LA W FIRM OF THE MONTH FLANAGAN & BESTFROM THE Publisher As I pen this Publisher Note, we are in a period, with remote work plans implemented all about. Many physical facilities are closed or providing limited “in facility” or “drive- thru” services. The U.S. Supreme Court has postponed arguments for late March and early April and Minnesota Chief Justice Lorie S. Gildea recently issued a statewide order for all Minnesota courts establishing temporary procedures for district court case processing. Just a couple months ago, in the first 2020 issue of Attorney at Law Magazine, Minnesota State Bar President Thomas Nelson re- minded us that hindsight is 20/20, and he recalled the worries we had surrounding Y2K. And the legislative priorities laid out by our state leadership have now moved to the side as the government acts to minimize the effects of COVID-19. Hopefully we will soon look back on these days, contented that our collective BEST prevailed. Though we can point to instances of panic and less than stellar human behavior, we also see numerous acts of kindness, leader- ship, and caring for one another. Once again, our legal community is leading the charge – taking action and driving positive change. Hopefully in publishing another issue of Attorney at Law Maga- zine we can help deliver some sense of normalcy, and further legal community engagement, as we remain “socially distanced.” This issue of Attorney at Law Magazine features the Best & Fla- nagan law firm – a firm founded on relationships that sees purpose in being tied to the community. Also contained, League of Women Voters Minnesota Executive Director recalls the story of the rati- fication of the 19th Amendment 100 years ago. Joan Bibelhausen continues our ongoing discussion on lawyer well-being with Men- tal Health month approaching, and the work Legal Aid is doing to protect students from lunch-shaming is presented. In this issue we also launch a Hamilton-themed new series written by local attor- ney, Jeff Storms, providing insights on starting and maintaining a successful small firm. We’re interested in presenting future stories about great legal community leadership and actions you witness during these chal- lenging days. Please contact me with stories of practitioners’ com- mitment to serving the community. Thanks, David Seawell PUBLISHER 763-742-2805 DSEAWELL@ATTORNEYATLAWMAGAZINE.COM Attorney at Law Magazine is published by: Target Market Media Publications Inc. David Seawell PRESIDENT & CEO INSIGHT MEDIA, INC. EXECUTIVE PUBLISHER ATTORNEY AT LAW MAGAZINE Howard LaGraffe VICE PRESIDENT Caitlin Keniston EDITOR Susan Cushing Veronica Jauregui ASSISTANT EDITORS Jaqueline Dávila GRAPHIC DESIGN Z. Peter Sawicki James L. Young CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Joan Bibelhausen Leykn Schmatz Jeff Storms Elanie Spector Jeff Storms Michelle Witte CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Eclipse Productions PHOTOGRAPHY Copyright ©2020, Target Market Media all rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or part is strictly prohibited. Advertising rates on request. Bulk third class (standard) mail. Although every precaution is taken to ensure accuracy of published materials, Attorney at Law Magazine & Target Market Media cannot be held responsible for opinions expressed or facts supplied by authors. Corporate Office : 5828 North 7th Street, Suite 200 Phoenix, AZ 85014 Phone (480) 219-9716 www.tmmpublications.com • info@tmmpublications.com TARGET MARKET MEDIA TARGETMARKETMEDIA Northern Alabama | Atlanta | Chicago | Dallas | Ft. Lauderdale Jacksonville | Los Angeles | Miami | Minnesota North Carolina Triangle | Ohio | Philadelphia | Phoenix | San Antonio Salt Lake City | Middle Tennessee | Washington D.C. ATTORNEY AT LAW MAGAZINE · MINNESOTA · V OL. 9 NO. 4 4TABLE OF Contents GEOTECHNICAL CONSTRUCTION MATERIALS ENVIRONMENTAL BUILDING TECHNOLOGY PETROGRAPHY/CHEMISTRY www.amengtest.com 800.972.6364 12 6 5 Tips for Attorneys Working From Home During The COVID-19 Crisis By Elaine Spector 8 On Your Own What’s Your Name, Man? By Jeff Storms 9 Build a Powerful Network for Your Law Firm Using Linkedin By Dimple Dang 10 Copyright is Automatic! By Z. Peter Sawicki and James L. Young 12 Best & Flanagan Law Firm of the Month 16 Votes for Women – 100 Years Later By Michelle Witte 18 Mental Health Month: Help is Available By Joan Bibelhausen 19 Legal Aid Protects Students from Lunch- Shaming By Leykn Schmatz SPECIAL SECTIONS 20 Talk of the Town AttorneyAtLawMagazine.com 55 Tips for Attorneys Working from Home During the COVID-19 Crisis BY ELAINE SPECTOR In a matter of days, COVID-19 has completely changed how we operate our day to day lives. For lawyers who have worked full-time in the office, the change to being fully remote may be challenging. I especially empathize with lawyers with small children, who are trying to adapt to a work from home arrangement, as well as care for their young children. I can imagine that it is not easy. I can say for the first time that I am thankful that my kids are teenagers. (Did I just say I was happy to have teenagers?!?) These are desperate times. With that being said, here are a few pointers that I hope will help you transition to a fully remote position, albeit, temporarily! No. 1: Designate your space for working only. Whether you have kids, are married, are single, whatever it may be, I recommend finding a place in your house/apartment/condo, if you have the space, that is designated as your office. When I first started working from home, I isolated myself in the basement. In fact, on my first day working remotely in my home, my husband saw me packing a bag of food, and he asked me incredulously “Where are you going?” “To my office, thank you.” It is important that you have a separate space as your office, so that you are not distracted by the domestic duties of the home. If a designated space is not possible, designate set work hours and stick to a schedule. If you have a family, designate a set work schedule and childcare schedule between you and your significant other. If you have kids and no significant other, you will have to be more creative. Remember, this arrangement is only temporary, and we will soon get back to normal. No. 2: Set boundaries. When I started working from home, my kids were 10, 12, and 14. It was in the summer, and my 12-year-old kept peeking in and wanting to tell me the latest, greatest thing. After the fifth interruption, I reminded him that I was at work and really to treat it like I was not at home when my door was shut. It was a beautiful summer day, and I had my window open for fresh air. My son went outside and dragged a chair by the window to talk to me. Failure! But a few days later, my son was used to the fact that I was home, and it was no longer novel. Eventually, with consistent reinforcement, my boundaries were respected and I was able to work uninterrupted. No. 3: Get dressed. By sticking to your normal morning routine, it will feel more like a regular workday. Shower, get dressed, have your coffee, and sit at a desk or table rather than the couch. This will help you maintain the mindset that you are at work, even though you are at home, and will aid your ability to focus on work-related tasks. No. 4: Connect with your colleagues via video conference. I can’t reiterate how important connecting with your colleagues via video is, especially during this time. At our firm, more than half of our employees work from home. When we need to speak to someone, we video call rather than calling on the phone. What a difference video makes. You will still feel connected with your colleagues despite the distance. If you are accustomed to an office setting, scheduling a daily or weekly call with your team or having a video lunch meeting will ATTORNEY AT LAW MAGAZINE · MINNESOTA · V OL. 9 NO. 4 6help things run smoothly, keep everyone on the same page, and make you feel less remote. I would encourage every company and law firm to have a video conferencing capability either through Teams, Zoom, Skype, whatever platform works for you. No. 5: Read and implement “Fair Play,” by Eve Rodsky. I can’t say enough about this book. Essentially, this book lays out some 100 household and childrearing tasks we do. The author, who is a lawyer and mediator, lays out a foundation on how to divide up tasks between partners. Typically, women will bear the brunt of the domestic tasks, and often, will ask their partners to execute a task without proper context. Rodsky lays out a simple strategy. First, eliminate the tasks that don’t apply to you and your family. Second, divide up tasks, so the person who is responsible for the task is in charge of conception, planning, and execution of the task, or as Rodsky coins “CPEing” a task. Every week, you and your partner can meet to redistribute the cards if one person feels overwhelmed or is not suited for that particular task. My husband and I implemented this book a few weeks ago. He is still responsible for the morning routine (including breakfast), and he also took the laundry and dishes. He is very grateful to be absolved of cooking dinner, handling the finances, and grocery shopping. Please do read the entire book. There are a few important steps that need to be considered before you divide up the tasks; once you do, balancing family and home life with working remotely will become much less daunting. These tips have been vital in acclimating to my work from home lifestyle. I hope they help you adjust to remote work and I wish everyone the best as they set up their new offices. I pray that you and your families stay safe and healthy during this uncertain time. This too shall pass. ELAINE SPECTOR IS A PARTNER AT HARRITY & HARRITY, LLP, A BOUTIQUE FIRM SPECIALIZ- ING IN INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY LAW. HER PRACTICE FOCUSES PRIMARILY ON THE PROS- ECUTION OF PATENT APPLICATIONS, SPECIFICALLY WITHIN ELECTROMECHANICAL TECH- NOLOGIES. AttorneyAtLawMagazine.com 7Hamilton premiered weeks before I left my former law firm and started (then-named) Newmark Storms Law Office with Eric Newmark. Hamilton miraculously speaks to almost everyone, which underscores its brilliance. I personally connected to it based upon where I was in my own life’s journey, particularly as to my moti- vation for starting my own practice. So, I listened to Hamilton, again, and again, and… With this column, I intend to borrow from Hamilton to help structure my thoughts and musings about the last five years of starting and maintaining my small firm practice. Hamilton often focuses on the concept of “name” in the context of both reputation and legacy. I’m going to focus on the former, as it pertains to my motivation for starting my own practice and its initial execution. We lawyers take our names seriously. Like movie stars, we jockey for our name’s position, whether it’s up the signature block or further left of the door. We cut four-name-firms down to one for modern brand- ing. Other firms avoid surnames in pursuit of egalitarianism. Some senior lawyers insist on signing their names on complaints or briefs despite minimal case involvement. See, e.g., Bruiser Stone directing to Rudy Baker in The Rainmaker: “I want you to draw up a lawsuit against this Great Benefit, and you put my name on it.” While younger lawyers begrudge that aspect, older lawyers know how hard it was to get there. Lawyers leave law firms for countless reasons. Starting my own firm was very much about “name” and what I perceived it meant for long- term success. Every lawyer’s path and goals are different, but I viewed having my name on the door as a prerequisite to obtaining more cli- ents and getting better results for them over the course of my career. I wanted more people to know my name. I wanted there to be no inter- nal or external doubt about where credit was due for my successes and was ready to stand independently accountable for my failures. People knowing your name = clients = feeding your family. In that regard, whom we link our names to in a new enterprise is critical. Joining an established criminal defense attorney was a no-brainer for me. Aside from the financial stability that a criminal practice brings to contingency fee work, successful criminal defense attorneys have a roster of hundreds of clients. That differs greatly from my prior experi- ence of working on a handful of larger cases. Those are real people who know their lawyer’s name, and who are often their first call, no matter the problem. If executed correctly, those are hundreds of people to share your name with. JEFF STORMS IS A PARTNER AT NEWMARK STORMS DWORAK LLC. HE HAS A DIVERSE LITIGATION PRACTICE WITH AN EM- PHASIS ON PLAINTIFF’S CIVIL RIGHTS AND SEXUAL ABUSE LITIGATION. JEFF IS A PERENNIAL SUPER LAWYER AND HAS TWICE BEEN NAMED AN “ATTORNEY OF THE YEAR” BY MIN- NESOTA LAWYER. On Your Own What’s Your Name, Man? BY JEFF STORMS “We lawyers take our names seriously. Like movie stars, we jockey for our name’s position, whether it’s up the signature block or further left of the door.” ATTORNEY AT LAW MAGAZINE · MINNESOTA · V OL. 9 NO. 4 8Beware: LinkedIn does have re- strictions on the amount of LinkedIn requests you can send within a short time period. If you really want LinkedIn to work for your law firm, it is important to also engage with your audience on LinkedIn. You can boost your engage- ment by: • Commenting on other people’s content or articles that they’ve been posted on LinkedIn. • Joining specific industry-related groups, posting your own content in articles there, and providing valuable advice and feedback to other members of the group. Furthermore, you can search for LinkedIn hashtags that will allow you to find articles and content that are relevant to your industry. If you find an article that you like, you can com- ment on it, like it or share it with your network. Start or Join a Group There are many legal industry groups on LinkedIn. You can choose to join local groups in your area or even join nationwide groups for the benefit of forming relationships with other attorneys nationwide that may lead to referrals or future partner- ships. Make sure you spend some time every week to work on your LinkedIn marketing and connections, and you will start seeing the benefits of build- ing a powerful network. DIMPLE DANG IS A LEGAL MARKETING SPECIALIST AND CONSULTANT WITH MORE THAN 15 YEARS OF EXPERIENCE IN THE LEGAL INDUSTRY. TO CONNECT WITH DIMPLE, EMAIL HER DIRECTLY AT DIM- PLE@DIGITALMEDIADIVA.COM OR SEND HER A MESSAGE ON LINKEDIN. You have probably heard the popu- lar saying “Your network equals your net worth.” This is quite ac- curate. To grow your business network, whether you are a solo practitioner or a large law firm, LinkedIn is one of the most powerful social media plat- forms. The key to building a powerful net- work on LinkedIn is to be strategic and selective about who you add into your network. You may not be aware of this, but LinkedIn allows you to up- date your settings in order to control who can connect with you directly on LinkedIn. You can update your settings on LinkedIn by going to the communi- cation tab and then click on Settings. You will then see an option for con- nection requests and you will have three options to pick from: • Everyone on LinkedIn (which is LinkedIn’s recommended sugges- tion). • Only people who know your email address or appear in your “import- ed contacts” list. • Only people who appear in your “imported contacts” list. Another interesting feature that LinkedIn has is that it allows you to grow your followers instead of your connections if you choose to do so. This option allows you to grow your number of followers without adding additional connections. You can make this change by going to your profile to the privacy setting and then scrolling down to where it says Blocking and Hiding, and select the make follow primary option and enable that button to Yes. Identify Specific People If you are part of a Chamber of Commerce or any other local net- working groups, you may want to search for people in your groups on LinkedIn and connect with them. You can do this by typing their name in the search box and requesting to con- nect with them. It is best to send ev- eryone a personalized message when requesting a connection. Not every- one is going to remember where they met you, so it is nice to send a per- sonal note. The Find Nearby Option Another great feature that you may not be aware of is the “find nearby op- tion.” If you are at a legal conference workshop or networking event, you can also turn on the LinkedIn Find Nearby option on your mobile device and it will enable you to see which LinkedIn users are within 100 feet of you. In order for this feature to work you must enable Bluetooth on your phone first. The one downside of this feature is that it does not allow you to send a personalized message. Therefore, I recommend taking a screenshot and sending a personalized invitation when you have access to your desktop. The Suggested Connections Option As you add new people to your net- work, LinkedIn will also suggest oth- er members that you may know. You have two ways to connect with these connections you can hit the Connect button, but the downside is that you will not be able to send a personal- ized message. The other option is you can click on their profile and request a connection to the other personal page, which will allow you to send a customized message. Build a Powerful Network for Your Law Firm Using Linkedin BY DIMPLE DANG AttorneyAtLawMagazine.com 9Next >