, here. RTM syncs with my Blackberry, and they keyboard shortcuts allow me to input scheduling order sfast. For a “big picture” view of all my cases, I use my  work planning template. It just works better than anything else, and gives me room to scribble notes and to-dos, as well as a daily list of most-important tasks.
• Contacts: Gmail/Google Apps. Gmail’s contacts manager has gotten much better, and Google Sync now allows me to sync contacts with my Blackberry. With the calendar and RTM syncing, I never need to plug my Blackberry into a computer. Plus, with Google Apps, I can share my contacts with anyone on my Google Apps account, so that we work together to build a comprehensive database.
• E-mail: Gmail/Google Apps. Gmail is just better, and once again, Google has a great Blackberry application so I can get my mail on my phone.
• Word processing / document creation: OpenOffice.org. Still using OOo because it is still better than Microsoft Office.
• PDF creation: OpenOffice.org, Ubuntu Linux, and Acrobat 7.0 Standard. Many documents are as simple as hitting the “convert to PDF” button in OOo. To print websites and things, I use the built-in PDF printer in Ubuntu Linux. For PDF document editing and assembly, however, Acrobat is indispensible.
• Timekeeping & billing: Freshbooks. I used to use spreadsheets for timekeeping and billing, but after trying the free version of Freshbooks, I switched. Freshbooks is a simple, powerful, and elegant timekeeping and billing solution. It beats anything else I have seen or tried by a mile.
• Bookkeeping / accounting: GnuCash. Still using GnuCash, which lets me handle the books like a bookkeeper so that I can see what is happening. Since switching, I have not had a single transactional error for my accountant to correct. I can’t say that for Billing Matters Plus.
• Backup: Dropbox, rsync, and external hard drives. I just went over my backup strategy in detail, but I replaced Unison with Dropbox shortly after that post. You can read more about why I love Dropbox in yesterday’s post.

As you can see, I rely heavily on the cloud. A lot of lawyers are still nervous about doing this. I am not. Most of those “cloud” apps now sync locally using Gears, software developed by Google to allow software like Gmail and Remember the Milk to store their data locally so you can use them even if you are not connected to the internet.

As for security, most cloud-based apps are more secure than most lawyers’ offices or computers. In fact, because cloud-based apps generally use stronger encryption and more-frequent backup than even I do, I think my data is probably more safe online.

Most importantly, with everything in the cloud, I have access to my entire office no matter where I am, and no matter what computer I am using.

I would love to hear what you are using to manage your solo law practice. Here is a template you can copy into the comments box:

• Calendar:
• Tasks/to-dos:
• Contacts:
• E-mail:
• Word processing / document creation:
• PDF creation:
• Timekeeping & billing:
• Bookkeeping / accounting:
• Backup:

What I Use to Manage My Practice [Updated] is a post from: Lawyerist

As I was waiting for my calendar to load on my Treo this morning to check my availability for an appointment, I had a moment of longing for the paper planner I used to use. No waiting for my Treo to crash, reboot, and connect. No tedious flipping through screens. Just open to the right page, check availability, and scribble a note.

On the other hand, it is awfully hard to back up paper, which is why I will not go back. And if you don’t have the paper calendar with you, you cannot use it. I am famous for leaving things lying around, so I need to be able to pick up where I left off with as little downtime as possible. And I love being able to access my calendar from any computer or phone anywhere in the world. Makes the waiting worthwhile, in the end.

Sometimes I long for paper (but not for long) is a post from: Lawyerist

Here comes something I have been wanting for a long time: an easy way to sync my Outlook Calendar with Google Calendar so that I can share my schedule with my wife. Oh, and co-counsel, I suppose.

Since I am always changing from one program to another, it also makes it easier to track my calendar through other applications like Thunderbird, Evolution, Rainlender, etc. Now if only all those programs played nice with iCalendar .ics files. (They all import and/or read them; only some will write to them properly.)

Find out more and download the Google Calendar Sync tool from Google.

Google Calendar sync for Outlook just released is a post from: Lawyerist

One of the biggest pains about managing a law practice is scheduling meeting, conferences, and other get-togethers with clients, opposing parties and attorneys, etc., all of whom have crowded calendars. TimeBridge goes a long way toward simplifying the process of setting meetings.

Here’s how it works: pick a few possible meeting times, and enter the e-mail addresses of the attendees (or their staff). They send it back with their availability, and TimeBridge either confirms the meeting time or asks for more possible times.

It also has a plug-in for Outlook and Google Calendar so you can use it without leaving the comfort of your PIM.

[via Lifehacker]

TimeBridge simplifies scheduling meetings is a post from: Lawyerist