You need a plan, right? A plan for your career or a business plan for your law firm. As the saying goes, life happens when you are busy making plans. But creating a plan, particularly when there are several people involved is often not as simple as it sounds. So for law firms, the best option often appears to be having a law firm retreat or a strategic planning meeting.

Many things in life are not as entertaining as they sound like they should be. Strategic planning doesn't sound like fun at all and the reality is often worse. But no one doubts its importance.

So in my Practice Management Advice column in the March/April 2016 issue of Law Practice Magazine, I take on the topic of Avoiding the Pain in Strategic Planning. It is a challenging and important topic. But getting all of the lawyers in a firm together for a meeting is always a challenge and, if you tell them the meeting is about strategic planning, it becomes even more problematic.

So I have outlined an alternative or two. I hope one works for you.

Even though this column has nothing to do with technology, it appears in the annual ABA TECHSHOW issue of Law Practice magazine. There is a lot of great great content in this magazine.

In Technology Competence: New Wine in an Old Ethical Bottle, former State Bar of Arizona Ethics Counsel Patricia A. Sallen reminds us that lawyers can no longer swear off the sauce of technology.

My friend Craig Ball writes on What Every Lawyer Should Know About E-Discovery. Yes, every lawyer. That means you, too, even if you never intend to darken the doors of a courthouse again. You never know when e-discovery will become a topic of conversation at a social gathering. Well, actually you do know that it won't, but it is important to understand the basics.

Say Yes to a Practice Management System is from Natalie Robinson Kelly. She is an expert on practice management systems. I know sometimes the Oklahoma Bar Association members tire of me repeatedly saying that they really need one of these tools. But I only say it because it is true. With Natalie no doubt pleased with her article, I can now publicly confess that I strongly suggested that she be asked to write the column in the magazine board planning session for this issue.

Let me end by noting a significant column in this issue. Tom Mighell selected as the topic for his Digital Toolkit column Note Taking Shoot-Out: OneNote versus Evernote. These are two great products and I use the word significant in describing his review because most lawyers should be using one or both of these tools. I know you will be interested in his overall winner. But you have to read the column to find out which product wins.