The decision to go to law school was an easy one for me; it had been my dream since I was 12 years old.
What I didn’t plan for was how this dream would impact how I perceived the business world. Law school not only prepared me for the legal profession, but it also gave me a system of best practices that I use today as an entrepreneur.
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A whopping 80%Â of new businesses fail within 18 months. If you want to be in the 20% that succeed, you need every possible tool available–and law school offers many of the most useful ones.
Here are five key law school lessons that helped me start and grow a successful business:
Plan for Your Desired Results
Lawyers win cases by assessing situations, deciding on desirable outcomes, and building strategies to achieve those results. In business, this means understanding your issues, forming your goals and then strategically planning how to achieve those goals. Everything you do should lead you to your goals.
In law school, a single exam determined my grade every semester. If I wanted to gain high marks, I had to actively plan my semester to best utilize my time to achieve my goal. In business, every quarterly result is your semester grade. If you actively plan to reach your milestones, you will see more long-term success.
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J.R. Garrett is co-founder of LogoGarden, and has recently taken on the role as General Counsel for PharmMD, an innovator in healthcare solutions. J.R. has years of startup experience, including early-through-late stage VC portfolio businesses. He is passionate about entrepreneurship and thrives on the opportunity to create value in his businesses, for all stakeholders.
BusinessCollective, launched in partnership with Citi, is a virtual mentorship program powered by North America’s most ambitious young thought leaders, entrepreneurs, executives and small business owners.