Skip to main content
School of Law

Time Management for Lawyers

7 March 2015

Time: 10:00am - 1:30pm
Venue: Room 1.2, CCLS, Queen Mary University of London, 67-69 Lincoln's Inn Fields, London WC2A 3JB

Good time management is an essential skill for the successful lawyer.  Lawyers who are organised and manage their time well are likely to find information more quickly, think more clearly, work more productively, utilise their legal skills more effectively, and make a better impression on clients and colleagues than lawyers who are disorganised or demonstrate other poor time management habits.

Good organisation and time management skills are not only crucial elements of a successful and satisfying legal career, but are also critical skills lawyers need to meet important ethical obligations to their clients.  A lawyer's duty to exercise good time management skills in professional matters is mandated by the American Bar Association's Model Rules of Professional Conduct, which have been adopted by many state bars.  Specifically, Rule 1.3 on Diligence states "A lawyer shall act with reasonable diligence and promptness in representing a client." Comment [2] to this Rule provides, "A lawyer’s work load must be controlled so that each matter can be handled competently."  This comment implicitly requires a lawyer to exercise competent time management skills such as monitoring the status of multiple projects, defining and prioritising a project's sub-tasks, tracking and meeting deadlines, and estimating the time required for the adequate completion of all the various components of the lawyer's workload.  Comment [3] to this rule warns lawyers to avoid procrastination as "A client’s interests often can be adversely affected by the passage of time or the change in conditions; in extreme instances, as when a lawyer overlooks a statute of limitations, the client’s legal position may be destroyed…."  And Rule 1.4 on Communication requires that "A lawyer shall keep a client informed about the status of a matter" and "promptly comply with reasonable requests for information…."

This session is organised so that on completion participants will be able to:

  • Understand the ethical and practical time management issues faced by lawyers on a day to day basis
  • Recognise the importance of having long and short term objectives
  • Identify and address their own time management issues
  • Employ good time management practices using tools and ideas introduced in the workshop

Participating students will receive a Certificate of Attendance.

This workshop is led by Dr Tracy Bussoli and Dr Pippa Heath.

How to Book

This workshop is open to CCLS postgraduate students only.

Attendance is free of charge but prior registration is required via Eventbrite.

Contact

For more information, please contact the CCLS Events Team on ccls-events@qmul.ac.uk.


Photography, video and audio recording

Please note that CCLS events may be photographed or video and audio recorded. These materials will be used for internal and external promotional purposes only by Queen Mary University of London. If you object to appearing in the photographs, please let our photographer know on the day. Alternatively you can email the CCLS Events Team on ccls-events@qmul.ac.uk in advance of the event that you are attending.

Back to top