Partner Spotlight | Deborah J. Schaefer, CPA

We sat down with Deborah Schaefer, CPA, founder of Deborah J. Schaefer, CPA, to learn how 42 years of legal accounting expertise shapes the way she helps law firms move onto stronger financial footing — and stay there.

Can you briefly introduce your organization and the type of firms you work with?

My organization is Deborah J. Schaefer, CPA. I’ve been in business for 42 years, and all I do is work with law firms — specifically, selecting and installing legal accounting systems. I am familiar with practice management and document management solutions as well. Legal billing and accounting is really where I focus my practice. Most of my clients are either coming off a legacy system or moving to a new automated legal accounting solution for the first time. My sweet spot is firms with anywhere from 5 to 100 timekeepers, though I work with solos as well, so I have a very broad base.

What makes your approach to serving law firms different from others in your space?

Being a CPA is what makes me different than most other legal consultants. Most people in the legal tech space come at it from the practice management or document management side, and they are not proficient in legal accounting. I am proficient in the time capture and billing requirements of law firms. The needs can vary by firm based on practice area and size. I also have a strong understanding of the proper recording of all the financial entries. Every firm needs accounting. Every law firm is required to manage their trust account and produce accurate financial statements. To me, it’s one of the most important components in a law firm’s technology stack.

What are the most common operational issues you see in firms before they implement new software?

Lawyers will attend law school to learn everything about practicing law. However, Law Schools do not spend any time educating lawyers on the business of law. Most lawyers at some point in their career will either be a partner or own their own law firm. Unfortunately, many lawyers do not understand accounting for lawyers. I find many smaller law firms are not focusing on the financial requirements of reconciling the banking accounting records. Often as law firms grow  they experience growing pains and may not understanding the impact of profitability and productivity reporting. These reports assist lawyers as they manage and grow their firms.

Migrating to new technology can feel overwhelming. How do you help firms move off legacy systems without disrupting their daily work?

Conversions on my end take no more than three business days, which matters for an accounting system. My approach to training is a phased one. As soon as data is ready, I have law firm staff working in the system right away: entering checks, receiving payments, and timekeepers entering time. I run separate sessions for the accounting team and the timekeepers.

I will tell every client the same thing when we start: we’re going to be best friends for the first month or two. You’ll call me constantly, we’ll email all day long — but if I’ve done my job well, within a month or two the firm will know as much as I do. I don’t want firms to be dependent on me long-term. I want to train them to solve their own problems, though of course they’ll still call for support or template changes down the road.

What benefits do your clients see most from implementing Actionstep?

It really depends on what legacy software or system the firm is moving from.  One of the biggest benefits is reliability of the reporting. Clients coming off systems where they couldn’t rely on the reports or the financial statements quickly find that they can rely on what Actionstep produces — that data goes in and comes out accurate. That’s the biggest win.

Cloud migration is its own major shift, especially for firms coming from an on-premise environment, which is still more common than people think. Before 2020, cloud computing felt very far away for many law firms, but now many in the industry have realized the benefits of allowing people to work where — and when — they’re most productive. Some practice areas still need someone in the office 9 to 5, but many don’t anymore, and that shift has been significant.

How are you seeing AI reshape the way law firms operate, and where do you think it’s headed?

Research and document generation are the obvious wins — everyone’s already using AI for that. But the bigger opportunity is timekeeping. A firm’s biggest assets are its people and its documents, so if AI can make employees more efficient for time tracking — recognizing what someone’s working on based on an email, a document, or a call, and surfacing a smarter, filtered list of matters — that directly improves profitability.

I don’t think AI is going to take over billing outright. Lawyers still want their stamp on every bill that leaves the firm, even in high e-billing environments like insurance defense. Where I do expect real change is on the banking side — bank feeds becoming fully integrated with accounting systems so there’s no more double entry for EFTs, deposits, or credit card transactions. Checks are going to fade out, partly because of the fraud that is occurring. Those redundant, manual tasks are what I expect AI to absorb first.

Where do you see the biggest opportunity for law firms over the next couple of years?

This isn’t about legal software specifically — it’s about the business of law more broadly. I think private equity and VC money are going to keep moving into the legal market, buying firms and building franchises; we’re already seeing that on the personal injury side. Law firms are going to become more nationalized and global, and more hybrid in how and where people work.

What I’d really like to see is law schools adding courses on the business side of running a firm. Law schools teach the law extremely well, but they don’t teach students how to run a practice — and roughly 90% of law school graduates end up as partners or solo owners who need that knowledge. The firms that make the most money are consistently the ones that understand the business of law, not just the practice of it.

Ready to bring the reliability of expert-led legal accounting to your firm?

Deborah J. Schaefer, CPA brings 42 years of legal accounting expertise to firms making the move to Actionstep – from clean conversions to hands-on, phased training. Get in touch to start your own transition.