A Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Mr. Paul Usoro, has listed diligent record keeping, a befitting office space, good relationship with clients as well as quality service as part of the areas lawyers must focus on to be able to attract good briefs and make good earnings in their practice.
Usoro spoke at the 2018 conference of the Nigerian Bar Association Section on Legal Practice, according to a statement made available to our correspondent.
The conference, which held in Port Harcourt, was with the theme, “Re-thinking and retooling legal practice for the challenges of our time.”
Speaking specifically on the theme, “Problems impeding our fee-earning capabilities as legal practitioners,” Usoro said law firms must never play down on their fees, noting that without good income the perennial problem of poor remuneration of young lawyers would never be solved.
“The quality of your work determines what you earn and it will help to put you at the top level of your earnings. You need to aim to be at the top level of your practice and that will determine the fees you command,” Usoro said.
Speaking on the importance of record keeping, he added, “If you do not keep records, it will be very difficult to put a cost to your work. One of the challenges in litigation is the timing it takes to complete it. When negotiating, it is good to have a safety valve that will enable your ability to renegotiate if the time exceeds what you had expected.”
According to Usoro, the appearance of a lawyer’s office says a lot about his worth.
“If your office appears tattered, the client is likely to price you the way you appear. So, appearance is very key in our practice. In a scenario where a client enters your office and it looks well kept, it automatically determines your fees,” he said.
Tags:
Newssplashy Tips