Solo lawyers make up about 21% of Colorado’s lawyer population.
Law Week partnered with executive business counselor Gene Commander for the State of the Solo survey, focusing on demographics, community work, how solos measure success, what they see for their future and more. Responses were collected from 146 respondents.
Demographics
In Law Week’s solo survey, 14.38% of respondents were 70 years old and older, 25.34% were 60-69 years old, 22.60% were 50-59 years old, 25.34% were 40-49 years old and 12.33% were 30-39 years old.
No solo survey respondents said they were 29 or younger, compared to 6% of law firm respondents in the State of the Law Firm survey last year.
“Demographically, the survey had very few respondents who were in their 20s and 30s,” Commander wrote via email to Law Week. “Compare to page 46 of the Office of Attorney Regulation Counsel 2022 annual report, which shows that about 6% of respondents in the Office’s demographic survey were 29 or younger and about 23% were in their 30s. This appears to show that lawyers tend to gain experience in larger firms or other settings before opening up their own practice.”
The largest number of respondents in the solo survey have been a solo practitioner for 7-10 years at 26.71%, with a similarly large share of 24.66% at 11-20 years. Other experience levels range from three years or fewer (15.75%) to 4-6 years (14.38%), 21-30 years (10.96%), 31-40 years (4.79%) and 41 years or more (2.74%).
Men made up 47.95% of solo respondents and women made up 49.32%, while 2.05% preferred not to identify and 0.68% identified as nonbinary.
In the solo survey, 88.97% of respondents identified as white, 4.83% identified as Hispanic or Latino, 4.14% identified as other and 2.76% identified as Native American or indigenous. Those who identified as Black or African American, Asian or Asian American and preferred not to identify represented 2% and lower.
For sexual orientation, the majority of respondents at 79.72% identified as heterosexual, while 12.59% preferred not to identify. Those identifying as gay and lesbian made up 2.80% and other made up 4.90%. When asked if they are a member of any Colorado diversity bar associations, like the Colorado Women’s Bar Association or the Colorado Hispanic Bar Association, 79.17% responded no, while only 20.83% said they were.
While 93.75% of the respondents reported they were members of the Colorado Bar Association, 6.25% were not. And while 71.72% of the respondents said they were members of the Colorado Bar Association Solo Small Firm Practice Section, 28.28% were not.
In Law Week’s solo v. firms research, transactional real estate solo attorney Barb Heikoff pointed to the impact of CBA dues on solo lawyers. Others can opt for an education pass through the CBA, according to Heikoff. Also, some solos belong to the American Bar Association because it offers free CLEs.
Community Work
Pro bono work remains a high priority for solos. Among survey respondents, 16.44% spent 50 or more hours on pro bono work in the past 12 months, 28.77% spent 10-50 hours and 31.51% spent up to 10 hours, while 23.29% performed no pro bono work.
Regarding community service not related to bar association service in the past 12 months, 39.73% of respondents said they spent no hours, while 26.03% spent up to 10 hours, 21.23% spent 10-50 hours and 13.01% spent 50 or more hours.
Success
When it comes to success of solo practices, the solo survey respondents ranked several factors in terms of importance to their success, including client satisfaction, work/life balance, overall profits and repeat business.
The top factor was client satisfaction, which 75.17% of respondents selected. Meanwhile, 66.21% identified work/life balance as an important factor, 51.03% identified overall profits, 33.79% identified repeat business, 33.10% identified overall revenues, 7.59% identified case win/loss percentage and 6.21% selected “other.”
“Solo lawyer respondents tend to work fewer hours than lawyers working in firms, as shown by a comparison of the results of the solo survey and the State of the Law Firm survey,” wrote Commander. “This is consistent with solos’ strong weighting of work-life balance as a factor relevant to measuring their success.”
Although solos make up a vital part of the legal ecosystem, they still experience struggles when it comes to the amount of time they must set aside for administrative and marketing tasks versus actual legal practice.
When it comes to the biggest challenges that solo practitioners face, the survey asked respondents about their concerns relating to spending too much time on administrative tasks, acquiring new business, rising costs and expenses, competition from firms, meeting client budget expectations, getting paid by clients, attracting and retaining productive support staff, technology advances and other issues.
Of respondents, 59.86% expressed they were spending too much time on administrative tasks; 35.92% said acquiring new business was their biggest hurdle and 32.39% said rising costs and expenses posed a significant challenge. Just 8.45% were concerned about competition from firms, 21.13% said meeting client budget expectations was a challenge and 28.87% said getting paid by clients was a challenge, while 19.01% identified attracting and retaining productive support staff as a challenge. Finally, 23.24% said technology advances posed a challenge for their solo practice and 16.90% said other issues were bigger challenges.
“Solo lawyers are often inundated with non-legal work, such as administrative and marketing tasks,” wrote Commander. “Only about 20% of the solo survey respondents said they spend 75% or more of their time practicing law.”
“Still, about 60% of solo respondents don’t employ any other staff to help them with these needs,” noted Commander. “Also, a large majority of solo respondents don’t plan to hire any other attorneys.”
On a scale of 1-5 (with 5 representing very good), the solo practitioners rated their overall personal well-being. The largest number of respondents, 45.52%, rated their well-being at 4, while 20.69% rated their well-being at 5, 25.52% rated their well-being at 3, 6.90% rated their well-being at 2 and 1.38% rated their well-being at 1.
“About two-thirds of solo respondents reported that their personal well-being is good or very good,” wrote Commander. “This is important, given the disproportionate levels of mental health challenges experienced by the lawyer population.”
“However, the fact that solos have no attorney colleagues to rely on means they can be at risk of stress when work demands rise,” noted Commander.
Future
When asked what rule or regulation changes would help solo practitioners have a more sustainable practice, there was a wide array of answers, including regulation on magistrates and judges, more virtual appearances, addressing malpractice insurance costs for solos and more.
“Courts/judges recognizing that solo practitioners have less leeway when it comes to court hearings/ trial dates,” one respondent offered as a potential solution.
“Judicial education about what it means to be solo/small firm and calendar management,” wrote another respondent. “Consistency with the use of WebEx to comport with the Chief Judge’s Orders statewide – most judges simply opt out and issue their own ‘local rules’ orders. It’s different from one county to another, and one judge to another, and practically impossible to meet judicial requirements.”
“Some way to allow multiple solo attorneys to access group health insurance plans and group retirement plans, without being members of the same law firm,” wrote another respondent.
“More guidance and comments about what constitutes professionalism and court expectations for solo/small firms (judges often expect us or force us to schedule several hearings in the same week),” wrote another respondent.
Overall, write-in responses to the State of the Solo survey indicate potentially valuable ways state or local bar associations and the Colorado court systems may help alleviate practice-related concerns for solos.
When asked what the most useful resources would be to help solo practitioners have a more sustainable law practice, each respondent ranked four possible resources from 1 to 4, with 1 being their first choice. In the rankings, 30.08% of respondents identified as their top choice help in reviewing and updating fee agreements and other practice management assistance; 25.55% selected help dealing with difficult opposing counsel or parties; 18.98% identified help navigating difficult client relationships and 11.85% selected ways to notify courts of upcoming vacation or leave schedules.
Out of the solo practitioners surveyed, 35.17% responded they plan to continue working in their solo practice for 11 or more years, 27.59% responded 7-10 years, 18.62% responded 4-6 years, 10.34% responded 2-3 years and 8.28% responded one or fewer years.
“Anecdotally, there appears to be some movement among lawyers in larger firms toward opening their own solo or small firm practice,” wrote Commander. “Other sources indicate that this may be a growing trend.”