Drafting Guidelines

A How-To Kit provides a step-by-step procedure for completing a common legal transaction or task. Your goal is to deliver a set of clear and complete instructions, with legal authority and any related forms, that will serve as a helpful starting point for any practitioner. The following is a summary of the parts included in a How-To Kit. See the sample for an example of a finished kit.

A succinct description of the legal transaction or task, beginning with a verb and limited to 70 characters (provided by ICLE staff lawyer).

Your name, as you want it to appear online. When the kit is posted online, your byline will link to your ICLE biography and photo.

The list of all the steps needed to complete the legal transaction or task.

• Each step should begin with a complete sentence (e.g., Step 1: Develop a record retention policy.).
• Each step is followed by one or more explanatory paragraphs containing succinct, practical guidance. Feel free to include lists within the steps if that is helpful. Each step must contain at least a sentence of explanatory text.

The ICLE staff lawyer will provide a short paragraph about what the kit covers and when it should be used, followed by a list of helpful ICLE and other resources.

The Additional Practice Guidance section provides additional explanation, definitions, ancillary issues, pitfalls, practice pointers, legal strategies, or other relevant material. Organize this part of the kit using subheadings if you cover multiple topics (see the Additional Practice Guidance section in the sample kit); arrange the topics in the order you refer to them in the Step-by-Step Guidance.

Include an Instructions section if you need to provide additional instructions for specific tasks in any of the steps, such as filling out forms or filing documents. Use subheadings to organize this material if you provide multiple instructions; arrange the topics in the order mentioned in the Steps.

Include or suggest necessary drafted or government forms that should be included in the kit. ICLE staff will create links to all forms in the kit. Users will be able to view the forms online and, for drafted forms, download a word processing version to customize for their own matter.