Do It Now

 My late father had a bit of advice which I try to live by: "Do it now."

When a new task comes to me, I try to do it immediately. This allows me to stay in the same flow of thought I had when I received the task. It lets me act upon fresh information and turn it into work-product that then serves as a memorial of the fresh information. By doing the task immediately, it helps me remember anything I just learned. It's such a waste of time to learn information, and then forget it. By doing it now, I retain more information and I make information actionable.

Doing it now also shows a sense of urgency. I once needed to see a medical specialist, and their first availability was in three months. That didn't feel good, to be forced to wait a long time on something that for me was urgent. Client's legal matters are always urgent to them, and by doing it now, I show them that their case is also urgent to me. It prevents them from having the feeling that their lawyer doesn't care enough about their case.

Doing it now also keeps me on top of the game that is litigation. Litigation is full of activity and developments, like a basketball game. When something happens in a case that is worth acting upon, I act as soon as possible. This keep my case moving forward. It gets me in front of the court as soon as possible. It protects me and my client from getting blind-sided. If anyone is going to do the blind-siding in a case, it's going to be me.

Of course, you can't always, literally "do it now." Often there is something else you have to do first. But then I put the new task on my calendar for when I am going to do it. In that case, I didn't literally get it done immediately, but I immediately put it on my calendar for prompt action.

You're going to have to do it eventually, so you might as well do it now.