Business Lawyers Network (worldwide)

[To download slides, see attachment below.]

Business Lawyers Network - Lexington **Signup**
Topic: "How to Package Legal Services"
Speakers: John L. Koenig, Esq. & Roger P. Glovsky, Esq.
Place: 9 Meriam Street, Suite 21, Lexington, MA (Directions)

The legal profession is rapidly changing. Clients are demanding fixed fees, faster response, and more transparency. Law firms are competing with online services and off-shore “outsourcing.” Lawyers know that the industry is changing, but the question is: changing into what? The answer could be a new model for law firms called “iLaw 2.0”. The iLaw 2.0 model is based upon “packaging” legal services, leveraging technology, and collaborating with an extended network of lawyers. John Koenig and Roger Glovsky will discuss what “packaging” legal services means and how iLaw 2.0 model can streamline the marketing and delivery of legal services. This will be an interactive discussion and other lawyers are encouraged to share their thoughts on new business models for the legal profession. Roger is in Boulder, Colorado and will appear virtually via Skype (sorry, no autographs!).

Friday 12/4/09 at 1:00 PM, internet radio program will feature this story. How can you improve your relationship with your manager? How can you get credit for your work? And what if you are the manager of someone with different expertise than you? Go to website talkshoe and search Confidence Coach or click:

www.talkshoe.com/talkshoe/web/talkCast.jsp?masterId=63116&cmd=tc

If you can't join live, the program will be recorded and available later.

We just posted Part 3 of the series on winding down a business. Although the concept of winding down a business is a pessimistic proposition, it is often a necessary action. This week's blog provides a good checklist of information for approaching the wind down process. You can find it at: http://www.askthevc.com/blog/archives/2009/11/preparing-to-wi.php.

For earlier posts:

Part 1: How to Wind Down Your Company

Business Lawyers Network - Waltham **Signup**
Topic: "How to Take Risk Out of Practicing Law"
Speaker: Gary W. Patterson, The FiscalDoctor
Place: Café at 890 Winter Street, Waltham, MA (Directions)

As many of you know, I recently moved to Boulder, Colorado, which has a very strong entrepreneurial community. Some people have compared Boulder to a "young Silicon Valley." Like Boston and SF, the venture capitalists play a leading role in encouraging entrepreneurship.

Business Lawyers Network - Boston **Signup**
Topic#1: "Drafting Tips from a Collection Lawyer" by John Postl, Esq.
Topic#2: "Trademarks, Corporate Names & Domain Names" by Lucy Lovrien, Esq.
Place: Ten Winthrop Square, Boston, MA (Directions)

I am pleased to share with you my article on how I use LinkedIn to build and enhance business realtionships. I hope you will find it interesting.

When you read the article, see if you can guess the 10 movie quotes. They just might test your knowledge (and to be fair, I've included the answers at the end).

This article is available at our website at the link below.

Thank you to my colleagues Lawrence J. Sheh, Esq. and Richard S. Creem, Esq. for their feedback and editing assistance.

GizmoFish is inviting all BLN members to a free Lunch and Learn September 29.

In the time it takes to enjoy a complimentary, catered meal, you'll learn:

• How backup and recovery technology has come a long way since the old days of tape backup and even solutions like Symantec Backup Exec

• How new, affordable technology does a full backup every 15 minutes instead of once every 24 hours - so you won't lose a whole day's worth of work

• How 'server virtualization' makes it possible to launch a spare server within 40 minutes of a crash

This law firm specializes in labor/employment, personal injury, and domestic relations litigation. It is also starting to expand into lower-level criminal cases. It has little competition in its area and boasts 80% return business each year. The owner’s cash flow has been consistently high for 5 years. It, and a predecessor firm, have occupied the office for over 30 years.

Even if you are not looking for a practice to buy, you may know of someone who is. Please forward this information to them.

Marc Gudema, CBI
marc@mbabusinessbrokers.com
BayState Business Brokers

Here is a recent case that might be of interest to you or someone you know.

A U.S. District Court judge recently held an officer and partner in a startup company personally liable under the MA Wage Act for payment of deferred and unpaid wages to his partner, even though the wages were expressly contingent on the company achieving profitability before it was to be paid (and in fact, profitability was never achieved).

Business Lawyers Network - Boston **Signup**
Topic: "Increasing Billable Hours with Better Time Management"
Speaker: Sue Weiss, Founder of Bottom Line Results
Hosted by: LexisNexis, 10 Milk Street, 7th Floor, Boston (Directions)

If anyone on BLN has experience working with barter/exchange companies, I would like to chat with you. I can be reached at 781-676-1900 x2.

Business Lawyers Network - Boston **Signup**
Topic: "How small firms can benefit from hiring even in a down economy"
Speakers: Wendy Duffey of The McCormick Group
Hosted by: Birnbaum & Godkin, 280 Summer Street, Boston, MA (Directions)

Business Lawyers Network - Wellesley **Signup**
Topic: "Web 2.0 for Lawyers"
Speakers: Victoria Merriman of Digital Loom, Inc. and Erik Heels of Clock Tower Law Group
Hosted by: Baystate Financial Services
Place: 55 William Street, Wellesley, MA (Directions)

Business Lawyers Network - Wellesley **Signup**
Event: BLN Social Hour
Topic: "New Ways to Think About Business Transactions"
Hosted by: Baystate Financial Services
Place: 60 William Street, Suite 350, Wellesley, MA (Directions)

A BLN member would like to start accepting credit cards as payment for legal services and asked whether I could recommend a merchant processing vendor. Our firm does not accept credit cards, but this is a topic that seems to be coming up more often. I thought other BLN member may be able to make some recommendations, which I can post on the LEXpertise website.

Do any of you accept credit cards for professional services? Are there vendors you would recommend?

[RPG: Excellent list of responses. Be sure to read James Bolan's comment and the article on ethics issues relating to gredit card payments]

Business Lawyers Network - Lexington **Signup**
Event: BLN Social Hour
Theme: Networking for Referrals
Hosted by:: Indigo Venture Law Offices
Place: 9 Meriam Street, Suite 21, Lexington, MA (Directions)

Business Lawyers Network - Newton **Signup**
Topic: "Proper Handling & Disposal of Client Files"
Speaker: James S. Bolan of Brecher, Wyner, Simons, Fox & Bolan, LLP
Place: Plates, 1 Wells Avenue, Newton, MA (Directions)

Does anyone know of any good patent brokers, particularly any who are willing to work for a seller (patent owner) on a pure contingency (success) fee basis? I am looking for such a service to assist clients who have obtained patents, or who have patent applications pending, but who have either been unable to commercialize the invention or who have run out of funds to pursue their patent or application. Such people often have created valuable technology, if only they could find a buyer or licensee.

Business Lawyers Network - Boston **Signup**
Topic: "Internet Marketing for Lawyers"
Speaker: Matt Rosenthal, Internet Marketing Specialist at Lexis-Nexis
Place: LEXIS-NEXIS, 10 Milk Street, Boston, MA (Directions)

MCLE recently upgraded its website and started a newsletter, called MCLE ThisWeek™, that features free forms and articles on CLE topics. You can register for the newsletter at the MCLE website.

For business lawyers, this week's newsletter featured a free download of the Registration and Reporting Requirements of the Federal Securities Laws from the Corporate Practice Series: MCLE BasicsPlus! I assume this link is only good for a week. So, download it now!

I am investigating providing an online portal for my clients. My dream portal would enable me to:

- send drafts of documents to clients for review, without a size limit to the documents; receive notification of when client has downloaded documents (I currently use Pipeline Exchange (www.pipelinexi.com) for this);

- receive feedback from clients on drafts;

- send documents to clients for signature; obtain electronic signatures on those documents;

Business Lawyers Network - Boston **Signup**
Topic: "Effective Networking for Lawyers"
Speaker: Diane Darling, Founder of Effective Networking, Inc.
Place: LEXIS-NEXIS, 10 Milk Street, Boston, MA

We just updated the website and added a new feature:

Groups
You can now join one of our groups or create your own! This new groups feature makes it easy to send email to all group members and organize information related to group activities. Forums, weblinks and events can be tagged to show only in your groups or shared with the public. You can even add an RSS feed for your group's latest news. Go to http://lexpertise.net/og to check it out!

Business Lawyers Network - Boston **Signup**
Topic: "Generating New Business in a Down Economy"
Speaker: Jim Hassett, Founder of LegalBizDev
Place: Citizens Bank, 53 State Street, 8th Floor, Boston, MA (Directions)

Event: BLN Social Hour
Theme: Best Websites for Lawyers
Host: Indigo Venture Law Offices
Place: 9 Meriam Street, Suite 21, Lexington, MA 02420 (Directions)

Attached is an updated copy of the Choice of Entity Chart.

Feel free to post comments or rate this content by clicking on the "Add review" button at the top of this page.

Note: Use of the chart is licensed under Creative Commons License, Attribution Share-Alike 3.0.

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Event: "Internet Marketing for Lawyers"
Speaker: Howard I. Goldstein
Date: April 22, 2005 (Friday)
Time: 7:30am
Place: Rebecca's Café, 55 William Street, Wellesley Office Park

Event: "Rainmaking without Selling"
Speaker: Stewart Hirsch, Esq.
Date: March 18, 2005 (Friday)
Time: 7:30am
Place: Rebecca's Café, 55 William Street, Wellesley Office Park

Topic: "Ten Technologies That Lawyers Should Know"
Speaker: Donald Davis
Date: January 26, 2005 (Wednesday)
Time: 7:30am
Place: Rebecca's Café, 55 William Street, Wellesley Office Park