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I was in the gym working out with my trainer Jerome this morning, and after finishing my bench press, Jerome exclaimed “We did it!” That cracked me up and I joked “We? I’m the one moving that weight and hey, I don’t see you sweating.” He came right back at me with, “But I was right there with you, Vickie. I’ve got your back so you can concentrate on feeling strong.”

I like to think I’m your “Jerome.” Whether you’re just starting your legal nurse consulting business or simply trying to take your CLNC^® business to the next level, think of me as your trainer. While you’re concentrating on the work ahead, I’ll be right there with you. When you read my blog, stay connected on Facebook or receive my mentoring advice, remember the “we” in your efforts. Yes, I’m right there watching your back and if you hang with me, the CLNC^® mentors and your CLNC^® peers in the NACLNC^® Association I promise you’ll always feel stronger.

Success Is Inside!

P.S. Comment and share what makes you feel stronger.

We are deep into the information age. In fact, there’s so much information coming at us from so many different directions that “information anxiety” should probably be a DSM-V diagnosis. Too much information (TMI) is our reality, and while there’s a distinct difference between quantity and quality, it’s easy to get sucked into the low quality noise. Do we really want to reduce our lives to the details of Ashton Kutcher’s sex life, Alec Baldwin’s musing about flight attendants or a constant stream of updates from “friends” we haven’t seen since high school?

Recently I was involved in three different mentoring situations with three legal nurse consultants. The first one forgot and missed our phone appointment. The second failed to complete the simple advance assignment I’d given her, despite the fact that she has more than enough free time on her hands – I know because I get her constant Facebook updates. The third is raising four sons, holding down a full-time nursing job and still made time to complete the assignments on schedule and attend an additional mentoring session for an upcoming interview with a potential attorney-client. Which Certified Legal Nurse Consultant do you think will be most successful?

In these busy times fraught with TMI what will you do to cut out the noise? Make a wise decision – your CLNC^® business depends on it. Now that’s a bit of information that really merits your attention.

Success Is Inside!

P.S. Comment and share what you will do to cut out the noise.

All smart business owners use social media to promote their services or products and so should CLNC^® consultants. Here are some simple ways successful Certified Legal Nurse Consultants are using social media in their CLNC^® businesses.

Talk to Your Friends – Let all of your friends know you are a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant. Ask each friend to connect you with an attorney she knows. Almost everyone knows an attorney, so if you have 250 friends, that’s 250 attorney-prospects waiting to hear about you and your CLNC^® services.

“In this day and age, one would be foolish not to utilize the marketing power of social media to help get the word out that you’re a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant. Through social media I have been very fortunate to have numerous friends and family members actually network for me. Their efforts have led to new attorney-clients and successful business relationships. New cases coming my way with no effort on my part – you can’t beat that!”

Julie Somen-Becker, RN, BSN, CLNC

Talk to Your CLNC^® Colleagues – Invite your CLNC^® subcontractors and colleagues to be your friend. Social media’s messaging tools are a convenient way to refer cases to expand each other’s business. Direct messaging is also convenient for referring experts and CLNC^® consultants.

“My social media contacts are primarily Certified Legal Nurse Consultants. I only spend 6-7 minutes a day on social media, but I have increased my pool of CLNC^® subcontractors with that minimal time investment. It’s well worth the time that you invest if you spend it wisely.”

Lawrence Frace, RN, CLNC

“I use social media to network with Certified Legal Nurse Consultants about potential testifying experts and new ideas for marketing campaigns. I’ve received some great ideas from other CLNC^® consultants and have reciprocated with some of my favorite rain-making tips. Keep your posts professional and assume everything that you write is public.

Dorene Goldstein, RNC, CLNC

Talk to Attorneys and Share Information – You might not want to “friend” your attorney-clients in order to avoid blending your personal and professional life. However, the question really doesn’t have to be “Do I friend or not?” Just create a business page for those professional relationships. That way you can keep your “friend” profile private and your “professional” page public. Your professional page can be a place to post useful links, share information, foster a sense of community and maintain your presence as a valuable resource.

“One attorney was asking a question about an OB case. I used this opportunity to educate him about the issues in his case, and by doing this I gained his trust. About a month later when I sent him a marketing packet and followed up with a phone call, he offered me that exact same OB case to review.”

Dorene Goldstein, RNC, CLNC

Facebook and Google Plus have made it easier than ever to get involved in social media. It’s a new world full of opportunities to expand your legal nurse consulting business. Used practically, professionally and purposefully, it can help expand your pool of CLNC^® subcontractors and experts, keep you in touch with your network of CLNC^® colleagues and attorney-clients and help you find new markets and attorney-prospects for your CLNC^® services.

Success Is Inside!

What I’m talking about is the daily life of your smartphone’s battery. Every smartphone has a different anticipated, average and not entirely satisfactory daily life. What that means is how long it will go between charges.

As an iPhone^® user, I have to charge the phone’s battery just about every day and a half, depending on whether or not I’ve done something radical like used the phone, headset or checked my email. If I do something totally wild and crazy like surf the Internet or use Yelp to find someplace to take Vickie to dinner, the battery life is even shorter.

Under normal use, I get about 36 hours off a full charge, but Apple^® recommends that you run the battery down below 20% before fully recharging it. If Certified Legal Nurse Consultants follow that rule, they’ll get just under a year of life out of the battery before it starts to degrade and last increasingly shorter periods of time. Worst of all, the iPhone battery is built in so I can’t swap it out myself. If you use your iPhone for your legal nurse consulting business and are pretty hard on the battery life, you might buy an extended life battery, but it ruins the phone’s looks by sticking out the bottom. Maybe you could buy a combination fat case and battery, which adds lots of juice and also ruins its look. I don’t know about my CLNC^® amigos, but I’d rather be cool than ruin the image of my iPhone (besides nobody really knows if your phone is working or not except in a movie theatre).

Being cool means being prepared and this means I have a 12V charger in my car, charging cables attached to my home and work docks and keep a full wall wart charging set in my Codi^® MobileMax rolling computer bag when I travel. Wherever your legal nurse consulting business takes you, take a minute to be prepared.

There are so many Android^® phones out there that battery life and swappable batteries are too varied to write about. Instead, let me offer legal nurse consulting Androids this advice – carry at least one fully-charged spare battery, keep a 12V charger in your car and pack a spare wall charger with your travel stuff. Do this and you’ll never find yourself looking for a payphone again.

In the meantime, if you want to maximize your TTBC (Tom’s Time Between Charges) for any smartphone, follow these simple steps:

1. Turn off the GPS except for those apps that really need it. If your GPS is on, your phone is either constantly pinging the global positioning system to tell people where you are or pings it every time you use certain apps. Turn it off except for essential apps like Fandango, Yelp, Zagat or others that help you find restaurants, gas or movies. Forget Google, Shazam, Dictionary and other apps that don’t need to know where you are to function properly. You do need your GPS for Facebook (at least for iPhone) if you’re posting a mobile upload. Otherwise, if checking in with FourSquare and becoming “mayor” of the local “Shake ‘n Steak” is important to you, get used to short battery life.
2. Turn off your Wi-Fi – at least when you’re not using it. Wi-Fi is a nice feature that can save considerable costs off your cellular bill if you use it in a Starbucks^®, hotel lobby or anywhere else that offers free Wi-Fi. However, the whole time you’re driving around or walking through Wal-Mart^®, your phone is searching for a Wi-Fi signal, possibly asking you to join any networks it discovers and, at the same time, draining your battery. Instead, keep the Wi-Fi off and turn it on while you’re waiting in line for that double decaf skinny soy latte (with two Splendas) before going to see your favorite attorney-client or CLNC^® subcontractor.
3. Always keep your phone where you can see it. When your phone is buried in your purse or on the backseat or floor of your car, it’s looking for a signal. In fact, it’s straining to find a signal that’s being blocked by a couple of thousand pounds of heavy Detroit metal. This, of course, strains your battery. Instead, keep your phone on the dashboard or in one of the cup holders (where you can safely reach it when it goes off). Turn it off when you’re at an attorney-client’s office and when you’re at work.
4. If you can adjust how quickly your screen goes to auto-lock or your screensaver kicks in, adjust it to the shortest period you can stand.
5. Finally, turn down the screen brightness and then set it to auto-brightness. The lower your screen brightness, the lower your battery draw. You don’t have to turn it down to where you need to step into a dark stairwell to use it, but at least drop it from the brightest to about midway and keep reducing it until you find a level you can live with.

Try these five simple steps and all Certified Legal Nurse Consultants will get some extra life out of their smartphone batteries. I’m sure the day that important attorney-client returns your call and you have the battery bars to take it, you’ll appreciate this tip.

Keep on techin’,

Tom

Certified Legal Nurse Consultants are probably aware that the reason viruses and malware proliferate on the Internet and Facebook is because people click on the darn links. The reason spam proliferates is not just because it’s cheap to send out 200,000 emails with one click of a mouse, it’s because people actually click on the links and buy the fake drugs or whatever else is being peddled.

This week, I have just two words I want to share: STOP IT!

That being said, let’s talk common CLNC^® sense, straight talk that hopefully will help keep you, your legal nurse consulting computer and your Facebook account safe while you cruise the Information Superhighway.

1. If you get an email from a friend, family member, another legal nurse consultant or anyone else in the galaxy that consists of nothing but a link in the body of the email, no matter what the email subject line is – DON’T CLICK ON THAT LINK! Chances are 110% it’s a link to a malware site that will infect your computer, turn it into a zombie and send out more and more of the same to help enlist more hapless users into botnets, which will then be used for all sorts of nefarious purposes.
2. If you get an official-looking email from a bank, credit card company or shopping site (think Toys-R-Us) that you DON’T have an account with telling you they’ve lost your password or that you need to login and reconfirm certain personal details, DON’T CLICK ON THAT LINK and try to login. All you’re doing is giving up your personal information and probably the same password you use on your real bank account. Doesn’t the fact that you don’t have an account with that organization ring any alarm bells? To quote Homer Simpson, “Duh!”
3. If you get an official-looking email from a bank, credit card company or shopping site (think Amazon.com) that you DO have an account with telling you they’ve lost your password or that you need to login and reconfirm certain personal details, DON’T CLICK ON THAT LINK! Real companies don’t lose your password. You’re simply giving up your information to someone who’ll use it to log into your real account.
   
   If you think the email looks real (and some look incredibly real), try rolling your mouse over the link (without clicking on it) and see what pops up on the mouse-over – it’ll probably be something like http://www.ripmeoffquick.ru/visa_scam, not http://www.firstnationalvisa.com/my_account
   
   Real banks, credit card companies and businesses can afford proofreaders and don’t write copy in ESL (English as a Second Language). So, please don’t be clicking on the most politely convenient link that must to be followed.
4. If you get something that’s obviously spam, don’t reply to it. All that does is confirm that you have a valid email address. Just delete it or mark it as spam or junk in your email reader.
5. On Facebook, if you get a message or wall post saying something like: “You are so busted in this hot video,” “You must see this drunk baby, it’s hilarious” or something similar (they change all the time). DON’T CLICK ON THAT LINK! If you do you’ll probably be asked to load special video-viewing software before you see the baby. The special software is, of course, malware that will infect your computer and maybe compromise your Facebook account. It’s really not you in the video (I’ve seen it, it’s not hot either!) and the drunk baby isn’t hilarious (Just sad.). Don’t be tempted, just remove the post.
6. Next, if you get a message on Facebook that tells you to follow a link to learn who’s viewing your profile, DON’T CLICK ON THAT LINK! You guessed it, you can’t learn who’s viewing your profile (and you don’t really want to know). All you’ll do is infect your computer and maybe your Facebook account and end up sending out the same message to all your friends. Just remove the post.
7. Sorry, but there are no international, foreign, domestic or intergalactic email lotteries that you’ve won and only need to send them your banking account information so they can deposit your winnings. Guess what they’ll do with your information?
8. I’m sorry to report that the IRS, FBI and state agencies with unclaimed funds, tax returns or seized, unclaimed money from criminal enterprises that just need your banking information aren’t real. If you really think any government agency is giving away money you’re in more trouble than I thought. The IRS, FBI and similar agencies don’t send email, they can’t afford the postage. If they did, they’d already have all your information because they are the IRS and FBI.
9. Finally, and I know this will come as a surprise to some of you, there are no real widows of deposed finance ministers in sub-Saharan African countries with millions of dollars that are emailing you simply because they need the help of their “most kind and honest sir or madam” to get the money out of the country (that’s what crooked banks and Swiss accounts are for.). If you correspond with them, you’ll end up sending them your money or laundering forged money orders and eventually land in jail. If you don’t believe me, Google^® “Nigerian 419 spam” for yourself.

This behavior will probably never stop during our lifetimes, but CLNC^® consultants can protect themselves with just a little common CLNC^® sense. Get started today and whatever you do, DON’T CLICK ON THIS LINK!

Keep on techin’,

Tom

This year is almost over and there have been a lot of advances in the tech world. Computers are faster, bigger and smaller and Windows^® 7 works better than anyone expected. Pocket cameras are better than ever. Smart phones do everything but shop and cook for us. But there’s still a lot of technology advances to be made that I think will improve our lives. I want to end the year with my personal tech wish list for 2011 and hope that some of you Certified Legal Nurse Consultants share a few of these wanton desires with me:

1. An actual reason to own an iPad^® (and I want it to be able to print too). It’s just not enough for a gadget to be the coolest thing on Earth, it also needs to be useful.
2. The “Cloud” to go away for now. I do believe one day our computers will all be small, solid-state devices that pull their software from the “Cloud” a la Google’s Chrome operating system (OS). But the Internet really isn’t everywhere yet. A wireless card from any of the major carriers or the Clear Network helps, but just like you drop calls, do you want to drop important documents? Even in New York City, I find spotty, slow Internet coverage, so why do we want to go back to slow computers? It’s hard enough checking email in Poughkeepsie; what about when I’m in Thimpu? Then there’s the whole security issue – who’s really responsible for protecting your data?
3. Internet access on airplanes, but not cell phone access. It would be nice to be able to check my email so that when I hit the ground and turn on my iPhone^® I don’t have 87+ emails from the office waiting for my immediate attention. Likewise I don’t want to spend 3-½ hours trapped on an airplane (without an ejection seat) listening to someone talk about their bunions or hemorrhoids on their cell phone. Give me the Internet or give me nothing!
4. Cell phones that won’t operate in a moving vehicle when they’re held in someone’s hand. Put down the phone and keep both hands on the wheel – you’re a bad enough driver even when you’re not distracted.
5. Cell phones with automatic volume control for the owner’s voice that keeps the person talking on the phone from shouting. You can hear me now so we can all stop using our cell-phone voices. Maybe an automatic limiting device that cuts the phone off after 20 minutes of inane conversation or when the signal to noise ratio gets too low.
6. An end to Facebook viruses (and computer viruses too while we’re at it). With all the talent, time and money behind Facebook, why can’t they come up with some way to screen out the evildoers on a real-time basis?
7. This is Vick’s pick for #7: GPS systems that will actually drive your car for you just like in The Jetsons. Need I say more or just “Rambler, take me to the Galleria”?
8. Microsoft^® to make some intuitive upgrades to its various programs. Get rid of that awful automatic formatting in Word^® and let me make my documents look the way I want them.
9. A software company to actually break Wirth’s Law (which states “Software is getting slower more rapidly than hardware is becoming faster”). I don’t think I need to expand on this, do you?
10. Finally, this is Vick’s pick too: computers and other electronic devices that work as fast as she does!

I’m sure there are a lot of other things about the tech world that would make my life and your legal nurse consulting business easier. If there’s something you want, comment and let me know. Otherwise I’m going to hope that Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and whoever really runs Google read this and will have a tiger team on it first thing Monday morning.

Keep on techin’,

Tom

We all love social media. For example, I use Facebook to communicate to all Certified Legal Nurse Consultants and aspiring CLNC^® consultants. I love reading details of your lives and seeing the fun photos you post. One Certified Legal Nurse Consultant told me that what she loves most about Facebook is that she never has to worry about keeping up with her friends’ email addresses – because their Facebook address never changes. If she’s on Facebook, she’s always in touch with them. This is really a radical form of communication and allows connection with more and more people, including attorneys, who are joining Facebook every day.

Something I’ve noticed though – social media can quickly move from a means of communication to an obsession. One can get caught up in all of the things to do there – the games and other ancillary applications. That’s my issue with social media. Clicking your mouse to get points to build a hen house for your farm or sending someone virtual hugs, flowers or groceries seems like a crazy waste of time.

Where we focus is where we yield results, and let’s face it, building a better farm, sending pictures of flowers and answering meaningless quiz questions becomes a feel-good addiction that reaps little more than distraction from vision and purpose. Does “I got a new llama for my herd today” or “I answered a quiz about Pop-Tarts^®” really sound better to you than “I got three cases from a new attorney-client today”? The way you unwind is certainly your personal choice, but I prefer to find my relaxation in nature, taking a walk or listening to the clacking of my bamboo while enjoying a glass of wine in my backyard. Relaxation has a beginning and an end but the demands of a “virtual farm” never will.

For successful Certified Legal Nurse Consultants living in the real world, those meaningless feel-good addictions are something we avoid. We spend our time growing our legal nurse consulting businesses, not fertilizing our virtual farms. I’ve gone though and blocked just about every “application” I can on Facebook to keep those “requests to bale hay” from cluttering up my wall. I appreciate that someone loves me enough to want to send me a virtual pet – but I’m busy with my legal nurse consulting business and connecting with my family and friends – and I hope you are too.

Social media is a great thing. It’s changing the way we connect and communicate. Just make sure that you’re using it to advance your legal nurse consulting business or to truly connect and communicate with your “friends.”

Success Is Inside!

Recently a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant contacted the Institute and told us about a subcontractor she’d hired. After completing the project, the subcontractor proceeded to list herself on several different social media sites as being associated with the contracting CLNC^® consultant. The subcontractor then used the contracting CLNC^® consultant’s “LinkedIn” profile and network to contact other parties announcing her association with the contracting CLNC^® consultant and marketing her availability to subcontract.

Looking at this through the subcontracting retro spectroscope, I believe that every CLNC^® consultant who is using subcontractors should include a “social media nondisclosure clause” in their subcontracting agreements. I don’t recommend hiding the existence of subcontractors from your attorney-clients and that’s not what this is about.
 
Simply speaking, your subcontractors should not use your social media and your connections for their own benefit, at least not without your expressed permission. I asked Tom to draft some language that you can add to your CLNC^® subcontractor agreements (with your contract attorney’s approval) and here’s the result:

SOCIAL MEDIA NONDISCLOSURE: Subcontractor agrees that throughout the term of this Agreement, and for a period of two (2) years after the termination or expiration of this Agreement, Subcontractor shall not, without the prior written consent of Company, in any way or in any form disclose, publicize, market or advertise to any contact of Company or any other person, party or company via any form of social media including, but not limited to, FaceBook, Twitter and/or LinkedIn, the fact that this Agreement exists, that you are working or have worked as a subcontractor with Company or any other facts regarding this Agreement and our relationship.

This may seem strict, but you don’t want your subcontractors marketing to, or associating with, your social media contacts. If they’re already a friend on FaceBook, you don’t want them discussing business on your Wall. As the legal nurse consulting world adapts to social media, so must our contracts.

Success Is Inside!

Every CLNC^® consultant using social media to market your Certified Legal Nurse Consulting business, raise your left hand (keeping your right hand on your mouse). That’s terrific! I know a lot of you participate and interact regularly with Vickie on Facebook^® and Twitter^TM. I also know that Facebook and Twitter can be semi-frustrating if you’re using them directly through a web browser instead of an application like TweetDeck or HootSuite^®. Why frustrating? Because you need to refresh the page on a regular basis to see the updates.

Likewise, if you’re a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant who’s bidding on business equipment on eBay^® or another auction site and you want to keep ahead of last minute snipers or just watch bidding trends, you face a similar problem. A problem whose only remedy is sitting, mouse-in-hand, and relentlessly clicking the “refresh” button on your browser.

Well my CLNC^® amigos, I have a solution for you, at least if you’re a Firefox^® user. Simply visit the Add-ons for Firefox page for ReloadEvery and install this nifty little add-on. It allows you, by right-clicking on an open web page, to select an automatic refresh interval for that page. You can even set your own custom refresh timings. This allows you to watch your Facebook wall or profile page and keep up with Vickie and your CLNC^® colleagues without the need to click the refresh button. It does have the innate danger of wiping out that half-written, pithy status update you typed in and hadn’t yet sent so be careful when you use it. Internet Explorer^® and Safari^® users are out of luck but I’ve read that the Opera^® browser has this already built-in.

With ReloadEvery installed, you always have the most current page/news in front of you and you’ll never miss a Farmburg Piglet request again. I think this is just another reason to move to Firefox as your web browser for your legal nurse consulting business.

Keep on techin’,

Tom

On a recent trip to Paris, I had the chance to meet up with a young friend, international artist and filmmaker Edward Silhol. We met at his new studio on a hilltop with one of the best-kept secret views of the city I’ve ever seen. He’d just moved in and was still getting it ready so I felt privileged to be one of his first visitors.

I met Edward in Burgundy a couple of years ago. Since then, I’ve walked and Metro’d over half of Paris to see his art in galleries and have cruised the far reaches of the Internet to see the private portions of his website (it’s so secret I can’t disclose it, although I would love to).

Edward’s talents and love of art are far more impressive to me because you can sit with Edward in a café and drink (too many) French coffees or bottles of wine (a personal record that still surprises not only me, but anyone who knows me) and never, ever run out of things to talk about. From FaceBook to the French Revolution, from Impressionists to Indian food or where to find the best darn baguette in Paris (it really was) you can sit and talk, or just be with Edward. Enlightening conversation is a trait that more Americans should take the time to embrace.

I’ve been privileged to meet many well-known artists, but what strikes me most about Edward is that he’s got an incredible understanding of what it takes to be an artist. And Edward’s sage insight is exactly what it takes to achieve legendary success as a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant. I want you to hear it from Edward himself so check out this video with Edward and me at his new studio in Paris. By the way, we did turn off the video at the café – yes, some things are meant to be private and don’t worry – Tom was right there by my side (red wine and all).

Success Is Inside!