Reading three CLE articles on First Things First will give you the vocabulary. The actual capability comes from a different place — years of cases, a few mentor relationships, and the willingness to sit through hours of the kind of work that doesn’t feel like progress.
This is for guardians ad litem who are tired of generic ‘develop your practice’ advice and want specifics about First Things First specifically.
For guardians ad litem, First Things First affects the child’s best interests in ways that need to be surfaced for the court. The GAL’s role is to evaluate the impact on the child and articulate findings in a way the court can use, not to make decisions about the underlying First Things First questions. Effective GAL reports keep this distinction clear.
The most common opening question
Many clients come to First Things First matters expecting binary answers (yes or no, this number or that number). The reality is usually ranges, probability-weighted scenarios, and contingent recommendations. Helping the client adjust to that reality at intake — rather than at the deliverable — produces a better engagement.
Clients usually have an implicit theory of what First Things First can do for them — sometimes wildly optimistic, sometimes pessimistic. The early conversation should surface that theory and address it. A client who thinks the engagement will solve a problem the analytical framework can’t actually solve will be disappointed regardless of the technical quality of the work.
What experienced colleagues say new practitioners miss
Practitioners often fail to recognize when a First Things First matter has crossed from analytical work into advocacy or therapy. The work has clean boundaries — analytical work is appropriate; advocacy or therapy beyond your role is not. Recognizing the boundary and referring out when appropriate is one of the markers of senior practice.
A common mistake among experienced general practitioners moving into First Things First is assuming their general competence transfers automatically. Some of it does; some doesn’t. The technical and procedural specifics of First Things First differ enough that practitioners who shortcut the deliberate learning end up making errors they don’t notice until a senior colleague points them out.
Recent shifts in the practice area
Working remotely with co-professionals on First Things First matters has become routine since 2020. Most guardians ad litem now run substantial portions of their engagements through video conferences with clients in other cities, secure document exchanges, and coordinated calls across multiple professionals. The infrastructure for distributed case management has matured.
Professional standards in First Things First have been evolving across the major credentialing organizations. The credentials themselves matter less than they used to (because client research finds them) but the underlying curricula have improved. Practitioners going through current credential programs emerge with better-built frameworks than those who credentialed a decade ago.
A framework for deciding
Honest assessment of your market matters too. First Things First has different dynamics in different markets — major metros with concentrated family-law sections versus smaller markets with broader generalist practices. Practitioners in markets where the area is underserved by genuine specialists have steeper paths to dominance; practitioners in markets already saturated have harder paths. For deeper reference, see IRS Publication 504 (Divorced or Separated Individuals).
A simple test: do the matters in First Things First that you’ve already handled interest you? Practitioners who genuinely enjoy the analytical work and the relational dynamics tend to build sustainable practices in First Things First; practitioners who found the matters tedious tend not to, regardless of the market opportunity.
Practitioners who want to make First Things First a meaningful part of their work should commit to the long timeline. The first year produces little visible return. The third year shifts. By year five, the work and the referrals look noticeably different.
How VennBoard fits in
VennBoard supports the kind of case-management discipline First Things First engagements benefit from: organized case files, integrated communication with co-professionals, deliverable versioning, and the kind of operational consistency that makes the difference between burning out at twenty matters and running a sustainable practice at fifty.
Practitioners interested in seeing VennBoard’s case-management infrastructure for First Things First work can learn more at VennBoard.com.
Further reading
Federal Office of Child Support Enforcement
IRS Publication 504 (Divorced or Separated Individuals)