The ABA's Solosez listserv is chock full of conversation, but reading from it can be like drinking from a firehose. Here, business development advisor Larry Bodine captured a discussion entitled, "Mistakes I've Made Setting Up a Solo Practice."

The participants' names are removed to respect their privacy.

Read this lively discussion as solos recount their war stories and offer their advice about retainers, enegagemnt letters, email security, yellow pages advertising, keeping clients happy, getting a real (non-AOL) email address, really bad websites, client communications, specializing, wasting time, phoning instead of emailing, being ready, and the biggest mistake of all: waiting so long to go solo.