Jessica D. Reilly, Clark Hill.

It is no secret that a young associate's workload ebbs and flows. When navigating the floods and famines, planning, prioritization and partnership are all useful tools to have on hand. Whether your practice is health care, employment or general litigation, sharpening these three skills will help you traverse the landscape of the earliest days of your practice so you know exactly what to do when the wave hits.

If you are balancing multiple projects or assignments for different matters, or even one large assignment with many sub-facets, planning is key. Ranking your tasks in order of priority helps you set the stage for a plan of action. In doing so, it is helpful to work backwards from your deadlines to help inform the tasks and their timelines. Setting internal guidelines is also a great way to plan for success and hold yourself accountable. You should also think about the substance of an assignment. Ask yourself: is the task something relatively easy and procedural, or will it require more brain muscle? Partnering with your peers and superiors can also help to gain more information to make sure the plan is accounting for potential hiccups uncovered along the way.

Once the priorities are set, stick to them. The ability to keep good time management and dedicate undivided concentration on those tasks is the difference between success and failure. Sometimes this requires a little bit of soul searching because you need to be able to target in on your strengths. Think about how your strengths and how you plan best; some are list oriented, others work best utilizing a strategy map, and some use partnership, or verbalize their plan before jumping into action. Whatever strategy works best, make sure the plan for the day, week, month or year is realistic.

Now that the plan is in place, it is important to keep it there by staying organized. Organizational skills keep you balanced, targeted and motivated. Organization should be employed from the start of your assignment until completion. Organization has many meanings; it is not always about keeping a clean desk and your papers in a neat stack. Organization helps break down the different aspects of an assignment or project by matching the tactic with the task. Figure out the best way to stay organized by again asking some clarifying questions in self reflection. Is this task best completed with collaboration? Will I need external resources? Do I need to delegate? As I learned in law school, not everything is straightforward or cookie-cutter perfect. Considering all the options allows you to unpack your assignment in a way that accounts for all different contours, utilizing strategic skills along the way to ensure success.

Partnership and communication are both essential and bring internal and external benefits. They can get you across the finish line in terms of seeking assistance, consulting strengths and weaknesses of a case, and fleshing out legal issues. Partnership and communication also allow you to set the expectations for team or the attorney you are assisting. Failure to communicate certain issues or hurdles related to an assignment can create blind spots for the supervising attorney or partner. Discussions and collaboration about issues that may arise are generally welcomed and expected in the workplace. This is extremely valuable when your workload is at its peak.

There is also an aspect of partnership that is internally rewarding. When you partner with others about an assignment, complex legal issue or resolution, you are showing your capability to take initiative. When you communicate concerns or confidences, you are demonstrating your ability to internalize the lineation of the law, engage a clear critical analysis and draw a succinct conclusion. Communicating with others in this way can help confirm your own progress and understanding for yourself. Often, it is not until something is said out loud that one grows a certain confidence when memorializing our understanding of the issue as a whole.

In our billable-hour world, busy is good—but too much of a good thing is a very real concept. Sometimes busy breeds chaos, and it can be hard to manage deadlines, maintain a high quality of work and achieve work-life balance. Focusing on planning, prioritization and partnership is essential when managing a task list, while also keeping your sanity. When work picks up, it is easy to feel disoriented, discouraged or stressed, but when the rubber hits the road, practicing and utilizing these skills as a young associate is the recipe for focus, clarity and strategic ability to accomplish your goals successfully.

Jessica D. Reilly is an associate at Clark Hill in the insurance and reinsurance practice. Contact her at [email protected].