How False Urgency Is Harming Your Legal Practice

markhope61
Jul 2
7 min read

Updated: Jul 22

Urgency is a word you hear often in legal practice. A client needs a contract reviewed right away. A partner wants a letter drafted before lunch. An email lands in your inbox with “URGENT” in the subject line.

Sometimes it really is urgent. Court deadlines, last-minute negotiations or risk-sensitive matters require fast responses. But many times it is not. It just feels that way.

This is where the problem lies. What we often face is not real urgency, but false urgency. It eats into your time, distorts your priorities and pushes your team into a reactive way of working.

So how do you recognise false urgency and deal with it effectively?

What is False Urgency?

False urgency happens when something is made to feel time critical without a clear reason. It shows up when someone says “I need this now” but cannot explain why tomorrow would be too late. It creeps in because we want to be seen as responsive and productive.

In legal settings, urgency should be driven by actual legal risk, procedural deadlines or clear client needs. When everything is urgent, you stop prioritising. You stop thinking. You start firefighting.

Over time this pattern leads to lower quality work, poor client outcomes and a stressed-out team.

Why False Urgency Feels Like Progress

There is a reason false urgency sticks around. It creates the illusion of momentum. People feel like things are moving. In high-pressure environments like law firms, that can feel rewarding. But speed without purpose is just noise.

Leaders often lean on urgency as a way to show control. It gets attention. It moves tasks forward quickly. But if everything becomes a priority, you stop thinking strategically. You spend more time reacting than solving.

Take this example. A partner asks for a draft “by the end of the day.” But the draft is not needed until next week. That may sound harmless, but if it pushes actual urgent matters out of the way, it causes real delays.

How False Urgency Embeds in Your Team

False urgency does not always come from poor intentions. It usually starts with perception.

Leaders may worry that a lack of visible progress will look like stagnation. So they shorten timelines to show action. Team members then learn that if they label work as urgent, it gets done faster. This creates a feedback loop.

Eventually, everything feels urgent. Response times shrink. Expectations rise. And the pace becomes unsustainable.

How to Shift Away from False Urgency

It is not about ignoring deadlines. It is about making sure that urgency is aligned with real need. Here is how you can begin shifting the culture in your legal practice:

1. Ask Better Questions

Before treating something as urgent, stop and ask:

What happens if this waits until tomorrow?
Who is affected if we do not act now?
Is there a legal, operational or client risk?

These questions can help you separate actual time sensitivity from emotional pressure.

2. Protect Time for Focused Work

Give your team time to think. Block out time for focused legal work and treat it as non-negotiable. Avoid interrupting with non-urgent messages or unscheduled calls. Think of it as you would a client meeting, valuable and protected.

3. Call Out the Pattern

Make it acceptable to challenge urgency. If you see repeated patterns of unnecessary urgency, raise it. Talk about it with your team. Culture change happens through small conversations.

4. Align Urgency with Legal Strategy

Only mark something as urgent if it directly supports case goals or client outcomes. If not, question whether it needs that label. Otherwise, it risks becoming a distraction.

5. Use Tools That Support, Not Distract

Think about where your time is going. Are you typing documents when you could be dictating them?

Dictation is up to four times faster than typing. By outsourcing transcription, you free up hours for casework, client meetings or billing. With OutSec Legal, you can dictate file notes, letters or legal documents using a free app, and receive fast, accurate transcription.

Our pay-as-you-go model means you only pay when you need it. Whether you are covering a staff absence, dealing with a sudden increase in work or simply need extra capacity, outsourced transcription helps you keep control of time and quality.

Working with Clients Who Create False Urgency

Clients sometimes create urgency where it does not belong. A classic example is a client who wants to complete on a house purchase next week. It might be driven by emotion, pressure from sellers or upcoming events like Christmas.

While you need to stay responsive, it is important to manage expectations. Buying a home is usually the largest financial decision a person makes. Rushing it is rarely the best approach.

What many lawyers forget is to factor in:

Your own current workload
Your team’s capacity and availability
Operational constraints

Rather than overcommitting, you could use support to meet timelines. This is where OutSec Legal can help. Our legal transcription and copy typing services help you reallocate work and stay on track. You can even pass the transcription cost on to the client when appropriate.

Did you know that using outsourced transcription can create 30 to 40 percent more time in your working day? That is time that could go toward billable work, supervision or improving cash flow through faster billing.

When Everything is Urgent, Nothing Is

When legal professionals are always in crisis mode, the quality of work drops. People work longer hours. Stress builds. Burnout follows. This is not sustainable, and it does not deliver better outcomes for clients.

Urgency, used well, creates focus. Used poorly, it becomes a source of confusion, stress and inefficiency.

Leadership is not about doing everything fast. It is about helping your team make clear choices, manage priorities and deliver quality work.

So the next time you find yourself writing “ASAP” or saying “this is urgent,” take a moment. Ask yourself if it really is.

Your team and your clients will thank you.

About OutSec Legal

At Outsec Legal, our services are designed to support legal professionals by providing reliable and high-quality legal transcription, allowing your practice to focus on clients and fee production. Whether your practice needs help with day-to-day transcription or support during busy periods, our pay-as-you-go option enables legal practices of all shapes and sizes to access support as and when they need it.

So What Are The Benefits?

Sole Practitioners/Barristers/Small Law Practices:

OutSec Legal is the perfect solution for sole practitioners, small law firms or barristers who need typing assistance on a pay-as-you-go basis, as it provides a cheaper alternative to employment.

Medium to Large Law Practices:

Medium to large law firms use OutSec to:

Reduce secretarial staff (completely or partially). This reduces the need for expensive office space (or enables space to be utilised for more productive use/fee generation);
Allow fee earners to concentrate on chargeable hour targets, rather than typing emails or amending documents;
Provide an effective solution to enable your fee-earning staff to work remotely. Therefore providing further opportunities to reduce expensive office space or increase your fee earner headcount with less space. It enables flexible working and makes law firms more agile;
Provide a business continuity solution to enable law firms to access secretarial staff in times of absence.
Enable firms to upscale support as the firm grows or at times of high workloads, without the need for employing additional staff.

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Want to know more, why not get in touch with us on 020 7112 7527.

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