Eighteen years ago, on October 1, 1996, REM’s “Monster” tour rolled into Hartford’s Meadows Music theater. Opening for REM that evening was a far lesser known band called Radiohead. On that warm early fall evening, I bought my first concert shirt. The shirt was a drawing of a bear in the woods with a question mark over its head. Below the picture was the following quote:
I had nothing to offer anybody except my own confusion. – Jack Kerouac
If I still had the shirt, I’d wear it to UConn Law School on Wednesday night. I’m serving on a panel of three lawyers for UConn’s Business of Law class. I’ll be discussing building a law practice and offering about 30 students my own confusion.
I’m extremely fortunate to have the clients that I have. Law is about community and people. Focusing a practice on representing individuals and small businesses presents a lawyer with an extraordinary opportunity to connect, improve, and grow relationships with clients.
The process of growing and building a practice is just that. It’s a process. Really it is many processes. At it’s core, building a practice is about letting people know what you do and doing great work for clients.
I hope that sharing my various struggles with the confusion that can come with building a practice can help someone else land clients as good as mine and enjoy the adventure that is small firm practice.