Over the past few months, I have seen a number of tweets in my Twitter feed that link to articles that discuss law firm reporting. Invariably, the articles discuss what financial reports the firm should be looking at.
As an example, Frank Strong of LexisNexis, whose Business of Law Blog is one of the best legal blogs around, recently posted 5 Essential Practice Management Reports for Small Law Firms. Of the 5 reports listed, they are all billing reports. This represents a tendency that I have seen with attorneys and law firms who only look at the financial reports to evaluate how their business is doing. When you come across an article about law firm reporting, it is almost always about the finances … how many hours did I bill, what was my realization rate, what is our AR, etc. In a recent post on the Time Matters forum hosted by my good friend and Elder Law Attorney extraordinaire, Robert Fleming, a poster said, “I use only the standard financial reports – Aged A/R and Detailed WIP. But I would like to do more.”
