In Part Two of this series, we examine your document scanning “workflow”.

A workflow consists of a sequence of connected steps. (Wikipedia)

And when you’re going paperless, you need to embrace a systemized approach to storing your documents. A scanner can’t do it alone.

In Part One of this series, we examined scanning in a document using ScanSnap Manager’s Profiles. Let’s say we set up our profile, and scanned all of our documents, which are now tucked away with automatically generated names into our “staging area” folder called “Awaiting Filing” in an easy to work with location, such as the Desktop.

Quick Look on Mac OS X Snow Leopard is the key ingredient here, because it quickly allows you to see your file without opening it in an application. Using Quick Look, your arrow keys, and your Enter key, you’ll be able to fly through your scanned files, rename them, and file them to your liking.

(Windows users, I’m not sure what to recommend, but a quick search turned up something called maComfort which emulates the Quick Look functionality).

Steps:

1) Open your “staging area” folder – in our example “Awaiting Filing” on the Desktop.

2) Enable Quick Look by clicking on the eye icon.

3) Use the arrow keys to move between documents, and hit Enter when you’re on a document to trigger the rename function.

NOTE:  Consistent naming convention are a must. My files are named “year-month-day description”, i.e. “2010-03-08 Bank Statement.” For words I type over and over again, like “receipt”, “statement”, or “invoice”, I use TypeIt4Me to speed up the process and eliminate errors.

4) Once you’ve named all your files, open up two Finder windows. Keep the “Awaiting Filing” window on the left and a working window on the right. Drag your renamed scanned files one by one into their target destination.

You’re done!

Have other paperless workflow techniques? Post ‘em as comments. We’d love to hear them.

This allows a head of steam to be built up in the morning, a la the “don’t check your email in the morning” philosophy.

And I would bet money that this attorney is not going to get into a car wreck responding to his or her mobile device while driving.

Thank you for your email. In an effort increase efficiency and effectiveness, I am now checking my email two times per day, at 11 am and 4 pm. If your situation is urgent, and cannot wait until 11 or 4, please call my office at xxx-xxx-xxxx and we will attempt to assist you. Thank you for your cooperation and I look forward to assisting you.

We’ve worked with a number of PMA’s for feedback on our software so we can best serve the needs of law firms. They are bar-none (no pun intended) the most knowledgeable people when it comes to suggestions and ethics of running a small law firm. Their services are a phone call away, and are usually free of charge.

What is a Practice Management Advisor? From the ABA’s Law Practice Management Section:

These bar programs, generically known as “practice management assistance programs” (PMAPs), are now at over 20 state bars and law societies in the U.S. and Canada. The programs are staffed by individuals known as Practice Management Advisors (PMAs) who are engaged or employed by state and local bar associations or law societies to help lawyers to manage their practices more effectively. Although the exact role of practice management advisors differs from state to state and province to province, all the advisors are committed to the process of increasing the quality of legal services by helping lawyers and law firms better manage their offices.

Most PMAPs share these common objectives:

* Assisting lawyers in improving efficiency and effectiveness in the delivery of legal services;
* Assisting lawyers in implementing systems and controls to reduce risk and improve quality in the delivery of legal services;
* Assisting lawyers in client relations; and
* Assisting lawyers and their office personnel in using emerging technologies to improve the delivery of legal services.

For more information and a list of PMA’s, click here.

If you’re not a user and devotee already, invest in one of the Fujitsu ScanSnap series of document scanners. I can vouch for ‘em myself.

A Fujitsu ScanSnap is like Paris: when people talk about it, you can’t imagine it living up to the hype. But when it’s your turn to take a look, all expectations are completely surpassed.

Here’s a tip for those using a ScanSnap: stop using the Quick Menu. That’s for noobs (techie for newbies). Use Profiles instead.

In ScanSnap land, a Profile is just a named group of settings. Nothing to be frightened of. Profiles allow you to scan a document and have it saved and named automatically in a location of your choosing.

This facilitates an efficient workflow which will allow you to scan and file a big stack of documents in no time at all. We’ll look at Profiles in Part 1 and the workflow in Part 2.

The following instructions are for the Mac: (any Windows user who would like to add their own instructions in comments or as a guest post lemme know).

1) Turn off Quick Menu by right-clicking the ScanSnap icon in the Dock, and unchecking “Use Quick Menu”.

2) Launch the ScanSnap Settings window by right-clicking the ScanSnap icon in the Dock, and selecting “Settings…”.

3) Add a new profile by clicking on the “Select a Profile” drop down, and choose “Add Profile…” Choose a good name, like “Legal Docs”. You can create different profiles for different needs.

4) You’ll see a bunch of tabs, from Application on the left to Compression on the right. For the purposes of scanning typical office documents, here’s my suggestions.

5) Under the Application tab, select Preview. The reason for this choice is that Preview loads quickly and is a lightweight app, unlike Adobe Reader.

6) Under the Save tab, choose a folder to dump the new file to. I like to put them into a folder called “Awaiting Filing” on the desktop. Think of this folder as a “staging area”. Once you scan your docs in, you will process them (in Part 2 of this series).

7) Next, click on the Scanning tab. For “Image quality”, select “Best (Slow)”. For “Color mode”, select “Auto Color Detection”. For Scanning side, select “Duplex Scan(Double Sided)”.

Once you get comfortable creating and working with Profiles, you can create different ones for different purposes, i.e. scanning in color photographs or your kid’s artwork.

We’re very excited that our legal cloud offering is catching on, that the industry and consumers embrace our elegant design philosophy, and happy to see Software as a Service making headway into the legal software field.

We received our award in the mail and put it on display – with a little inspirational music:

Right before our eyes a major transformation is occurring within the legal profession. I believe 2010 will emerge as a year that we will look back upon as a tipping point. A year where lawyers left behind the traditional confines of their office walls—no longer tethered by phone cords, computer cords, or real estate leases–to practice where and when it suits their needs and the needs of their clients. 2010 will be the year that being small, mobile, and almost expense-free went mainstream.

Several trends are intersecting to drive this major transformation. They include the rapid innovation of mobile technology, the changing perceptions of consumers, economic trends that are squeezing the bottom line for many law firms, and the rise of solo and small law firms started by big firm refugees. Let me identify and discuss how these trends are coming together to change the practice of law in fundamentals ways, and whether the Apple iPad is the tipping point in this change.

Amazing work Reid, thanks for your insights! Click here to read the full copy.

* Monday, March 1st
* 3pm-4pm, ET
* 218-895-0646
* code 2227#

Barbara pioneered a number of “firsts” in this webinar:  first time we put one of the attendees on the line to join the discussion, first time one of the hosts is doing a follow-up call, and first time we’ve gotten homework!

Click Here to download your homework and the Barbara Nelson Rocket Matter Webinar Materials

Click here to download a blank Rocket Matter Week Calendar for scribbling.

Some of the many Time Management Tips from Attendees:

* I use technology to change my work environment. If I feel like I’m stuck in a rut, I’ll leave the ofice to work. Forward phones & grab my laptop. Working in the park is very productive.

* Twitter + Facebook ought to be rewards (not habit) for many.

* Tip for perfectionists: time block things & deem them done at end of block.

* Hemingway always had a starting point for the next day’s writing.

* Plan time to think.

* I leave Monday mornings open for calls, emails, reviewing weekend’s mail.

* Google calendar up on the desktop whenever I am at my desk=crucial.

* The frog tastes better in the morning than late in the day (i.e. do the thing you don’t want to do EARLY & get it out of the way).

* Wear a kamikaze headband to signal “don’t bother me now.” Extreme time blocking (may not work at the courthouse).

* You can print out your computer calendar, and it’s more easily revised & accessed on the road.

* Scheduling call-backs for status may be a good way of training clients/family (if family cooperates).

* Train clients to ask quick questions by email, which makes answering easier/less urgent/less intrusive.

* “Don’t Open Email in the Morning” book worth checking out.

* Make something you don’t want to do but have to do fun: Put on some good music, have a glass of wine, etc. Change the association from negative to positive.

* End-of-day and Friday time management effectiveness review after blocking time on my calendar has been the best way to get started. This will help in limiting time-wasting activities – as Barbara said, without the judgment.

* As a solo with a home office, I try to work outside my office at a coffee shop or other “third place” at least once a week for a couple of hours. Changing up the location from time to time = more productivity.

I couldn’t believe it.  I wasn’t able to install Apple’s mammoth iPad SDK on my two-year old MacBook Pro because I was out of hard drive space.  Luckily, some genius named “eriban” wrote a donation-only program called GrandPerspective.

GrandPerspective employs a heat map, an amazing visual tool I first experienced in the financial industry to show volume, market cap, industry, and movement of stocks in a market.  Eriban applies it to the files and folders on your hard drive to identify what’s taking up the most space.

For example, here’s a scan of my hard disk:

The larger the rectangle, the larger the file.  As you can see, I have some mammoth stuff going on.  The entire left side of the heat map, representing over 50% of my drive space, is taken up by VMWare Fusion Virtual Machines.

Using this heatmap, I was quickly able to identify the files and folders that were hogging my disk space and eliminate them.  For one of the virtual machines, I disposed of old snapshots I didn’t need any more.  Some of the other large boxes were large downloads or applications I haven’t touched in months.  ¡Adios!

In one hour, I freed up over 60 GB of space on my hard drive.  Thanks so much, Grand Perspective.

• This webinar is sponsored by Rocket Matter and is free to attend.
• We’ll be raffling off a $50 certificate to Best Buy!
• We’ll also give away free copies of Barbara’s book, Market You Must … for Lawyers.
• Date: Thursday, February 25th, 2010
• Time: 12PM – 1:15PM EST
• Space is limited! Click here to reserve your Webinar seat.
• Check out Rocket Matter’s new YouTube channel and see highlights from LegalTech NY and other excellent adventures.

Description:
Rocket Matter is proud to host a free webinar on Time Blocking – the best way to make sure you do what you need to do, in order to have time for what you want to do.

Getting more done in less time is the focus of this interactive seminar. Join lawyer’s coach, Barbara Nelson, to learn how to manage yourself and take control of your time. You’ll learn the technique of time blocking, which clients call “the single best technique” for improving productivity. Bring your own challenges and questions to the call, and be ready to commit to changing the way you work so that 2010 will be your best year ever!

About Barbara Nelson:

Barbara, famous for her Successfully Solo blog and consulting, provides expert business coaching to a select group of solo and small-firm attorneys who are ready to take their practices to the next level. She brings over fifteen years of solid business experience to her practice, working in large global firms as well as in a small consulting partnership that experienced many of the same issues her clients face.

Barbara holds an MBA from the University of Chicago, has completed over four years of formal training in business coaching, is certified to coach practice management processes, and is a member of the International Coaching Federation.

Barbara started specializing in the business of law firm practice management after working with two attorney clients. They were not only overwhelmed and underpaid–they were smart, motivated, interesting and fast. Barbara’s style is direct, to the point, and somewhat irreverent- a good match for her attorney clients.

Please join us by clicking here!

Amber Singleton Riviere writes in Web Worker Daily about the importance of padding your schedule and other aspects of your life with buffers:

It might seem efficient to have back-to-back appointments with small buffers to compensate for meetings running over and time to get to the next one, but what about the time needed to process what happened in the meeting? In every appointment I have, whether with a client about a project, a partner about a strategic alliance about collaborations we’re getting underway, or a guest about the radio show, there’s usually some sort of follow-up that needs to be done after the meeting. Wouldn’t it be more effective to do that while it’s still fresh on my mind?

This is a phenomenal tool for anyone to have in their belt. I like the push-back from the constant particle accelerator of multi-tasking, push emails, tweets, and the 24-7 nonstop information deluge.

Read the full article here on putting buffers around appointments, weekend, projects, workdays, and more.