What I use to manage my practice

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 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:

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Sam Glover is a Minneapolis Lawyer and Technology Expert.  He can be found at The Laywerist.