The Optimized Office

Full-service organizational development consultation and services for small to medium business owners.

Most common key deliverables offered to clients have included:

✔️ HR: Recruiting and onboarding program, KPI's, bonus plans, staff planning, recruiting services. 

✔️ Training and development: 1x1 coaching and team workshops for communication, team building, supervisory skills, meeting improvement, and organizational skills. 

✔️ Finance: Planning and comprehensive implementation to maximize existing revenue streams.

✔️ Office processes & organization: Office processes for A/R, A/P, customer intake, and workflows.

Organizational Development Consultant

Preppio: Remote Employee Onboarding

Advisory Services

1st Gen Entrepreneurs

Founding Member

The Coconut Traveler

Sustainable Business Consultant

Markee Valuations, LLC

Limited duration engagement. Primary key deliverable: Organizational development to support business growth and staff expansion. Project workflow development and staff planning, recruiting, and onboarding. Secondary contributions: Finance Analyst responsibilities.

Organizational Development / Finance Analyst

Archdiocese of Portland in Oregon

Managed all administrative aspects of a clergy personnel office. Restructured and improved numerous processes for annual events, reports, meetings, and personnel transitions. Comprehensive department improvement plan, project management guide for implementation of the plan, training guide, and detailed plan for onboarding future staff.

Office Administrator/ Organizational Development

Audigy

The purpose of this role was to coach audiology practice owners using strategic business platforms while perpetuating growth in their business operations.

Operations Manager

YESCO

While retaining the responsibilities of my previously listed position, I managed a service/selling branch of 30+ employees. Transitioned this branch office to a new location and restructured the staffing model to maximize efficiency and exceed profitability objectives. Strategic planning and analysis included opening 3 satellite branch locations.

Branch Manager/ Assistant Division Manager - Finance

Division finance/credit manager duties and oversight of four branch offices including a team of five office staff. Reorganized duties to increase efficiency and productivity after a necessary labor reduction equaling a loss of 100 labor hours a week.

Business Office Manager/ Assistant Division Manager - Finance

Executive Assistant

In a world of endless options, I help clarify the simplest path to a productive, engaged workplace. It’s all about the right people and the right processes.

With experience working in both large and small companies across various industries, from entry-level to upper management, I have a unique perspective on what it takes to succeed. As a Credit Manager, Finance Analyst, and member of a consultant management team, I've had the opportunity to see the inner workings of over 60 small businesses.

From these experiences, I've gained valuable insights that shape my approach. For instance:
💡Success and failure are measured differently for each organization.
💡Engaged teams are essential to achieving a business's mission.
💡The simplest ways to increase employee engagement are often overlooked.
💡Miscommunication is costly and underlies most issues.
💡There are many right ways to achieve an exceptional outcome.

If you'd like to talk more, feel free to message me or go to www.optimizedoffice.com and book a chat. I'd love to learn more about you!

Rachel Marie

Writing Law Tutors LLC

🔷 For individual attorneys & law firms:

-Conduct 1:1 legal-writing instruction for practicing attorneys to improve the clarity, conciseness, readability, and persuasiveness of their legal and other professional writing. 
-Devise lesson plans to teach fundamental writing skills based on review of past writing samples. 
-Prepare suggestions and feedback to improve current writing projects, including briefs, memos, business letters, and thought-leadership/marketing publications. 
-Publish LinkedIn columns to provide legal-writing tips under #DearLegalWriter.

🔷 For law students:  

Provide law-school academic, career, and legal writing coaching for law students. Services include: (1) 1:1 coaching; (2) resume & cover-letter reviews; (3) detailed suggestions on legal writing samples for submission with job applications; (4) interview preparation; (5) career counseling; (6) LinkedIn profile reviews & networking support.  Publish content for law students in 💌 Dear 1L column under #Dear1L.

Founder | Legal Writing Coach & Trainer

Legal Writing Coach | Law School Tutor & Career Consultant

University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School

Conduct mock interviews for law students preparing for law-firm, on-campus job interviews (OCI).  Review law-student resumes and writing samples in advance of submission for OCI and judicial clerkships.

Career Consultant

Reed Smith LLP

Counsel

Proskauer Rose LLP

Special Employment Law Counsel

The Hershey Company

Senior Counsel

Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP

Senior Associate

Associate

Goodwin Procter LLP

Summer Associate

Testa, Hurwitz & Thibeault, LLP

Paralegal

The Princeton Review

Course Instructor

Legal Writing Coach | Teacher | Writer | Creator, Dear 1L® & Dear Legal Writer | Former BigLaw Litigator (L&E) | Law-Mom

Hi. I’m Amanda. I work with lawyers who want to improve their legal writing—whether that’s drafting more persuasive briefs, sending clearer emails to clients, writing thought-leadership articles, or just saving time on revisions. 

I also have a broader mission: to improve how lawyers and law students learn legal writing. We need more up-front teaching and less after-the-fact criticizing. Most of the time an associate makes a mistake, it’s because no one ever taught them otherwise. I aim to fill that gap.

I am a teacher at my core, and I adore nurturing both new and not-so-new legal writers. I’d love to help you make legal writing a superpower that propels your career forward the way it did mine.

Before doing what I do now, I spent 20 years as a BigLaw litigator writing for demanding partners in high-stakes, complex, motion-heavy litigation. I did briefs, blogs, letters, client alerts, long-form articles, appeals, and everything in between. I also served as co-editor for two law department blogs and supervised associates in their drafting work. In the process, I got trained by some of the best legal writers in the business.

In 2021, I branched out on my own & formed Writing Law Tutors LLC. Since then, my focus has been on improving the legal writing experience of lawyers & law students everywhere. 

📕 To that end, I have an Amazon best-seller, “Dear 1L: Notes to Nurture a New Legal Writer.” I recommend it for all as the best place to start!

▪️ For litigators: I provide the tools, training, feedback you need to become a confident legal writer. Let me be a “Secret Senior Counsel” who helps you improve your drafts before you turn them in. That will mean less red ink and a lot better reviews.

▪️ For law students: You know me from my Dear 1L letters and my book. I bring the same passion to my coaching sessions. I’d love to help you on your journey to becoming a super-powered legal writer. 

▪️ For pre-law students: Work with me on your law school personal statement and prepare for law school writing the summer before you start. 

⚓️  My anchor is my family. I am a mother of three girls who are in their 20s. I am fortunate to have an amazing husband, Matt, a managing partner at Kleinbard in Philadelphia, who helps support my journey. 

CONTACT:  You can best reach me through Dear1L.com, or by email at Amanda@Dear1L.com. 

I will be psyched to hear from you!

💌 Amanda

Amanda Haverstick

Dear 1L, YOU MUST IGNORE what you learned about varying word choice. Your middle-school teacher only gave you half the story. 

Replace her rule with this new, refined rule for legal writing, and get your words right in your memo:

🔷 1: Do NOT vary the substantive words of your case.

Examples:

a/ If you write that the parties’ contract was “terminated,” don’t later write that that contract was “cancelled” or “voided.”

 b/ If you initially say that the disputed property was a “warehouse,” don’t later call it a “distribution center.”

 c/ And if you initially say the contested item was a “laptop,” don’t later call it a “computer.”
 
The problem with varying these types of substantive words is that your reader may think it means you are talking about two, distinct terms. And if your reader is confused, they will not find you credible. 

In fact, if your reader gets too confused, they may bag your brief altogether and turn to your opponent’s brief for guidance. 

		  —> That’s the WORST possible outcome.

So always be consistent with your substantive words.
 
🔷 2: DO vary your “glue” words.

 “Glue words” are transitional phrases, adjectives, and verbs that hold sentences together. You can and SHOULD vary your glue words.

 Examples: 
Moreover
However
Therefore
Thus
also
and
but
for
yet

🔷 3: DO vary “garden variety” words.

 “Garden variety” words are those that come up again and again in legal writing.

 Examples: 
allege
argue
assertion
contention
requirement
allegation

⬇️

And so, vary your “Therefores” and “Thuses,” your “Moreovers,” and your “arguments” and “contentions.”

 But don’t vary the substantive words that make your case unique and distinguishable from other cases.

 Never risk confusing your reader.

💌 Amanda

#Dear1L
#DearLegalWriter

P.S. The above is taken from a tip in my monthly legal-writing newsletter. If you’d like to access past editions and sign up for future, I’ll drop a link for you in a comment.

P.P.S. Please ask any questions you may have. Learning the difference between glue words, garden variety words, and substantive words is HARD when you’re just starting out.

Legal Writing Coach & Pre-Law Advisor. Amazon Bestselling Author, “Dear 1L: Notes to Nurture a New Legal Writer.” Big Law Alum. Law Mom.

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