I want to tell you about a friend of mine. She is one of my dearest friends. The kind of friend you do life with. Our kids are close, our husbands are close, we even vacation together. But…she and I are VERY different (in a good way). She is “go with the flow,” and I work best with a checklist and a paper calendar. She lives to “just wing it,” and I need a detailed itinerary. Needless to say, we never have a dull moment. Recently, she said she wanted to get in shape, so she bought a treadmill. She set a goal to walk every day. A month or so went by, and while we were doing life together, I failed to check up on her and how she was liking the treadmill. I was at her house when I got the chance to see the new machine, but I didn’t recognize it because it had become something else entirely. Nestled in the corner of her master bedroom was a new treadmill that had been transformed into a perfectly useful clothes rack for her and her husband’s hang-up laundry! I couldn’t help but laugh hysterically, and my friend did, too.
So, what does this have to do with running a law firm, Sarah?
Well…how often do we have the tools, know the good they will do for us, and STILL not use them as they are intended? I think there is a deeper meaning in my friend’s situation we can dig into: Having the right tool doesn’t matter at all if you don’t use it the way it was designed to be used.
Let’s take a minute to list out all the tools your law firm may be using! I’m sure there are way more than listed here, but I’ll start with a few.
Just like having a bunch of tools in your toolbox doesn’t make you a carpenter, tools sitting in your office don’t automatically make you a standout law firm. You may have every tool in the shed, but HAVING them and USING them are two very different things.
Remember: The tool itself doesn’t create change. PEOPLE using the tool intentionally create change.
My friend had the treadmill, right? She even had good intentions to use it. But in the end, she didn’t put her feet on the moving belt. So, number one…you need to use the tool to see change! Now, my friend could argue she WAS using the tool...she was using it as a nice clothes rack. Number two…the tool will serve you best when you use it as it was intended!
As a firm leader or owner, can you answer this question honestly?
At Vista, we, too, often see firms using expensive tools as proverbial clothes racks. Here are some common examples:
Your Case Management System: You’ve paid a pretty penny to implement this new software. Are you using the functionality available to you? Or have you created spreadsheets and workarounds because “that’s how we’ve always done it”? Sometimes the issue isn’t the software. Sometimes we are simply not using the software we already have to its full potential.
Your Dashboard (even your Vista one): Are you looking at it and making decisions based on the information it presents? Or do you pull up the dashboard once a month simply because you know you’re supposed to?
Here’s something to note: If you are not using your Case Management System correctly, as it was intended, I’d be willing to bet the dashboard isn’t accurate either. And if your data isn’t accurate, you could be making decisions based on bad information. That’s a much bigger problem than not looking at the dashboard at all.
Your SOPs: Someone on your team put time and effort into creating your Standard Operating Procedures. But why? Did they just create them to check a box, or are they actually being used, trained, updated, and followed? An SOP sitting in a folder cannot make any improvements at all.
Your Vista Firm Assessment and/or Personality Assessments: Did you use Vista to assess your firm and identify areas for improvement? Did you have your entire team take the DiSC, Kolbe, or Berke personality assessment? That’s fantastic! But the assessment itself isn’t going to improve your firm or your team. Understanding the information and doing something with it might, though. Maybe it helps you change a process for better efficiency. Maybe it helps you understand how a team member communicates. Maybe it changes the whole way you hire, manage, and lead. The value isn’t necessarily in having the assessment done or taking a personality test. The value is in what you DO with what you learn from them.
Not every tool in your arsenal is software, a new program, or the latest AI thing to hit the market that is supposed to make your job easier. Sometimes (I'd argue quite often) your greatest tools are people.
You hired a CFO. That's a big deal. But are you actually letting them do their job? Are they in the room when the big financial decisions are being made, offering real insight and strategic guidance? Or are they tucked away in a cubicle, heads down, simply crunching numbers and processing invoices? Because if it's the latter, you're paying CFO money for bookkeeper work, and that's not a great return on your investment.
You created a leadership team. That's great — truly. But here's the real question: Are they actually empowered to lead and make decisions? Or does every call, every approval, every minor judgment call still find its way back to your desk? If you're the bottleneck for every decision, you don't really have a leadership team...you have a group of highly paid people waiting on you.
You hired a consultant. (Maybe it's Vista. If so, good call.) Are you genuinely willing to listen to what they have to say? Not just nod along in the meeting and then go back to doing things the way you've always done them, but actually consider their advice, sit with it, and be open to making real changes? A consultant is only as valuable as your willingness to act on what they bring to the table.
You promoted a team member into a managerial role. Did you also provide leadership training? Are they fully prepared to transition from highly skilled technician to effective manager, with the communication, delegation, and accountability skills the role demands? Without deliberate development, newly promoted managers often get stuck doing the work they used to do rather than leading the people now responsible for it.
This brings me to what may be the most important tool in your arsenal, the one that might not be getting any action at all.
You can have all the tools in the world, but if you are unwilling to regularly evaluate and analyze their effectiveness and change course when needed, you'll never realize the full value of your investment.
Here’s the thing: Coachability doesn’t mean agreeing with everything you’re told. It means being willing to listen, consider, ask questions, and determine what you can learn. My friend didn’t get defensive once we finished laughing about her using her new treadmill as a clothes rack. She knew, after I called it to her attention, that the tool she bought to help her get in shape wasn’t being used the way it was intended. Did it sting a little to admit it? Maybe. But her goal was to get into shape, not become a professional clothing hanger!
There is a distinct difference between having the tool and leveraging the tool. Are you leveraging the tools you have invested in?
It’s tempting to believe the next shiny new tool will solve challenges at your law firm. A fresh tech platform, another app, or the latest system promises solutions that feel just out of reach. But before you add another tool to your collection, it’s worth pausing and taking stock. Are you truly using the tools you already have to their fullest potential? Often, the smarter and more cost-effective move is to evaluate what’s already at your disposal, identify gaps, and then determine whether a new investment is genuinely needed, or if the solution lies in rethinking your current approach.
So, before you jump the gun and add yet another tool to your arsenal, ask yourself:
Because let’s be honest. Buying another tool is easy. Using it well is where we have to DO the work.
At Vista, we spend a lot of time talking with plaintiff firms about strategy, people, processes, data, best practices, technology, and growth. One thing we see repeatedly is that firms don’t always need another solution. Sometimes, they need help getting more out of the solutions they already have. We love to help firms identify what IS working, what ISN’T working, what is missing, and where meaningful improvements can be made. Your firm most likely doesn’t need a bigger toolbox. You might just need to practice using what’s already inside it.
If you take one thing away from this blog, let it be this: The software. The data. The processes. The people. The feedback. USE THEM!
And remember, the willingness to listen when these tools tell you something you don’t want to hear might be the MOST important tool in your box. Let the tools you’ve invested in help you IMPROVE.
Your firm can't reach its goals by simply having the right tools. You must USE them. Because when you use the tools AS THEY WERE INTENDED, you might discover those are the sharpest ones in the shed!
