Set the firm name, workspace address, timezone, jurisdictional context, and legal or numbering defaults from the settings pages that own them. These defaults should populate downstream records where appropriate so lawyers are not asked repeatedly.
Set home currency before financial activity. Multi-currency reports must still state their basis and conversion behavior.
Practice areas and custom properties should answer real routing, reporting, conflict, billing, or operational questions. Prefer a controlled option field when the firm needs consistent reporting and free text when the fact is genuinely unique.
Review unused values before adding near-duplicates.
Module activation is firm-wide availability. A module can also have its own feature, workflow, display, and access controls in the module menu. Turn on a module when the firm has an owner and a workflow for it; turn it off when it would add navigation without a real job.
Disabling a module does not mean its historical records should be deleted.