How I Finally Took a Real Vacation From My Law Firm

As a law firm owner, it can be really hard to take a REAL vacation.

Since starting my law firm in 2019, I took my first 2 weeks out of office this year. Here's what that looked like for me as a law firm owner. First - I'm sharing this because many of us in the legal industry struggle with work/life balance and adequately unplugging from work. Many of the lawyers and law firm owners I coach struggle with this as well, and one of my coaching clients recently left litigation. She is much happier now but works for the courts. For those of us that still want to litigate or work in some capacity as litigation adjacent, going out of office takes a fair bit of preparation. But it can be done! In the past, I would take a few days off here and there. Since I was traveling to Scotland and London this time, I wanted to take more time off. I was nervous about being out of office for 2 weeks leading up to my trip. However, what surprised me is that once I was gone for a couple of days, work stress faded into the background. I was confident that my team had things covered. I did a few things to prepare for this longer trip: 1) I notified my clients ahead of time of my out of office period, and asked them to send me things they needed ahead of time. 2) I didn't put my return date on my email out of office responder. I just stated I was "out of office" and gave an alternative point of contact. I plan to keep doing this in the future, that way clients aren't expecting a response from me right when I get back. 3) In the weeks leading up to my vacation, I ensured that I had another attorney on client calls and emails. That way, when the client reached out, the other attorney could keep the case running while I was out.

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