With the development of COVID-19, we are in an unprecedented and uncharted territory where there is no certainty as to when the course of business and schooling will return to normal. This time of quarantine and remote work/schooling requires fluidity and a higher level of reliance on the digital world. It is important to be able to utilize all of the tools out there which are designed to keep your life and business flowing such as virtual office platforms, online schooling and practice management programs. This is a particularly tough time for parents having to juggle both working from home and homeschooling their child(ren). Co-parenting can become more difficult as well. For those of you having to try balancing your children’s education, co-parenting, and work, here are a few tricks that will hopefully help make this easier on you and your children.
Set a schedule for your children each day that follows along with your work schedule. Set timers and reminders. Say you have a phone conference at 11-11:30. Put an independent activity on your children’s schedule that requires their attention and focus for the duration of the time your phone conference is scheduled for. This could be an activity such as quiet reading time, an online lesson from their school or an assignment. To avoid having your children interrupt your phone conference, designate a time at the conclusion of your call for them to ask for your help with their work. Utilize an app such as your timer on your phones or alerts on their devices that lets them know what they should be doing and when. If you have artificial intelligence devices such as Alexa or Google Home, these are great tools as well that help with giving automatic reminders to your children.
Utilize apps and programs to assist with co-parenting. There are an abundance of apps and programs to help foster strong co-parenting relationships and healthy communication even beyond the time of this season of quarantine. Utilize Facetime or any video chatting application on iPhones and Androids to allow your kids to communicate with their other parents. WeParent is one of many applications available on the App Store and Google Play that helps manage communication, custody schedules, events, appointments, documents, photos, and more. WeParent has many positive reviews and is free for download. Throughout this stressful time and going forward, embrace these kinds of tools that will help you and your co-parent stay on the same page and keep record of communications and efforts to stay in accordance with your parenting plans.
Many legal professionals remain hesitant to heavily integrate technology into their practices and lives because of traditional methods that have worked for centuries. Filing cabinets remain full of conventional client files and hard copies of documents. Though “hard copy” style of practicing law still leads to good outcomes, if there was ever a time to embrace technology, it certainly is now. We understand this is a trying time. Our firm took the necessary steps to be here for you throughout the entirety of this crisis. We have procedures and plans in place that will keep our office productive as usual. Please do not hesitate to reach out to our staff via phone, email, or Facebook messenger to schedule a consultation.