In Clio Manage, the practice area records the type of law a matter falls under. Practice areas drive how your firm groups matters, and each one carries its own matter stages board. Setting them up before creating matters keeps matter organization, stage tracking, and reporting consistent from the start.
Two settings tabs control practice areas.
- Practice areas are the list your firm works from, where you add, rename, and delete entries.
- Practice area enablement controls which of Clio's 58 practice area categories your firm turns on, and which one is primary. Both sit under Settings > Firm Preferences, alongside Matter numbering.
Note: Practice area settings are available to administrators.
Manage practice areas
Adding, renaming, and deleting practice areas all happen on one settings tab. Clio Manage arrives pre-populated with a set of practice areas, so your firm can work from those or build its own.
- Go to Settings > Firm Preferences > Practice areas.
- Click Add practice area.
- Enter the name and click Save.
- Go to Settings > Firm Preferences > Practice areas.
- Under Actions, click the pencil icon for the practice area you want to rename.
- Enter the new name and click Save.
Note: If you want to delete practice areas that are assigned to a current matter, you will need to reassign those matters first, or clear the unused practice areas using bulk operations.
- Go to Settings > Firm Preferences > Practice areas.
- Under Actions, click the trash can icon for the practice area you want to delete.
- At the warning prompt, click Delete practice area.
Remove unused practice areas in bulk
Bulk operations clear out practice areas your firm no longer uses, in one pass rather than one at a time. Administrators can run it from Settings > Bulk Operations. When performing a bulk operation, choose the operation, generate a preview, review exactly what will change, and then perform it.
Important: Bulk operations affect large amounts of data and cannot be undone. Once an operation starts, it runs to completion. Use the preview step to review the full list before confirming.
Tip: Each operation stays in the table as a record. To clear a queued operation you decided against, or tidy up a completed one, click Delete on its row and confirm. Deleting the record is permanent, and it leaves your practice areas untouched.
- Go to Settings > Bulk Operations.
- Click Add.
- Select Remove Unused Practice Areas.
- Click Generate Preview. The operation appears in the table with a State of Preview Queued, which becomes Preview Completed once the preview finishes. Larger firms wait longer.
- Click Preview and review the list of entries to be deleted.
- Click Confirm Deletion to accept the preview and return to the Bulk Operations page. To stop instead, click Cancel.
- Click Perform Operation.
- In the warning window, click OK to begin the deletion.
Enable practice area categories and set a primary
Practice area enablement controls which of Clio's practice area categories your firm turns on, so the product reflects the work your firm actually does. The primary category marks the one your firm works in most.
- Go to Settings > Firm Preferences > Practice area enablement.
- Find the category you want. The list runs to 58 categories across several pages, and each row carries a status of Enabled or Disabled.
- Click Enable for that category.
- In the Enable practice area category window, under Practice area category status, select Enabled.
- Optional: Check the box for Make primary practice area category.
- Click Save. To turn a category off, open the same window and select Disabled.
Up next
Create and Manage Matter Stages. Every practice area carries its own stages board, so build the stages that match how your firm runs each type of case.