Category: Legal Technology

The Six Biggest Mistakes Law Firms Make When They Upgrade Technology

Recent featured blogger at the National Law Review –  Ben M. Schorr of Roland Schorr & Tower – provides some great insights into common mistakes made by lawfirms when upgrading technology.   

As an information services professional I’ve spent the past two decades helping law firms with their technology. Over that time I’ve come to identify 6 major mistakes that they tend to make when they install or upgrade new technology.

#1. They Don’t Have A Goal.

It’s important before you even consider upgrading your technology to ask this question: What problem are we solving? Too many firms forget what business they’re in and run around installing fancy new systems that don’t address any specific needs. Sometimes they’re talked into it by vendors or consultants; sometimes it’s the brainchild of a computer-savvy associate or staff member. Far too often the result is a lot of money spent for new systems and no increase in productivity. If you don’t have a goal, you’ll never reach it. Back home in Indiana folks say “If you don’t know where you’re going, pull over and stop ’cause you’re there.” This is rarely truer than in technology where you are constantly bombarded with possible routes – in the form of cool toys – but unless you have a destination it makes no sense to even start the car.

How can I avoid making this mistake?

Start by identifying the problem. Write it down. Write down the proposed answers. Review the problem (and proposed solutions) with the users and with your information services people (or consultants). Once you have a clearly defined (and agreed upon) problem and solution, set a timetable. Make it realistic. This can be one of the hardest parts of this step because you don’t want to rush things and end up with a hastily implemented, and poorly constructed, solution.  But at the same time you can’t drag your feet too much or the technology will change right out from under you and you may find that your preferred solution has been discontinued in favor of a new and improved (read that “more sophisticated and expensive”) solution.

#2. They Don’t Talk To Their Users.

Too many firms get a great idea for a new technology, throw the switch and roll it out to their users without even much warning to the users that it’s going to happen. As a result there is confusion, resentment, fear and a LOSS of productivity.

How can I avoid making this mistake?

Don’t just impose change from the top down or you’ll end up with users who resent and are intimidated by the new technology. Ask them what they need. Ask how they will use it. Have them compose a “wish list”. Observe their procedures. You’ll find that the users will accept the new systems much faster and easier if they have some input into its selection/creation. If you’re in a large firm consider putting together a users group of various staff members. Try to include at least two members of each category (partners, associates, paralegals, support staff, accounting, etc.) and don’t just pick the ones who know a lot about technology. Oftentimes the most valuable input will come from that partner or secretary who is awkward with the computers. Have them meet each month and ask them to talk about how the technology is (or isn’t) working for them. Have them suggest improvements. It’s important that you listen to their input and let you know that you value their contributions.

#3. They Don’t Do Their Homework (Or Pay The Smartest Kid In Class To Do It For Them).

I often see firms that buy a solution they don’t understand. What is it? How does it work? Why do we need this again? Many times they see a flashy ad or get a presentation from a salesman and sign the papers in the excitement of the moment.   They don’t clearly understand the problem or how this solution solves it.

How can I avoid making this mistake?

Do your research. Visit the Internet sites for the products you’re interested in. Visit the sites of some of their competitors. Read the trade magazines and try to keep a handle on what’s happening in the industry. Talk to the users (see #2) and vendors. Attend demos and seminars. You’ll probably have to start learning about the technology at least 3-4 months before you plan to upgrade or the hill will be too steep to climb. If you can’t (or don’t want to) do the research yourself, find a consultant that you feel comfortable with. Get recommendations from other firms in your area of people they’ve enjoyed working with. Ideally the consultant should be familiar with the solutions you’re interested in, but shouldn’t sell those solutions themselves (that way he has no financial interest in selling you something you don’t need). Never hire a consultant that you don’t trust completely. Your consultant should be able to explain the basics of the relevant technology to you in language you can understand and, most importantly, should be able to clearly explain the expected benefits to you.

#4. They Don’t Document Everything.

At one firm I worked for, I discovered that they had an entire floor of the building wired for network cabling but didn’t have a map or any other documentation about the cabling. All they had was plugs in the walls and loose wires in the computer closet. As you can imagine troubleshooting cabling problems became quite an adventure. It’s far too common to ask what kind of hardware is in use and have firms not know for sure.   Documentation failures go well beyond cabling – system configurations, numbers of licenses, software in use…oftentimes goes unrecorded and when it’s time to troubleshoot or upgrade there is not enough information available to make good decisions or accurately foresee potential problems.

How can I avoid making this mistake?

The solution is easy, but can be tedious. Insist upon complete documentation from your vendors. Maps of cabling. Labels on everything. When you deploy new equipment keep a file that indicates serial numbers and specifications (RAM, hard drive, processor, operating system, etc.). Often you can get that information from the invoice you received for the machine. Keep a list of what software you have in use, how many licenses you own, and what versions you’re running.  Document the date that the system or application was deployed and from where it was purchased. This documentation can make troubleshooting MUCH easier down the road.

#5. They Skimp On Training.

This is a VERY common error. It never fails to surprise me when I see a firm that will spend $50,000 on computer equipment but won’t spend $500 to train the users.

How can I avoid making this mistake?

The most important part of your system is the user – upgrade them! Would you fly an airline that advertises that “All of our pilots have driver’s licenses and we have a copy of “Big Planes for Dummies” in every cockpit!” I doubt it…yet many of you are flying your firms with crucial personnel who haven’t had even 20 minutes worth of training in the products that you depend upon to get your work done. Even long after the installation training can be productive. You may think that your assistant knows the ins & outs of your word processor, but what if a 2-hour class could teach him or her new tricks or secrets to get things done faster? If these new tricks saved them just 12 minutes a day that would be an entire HOUR each week that they’d gain. In a month they’d have recouped all of the time invested in the class, twice over. This goes for executives as well, by the way…

Consider bringing in an outside trainer (or even an inside resource) to do a 1-hour lunchtime training in your conference room.  Try producing an internal e-newsletter with tips and tricks for the products you use (ProLaw, Word, Excel, WordPerfect or whatever).  Encourage your users to have interest and discussions about technology.

Consider creating a “Trick of the Week” award where the person in your firm who submits the best new trick or tip for using your systems wins some prize – maybe a prime parking space in your lot for the week, an extra-long lunch break on Friday or a box of chocolates.

#6. They Don’t Follow-Up.

This comes back to talking to your users. If you don’t look out the window how do you know if you reached your destination? Don’t find out 6 months later that the staff hates the new software or that the new printers don’t work properly.

How can I avoid making this mistake?

After the upgrade is in place you need to contact your users and ask them if they’re happy. Try to be there when they first use it to get their initial reaction. Check in with them again the following day. Check in again the next week…and again weekly or bi-weekly for the next month or two. Look back at your written “goal” from #1 and see if you’ve solved your problem. If you didn’t, figure out why and make adjustments. Users will often forgive you if you find and fix problems quickly they often won’t forgive you if you give them a “solution” that doesn’t work and then leave them to deal with it on their own. Many times you’ll find that the problems are really “pilot error” and can be corrected with more (or better) training. Sometimes the problems will be equipment or software problems and finding them in the first days or weeks can mean the difference between getting your vendor to replace the inadequate product with something more suitable and getting stuck with it for the long term.

Preventing these mistakes takes a little effort but it’s not expensive. What’s expensive is making these mistakes and ending up with a system that you paid considerable money for and that leaves your users frustrated and your productivity down.

Copyright ©2011 Ronald Schorr

IQPC’s 11th eDiscovery Summit – April 27-29, 2011 San Francisco, CA – Save Big if Registered Before April 1st!

The National Law Review is a proud media partner for IQPC’s 11th eDiscovery Summit – April 27-29, 2011 San Francisco, CA

IQPC’s 11th eDiscovery Summit features hands on sessions and practical instruction to bring back to your eDiscovery teams. You will engage with IT and legal focus groups to candidly discuss anticipated push back issues, observe how different roles within your company approach imminent litigation and put bridging the gap strategies into practice.

It is no secret that you want to reduce the cost of eDiscovery, yet how do you know if you are paying a reasonable price for ESI processing and review? Do not miss this unique opportunity to learn about outside the box pricing structures and benchmark with your peers to gain a realistic picture of fair pricing for electronic information management.

Why attend the 11th eDiscovery Summit?

  • United States District Court Judges share their experiences with companies committing costly electronic discovery mistakes
  • Bridge the gap between IT and legal through a practical exercise with IT and legal focus groups
  • Learn practical steps to create a solid cross-functional eDiscovery team fostering communication and effective workflow between departments
  • Gain valuable metrics to assess the repeatability and defensibility of your eDiscovery procedures
  • Maximize the benefits of social networking and cloud computing without compromising security and increasing risk
  • Earn CLE Credits! Find out more

Registration, Location & Details…..

  • April 27 – 29, 2011 The Hyatt Regency San Francisco, CA

  • Save Big on Registration – if you sign up prior to April 1st
  • For More Information and to Register – Please Click Here:

Social Media Posts by a Third Party: Florida Bar Rules

From Business of Law Guest Blogger at the National Law Review Margaret Grisdela of  Legal Expert Connections – a great quick  overview of those tricky Florida State Bar rules concerning social media:  

Ethics in Blogging was the topic of a presentation I made this morning at the Broward County Bar Association, with co-presenter Alan Anthony Pascal, Esq. of The Florida Bar.

Posts to a lawyer’s social media page by a third party was one of the topics we covered. Below please find some highlights from the Florida Bar Guidelines for Networking Sites, which applies to Florida attorneys as well as lawyers from other states who are soliciting business in Florida.

Third Party Posts

“Although lawyers are responsible for all content that the lawyers post on their own pages, a lawyer is not responsible for information posted on the lawyer’s page by a third party, unless the lawyer prompts the third party to post the information or the lawyer uses the third party to circumvent the lawyer advertising rules.”

Removal of Non-Compliant Information from a Lawyer’s Page

“If a third party posts information on the lawyer’s page about the lawyer’s services that does not comply with the lawyer advertising rules, the lawyer must remove the information from the lawyer’s page.”

Request for Removal of Info on a Page Not Controlled by the Attorney

“If the lawyer becomes aware that a third party has posted information about the lawyer’s services on a page not controlled by the lawyer that does not comply with the lawyer advertising rules, the lawyer should ask the third party to remove the non-complying information. In such a situation, however, the lawyer is not responsible if the third party does not comply with the lawyer’s request.”

Lawyer Social Media Pages are Exempt from Filing

“Finally, the Standing Committee on Advertising is of the opinion that a page on a networking site is sufficiently similar to a website of a lawyer or law firm that pages on networking sites are not required to be filed with The Florida Bar for review.”

Page references in these guidelines can include a LinkedIn profile, a blog comment, Twitter profile, Facebook page, etc.

Read the Florida Bar Guidelines for Networking Sites here.

© Legal Expert Connections, Inc.

 

 

Why We Decided to Become Certified Legal Project Managers

From this week’s Business of Law Guest Bloggers at the National Law Review – Stacy D. Ballin and Mitchell S. Thompson of Squire, Sanders & Demsey LLP insight on the need and the process of becoming a Certified Legal Project Manager: 

On January 7, 2011, in a simple conference call, the two of us struck out upon a new venture that we believe will help us serve our clients better, and might just mark the start of a new and significant trend for law firm partners.

In a kick-off telephone conversation with consultant Jim Hassett of LegalBizDev, we plunged into an innovative program of study in the rapidly growing field of legal project management.

That conversation was the beginning of a six-month distance learning course put together by LegalBizDev that we can complete at our own pace and that leads to the title of Certified Legal Project Manager. We are among the pioneers in this, the first formal program to certify lawyers as legal project managers.

Squire, Sanders & Dempsey LLP is one of the first major legal practices to take project management to a new level. As the co-chairs of Squire Sanders’ Project Management Committee, we are taking the lead in obtaining the certification ourselves and in helping to plan how to spread best practices within the firm.

What does project management have to do with lawyers? Well, pretty much everything.  The world has changed, and clients need more than ever from their law firms. They want their lawyers to partner with them to achieve their business goals and deliver value, not to merely send them a monthly bill showing how many hours have been spent.

Like every other kind of business worldwide, law firms are becoming more cost-effective and efficient in providing their services. It’s no secret that many users of legal services – including the corporations, governments, and nonprofits, big and small, that big law firms serve — have perceived some disconnect between their costs for legal services and the value of those services. This trend has been building since the DuPont Legal Model was launched in the 1990s, and it was accelerated by the recent economic downturn.  Even as the economy improves, however, we expect clients to continue to require greater value than ever from their law firms.

The Association of Corporate Counsel’s Value Challenge is perhaps the best known of several concerted efforts by corporate counsel to improve the methods and tools that law firms use in delivering legal services. Squire Sanders has formally endorsed the Value Challenge, and adopted our own principles in the form of the Squire Sanders Partnering for Worldwide Value Covenant. Our combination with Hammonds LLP, which took effect on January 1, 2011, makes us one of a very small number of global firms that clearly articulates the importance of providing cost-effective services to our clients.

Among the principles that are integral to our covenant are that we will proactively offer our clients alternative fee structures; that we will provide budgets and estimates for each engagement and advise the client immediately if there may be material changes in cost; and that we will continuously work to become more cost-effective in the delivery of our services.

Our enrollment in legal project management certification was directly related to our value covenant. If Squire Sanders is going to live by these ambitious principles, our lawyers must understand project management and put it into practice. Unless law firms understand project management principles and put them into action, there is no way that they can thrive and deliver excellence while pursuing alternative fee structures and providing firmer budgets and estimates on hourly matters.

Project management is a well accepted technique in business and industry. It can be defined as the discipline of planning, organizing, securing, and managing resources to achieve a project’s goals within the constraints of scope, time, and budget. We are convinced that the time has come for its careful application to major legal matters, including large transactions and significant pieces of litigation.

Lawyers will benefit from project management tools because they can improve communication with their clients and focus on clients’ true needs, thereby reducing client risk and delivering greater value. Client will benefit because they can work with lawyers who put client business goals first, use creative ways to provide solutions to client challenges and ensure clients receive the best value for their investment in legal services.

There are many challenges involved in bringing the well-tested tools of project management into the legal world. For example, legal project managers must take into account client-imposed deal deadlines, due diligence requirements, opposing litigation counsel and their tactics, and deadlines and court calendars that are out of a lawyer’s or law firm’s control — but we believe that these obstacles can be overcome.

In our certification program, we will do assigned readings from six leading textbooks in the field of project management and answer a series of probing essay questions. We will focus on eight key issues that lawyers must understand in order to be effective project managers: setting objectives and defining the scope of a project; identifying and scheduling activities; assigning tasks and managing a team; planning and managing a budget; assessing risks; managing quality; managing client communication and expectations; and negotiating changes of scope. All along the way we’ll interact with Jim Hassett and his staff.

At a later stage of the course, we will apply project management concepts to an actual matter on our plates at Squire Sanders. For example, we might be asked to assume that the same situation would arise again but that this time the client insists on a fixed price at a lower total cost with better communication throughout. We will have to solve the problem with our new project management tools.

In that first conversation with Jim Hassett in January, we discussed Squire Sanders’ position in the vanguard of this emerging area and how to maximize the benefits to our clients. In future conversations, we will discuss the most efficient ways to make project management information accessible to other members of our firm so that each lawyer can determine the best way to apply these principles in his or her own practice.  We hope that the program and the certification will help our firm and our clients succeed in this rapidly changing world.

©Squire, Sanders & Dempsey All Rights Reserved 2011

 

 

Got Klout? Measuring Your Law Firm Social Media Efforts

Many thanks to our Business of Law guest blogger Kevin Aschenbrenner of Jaffe PR who provided some truly useful information on how law firms can gauge the effectiveness of their social media programs.  Read on….

One of the most frustrating aspects of actively working on law firm social mediaefforts is the feeling that you’re in a vacuum. You often can’t tell if anyone is listening. And, posting, “Do you think I’m awesome?” just won’t cut it.

This is why influence is such a hot topic in social media. Essentially, the more influence you have online the more likely it is that people will not only pay attention to you but also act on what you post. I talk more about influence in this blog post. Go ahead and read it. I’ll wait.

Welcome back. So, influence. It’s a good concept, but it’s a bit of a vicious circle – you need influence to have an impact online but you need to know what your influence is to use it to assess your law firm social media efforts. It makes my head hurt, too.

Or, it used to. Now there’s an online tool that will measure your influence. It’s called Klout (www.klout.com) and it ranks your online influence with a number out of 100. For an example, here’s a link to my Klout Score:http://klout.com/kevinaschenbren. As Klout Scores go, I’m not up there with Brian Solis (85) or Chris Brogan (84), but it’s respectable and, I’m within kissing distance of 50, which is the Klout Score required by a few hotels in Las Vegas in order to qualify for free upgrades (http://adage.com/digitalnext/post?article_id=146189).

But I digress. I’ve found Klout very helpful as a sort of diagnostic tool for my social media efforts. It’s not perfect and I quibble with some of the other information you get in your report, but it’s not a bad guidepost.

To find out your Klout Score:

  • Go to www.klout.com and type in your Twitter handle.
     
  • To see your entire report, I suggest creating an account. It’s free and gives you access to additional data and it will also ensure your score is refreshed regularly.
     
  • You can increase the accuracy of your Klout Score by linking your Facebook and LinkedIn accounts.
     
  • Check back periodically to see how your Klout Score is doing.

And, if you really want to have fun with your online influence, check out Empire Avenue (www.empireavenue.com). I’ll leave you to explore that one on your own.

© Copyright 2008-2011, Jaffe PR

One of the most frustrating aspects of actively working on law firm social mediaefforts is the feeling that you’re in a vacuum. You often can’t tell if anyone is listening. And, posting, “Do you think I’m awesome?” just won’t cut it.

This is why influence is such a hot topic in social media. Essentially, the more influence you have online the more likely it is that people will not only pay attention to you but also act on what you post. I talk more about influence in this blog post. Go ahead and read it. I’ll wait.

Welcome back. So, influence. It’s a good concept, but it’s a bit of a vicious circle – you need influence to have an impact online but you need to know what your influence is to use it to assess your law firm social media efforts. It makes my head hurt, too.

Or, it used to. Now there’s an online tool that will measure your influence. It’s called Klout (www.klout.com) and it ranks your online influence with a number out of 100. For an example, here’s a link to my Klout Score:http://klout.com/kevinaschenbren. As Klout Scores go, I’m not up there with Brian Solis (85) or Chris Brogan (84), but it’s respectable and, I’m within kissing distance of 50, which is the Klout Score required by a few hotels in Las Vegas in order to qualify for free upgrades (http://adage.com/digitalnext/post?article_id=146189).

But I digress. I’ve found Klout very helpful as a sort of diagnostic tool for my social media efforts. It’s not perfect and I quibble with some of the other information you get in your report, but it’s not a bad guidepost.

To find out your Klout Score:

  • Go to www.klout.com and type in your Twitter handle.
     
  • To see your entire report, I suggest creating an account. It’s free and gives you access to additional data and it will also ensure your score is refreshed regularly.
     
  • You can increase the accuracy of your Klout Score by linking your Facebook and LinkedIn accounts.
     
  • Check back periodically to see how your Klout Score is doing.

And, if you really want to have fun with your online influence, check out Empire Avenue (www.empireavenue.com). I’ll leave you to explore that one on your own.

© Copyright 2008-2011, Jaffe PR

Yes, It’s Data Privacy Day

Here’s some news – it’s Privacy Day !  The National Law Review was alerted to this news by Emily Holbrook of the Risk Management Monitor – read on: 

It may surprise you, as it did me, to learn that today is Data Privacy Day, an “international celebration of the dignity of the individual expressed through personal information.” But Data Privacy Day also highlights the need for individuals to protect their data and how they can go about doing so.

There are many organizations out there that aim to help individuals protect their personal information and help businesses comply with data protection laws and regulations. The Online Trust Alliance is one such organization, whose mission is to create an online trust community, promoting business practices and technologies to enhance consumer trust globally. They recently released their “2011 Data Breach Incident Readiness Guide” to help businesses in breach prevention and incident management.

According to their newest guide, the true test for organizations and businesses should be the ability to answer key questions such as:

  1. Do you know what sensitive information is maintained by your company, where it is stored and how it is kept secure?
  2. Do you have an incident response team in place ready to respond 24/7?
  3. Are management teams aware of security, privacy and regulatory requirements related specifically to your business?
  4. Have you completed a privacy and security audit of all data collection activities, including cloud services, mobile devices and outsourced services?
  5. Are you prepared to communicate to customers, partners and stockholders in the event of a breach or data loss incident?

With the White House, members of Congress, Commerce Department and the FTC calling for greater privacy controls and breach notifications, self-regulation by businesses is becoming more and more important.

Google, one of the supporters of Data Privacy Day and the initiatives of The Privacy Projects is hosting a public discussion on privacy later this afternoon with representatives from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the FTC and the National Institute of Standards and Technology scheduled to attend. If you can’t stop by Google’s DC office for this event, don’t worry — it will be captured on video and posted to YouTube soon after.

Risk Management Magazine and Risk Management Monitor. Copyright 2011 Risk and Insurance Management Society, Inc. All rights reserved.

Want your website to get noticed? Break the rules!

From Moiré Marketing Partners, the National Law Review’s Business of Law Guest Bloggers this week, Sean Leenaerts provides some interesting insights on different things to consider for legal websites:

Every time I hear someone in marketing or advertising talk about “best practices” for website design, I roll my eyes.

Now granted, many of the do’s and don’t’s of web design have merit. They’ve been tried, tested and proven to work. And I believe that certain best practices such as ease of navigation, making good use of white space, ensuring that site text is easy to read and building for fast loading times are sarcosanct. But I also believe that best practices are helping to hold marketers back.

The problem I have with best practices is that while they are there to guide everyone in website design, they also cause everyone to look pretty much the same. Adherence to best practices tends to create a formulaic, templated approach to website design. The logos, colors and images on various sites may differ, but they mirror one another in their composition–i.e. logos in the upper left, navigation at the top, copy centered or aligned to the right, vertical scrolling, etc. They’re design conventions that definitely work, but make for few standout websites.

“Okay,” I can hear you saying, “that’s all well and good. But I’m a law/accounting/financial services firm. My site has to be functional, and it should stand out because of my message, not because it looks cool and creative.” All true. But in order to read your message, your site has to be noticed first. While I’m not advocating that professional services firms push the boundaries of convention just for the sake of being different, there are a few rules you can break (or at least bend) in order to make your site stand out from the competition.

Go Horizontal

While usability studies show that most website users prefer to scroll and read text vertically, most of those studies were conducted years ago prior to the ubiquitousness of touch screens, widescreen monitors and many other developments we now take for granted. For touch screens like those on the iPhone/iPad, horizontal navigation is the preferred form of navigation because it’s more ergonomic to move your hand from side to side than up and down. In the case of monitors, screen resolutions have gotten better. We used to design for 1024 x 768 screen resolutions. Now, many screens have resolutions that are 1440 x 900 and they’re much wider, which means that viewers get more real-estate horizontally than they do vertically.

I also think–and this is strictly my opinion–that our brains are better wired to consume information horizontally. Maybe it’s because we’ve been doing it that way offine for so many years. Books are read with a horizontal flip, galleries place paintings and photographs alongside each other, and most of our world is organized horizontally rather than vertically–i.e. our houses are next to each other and we move through the world in a mostly linear fashion.

Chart a New Course

Navigation buttons and links should always be easy to find, but do they always need to be at the top or along the sides of the page? And do they always have to be “buttons”? Unconventional navigation–as long as its easy to find and figure out–has the ability to engage the audience and keep them on your site. A good example of navigation that breaks with traditional design and works well is from the web design firm Hello Goodlooking in Helsinki, Finland:

Here, the navigation buttons are centered on the page and move to the sides when you click on them and open a window. They’re easy to see, easy to understand and make the site simply downright fun to navigate.

Shift Your Perspective

Right-aligned page content is often not seen in a world of centered or left-aligned web pages.  Whenever I come across a page that is aligned uniquely, I have to pause and take a second look. It’s a simple (and safer) way to look unique without having to deviate from other conventions of website design.

Be Bold

Using reversed type, multiple typefaces and unique fonts is generally frowned upon in website design. Yet sites that do all or some of these things tend to grab a lot of attention–and not necessarily for all the wrong reasons. And you don’t have to be a kooky design firm to do it. Morrison Foerster is a law firm whose website is truly unique within the industry. No images, just type–and mostly reversed type, at that. Big, bold headlines. A conversational tone. And don’t even get me started on their careers site, which has to be one of the best in any industry. Most law firms make claims to be different and innovative. MoFo’s website backs it up.

Sometimes breaking with best practices is worthwhile. In fact, I’ll go so far as to say that it’s the only way to truly stand out. Striving for innovative design and a better way of web browsing has brought about some great changes in the last decade. Being different to be better is a perfect example of when the rules of best practices should be broken.

Copyright © 2011 Moiré Marketing Partners, Inc. All rights reserved.

ABA Second Annual Electronic Discovery & Digital Evidence Workshop Feb 18-19 San Francisco, CA

The National Law Review is a proud supporter of the ABA’s  Second Annual Electronic Discovery and Digital Evidence Practitioners’ Workshop Feb 18-19 in San Francisco, CA.

This practitioners’ workshop will provide in-depth and hands-on education for in-house and retained counsel who are involved in (or who expect to become involved in) litigation involving electronic discovery and digital evidence. Executives and other litigation stakeholders from large and small public and private organizations will also gain invaluable insights on how best to prepare your technical staff and information systems to respond to requests for electronically stored information (ESI). Addressed to intermediate and advanced ESI litigation practitioners, the workshop will be taught by our faculty of leading federal magistrate judges, ESI litigation practitioners, forensics experts, and technology thought leaders, all of whom have significant experience in managing all aspects of ESI litigation. This workshop is unique in that its scope is much broader and deeper than traditional e-discovery courses that address only basic ESI concepts.

The curriculum consists of case studies, a mock trial, keynote sessions and panel discussions with luminaries in the field, and small workshops for practitioners, technologists, and forensic experts. We expect the entire program will be both illuminating and entertaining. Topics will range from ESI search trends and developments to emerging digital evidence issues and ethics to evidentiary issues from a criminal perspective. The sessions will address the key rules from the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure that impact on e-discovery. There will also be plenty of time for interaction with three federal magistrate judges and for networking at the receptions at the end of each day. 

The Conference will be held at the University of California – Hastings College of Law and  mandatory continuing legal education (MCLE) accreditation has been requested from all states that require continuing legal education.  15.25hours of CLE credit including 1.0 hours of Ethics credit have been requested from those states recognizing a 60-minute credit hour and  18.3 hours of CLE credit including 1.0 hours of Ethics credit have been requested from those states recognizing a 50-minute credit hour.

Click Here for More Information and to Register.

When Is Research Misleading?

Sue Stock Allison, the Managing Director of The Brand Research Company, as Sister Company to Greenfield / Belser Ltd.  was recently the National Law Review’s recent Business of Law Guest Blogger.  Sue shared five key things for Law Firms to keep in mind when performing opinion research.  

Sometimes, when it comes to opinion research, what you see is not necessarily what you get. For instance, focus group moderators can inadvertently (or purposely) create bias among recipients. Or when questioned about buying habits or intentions, people may tell questioners what they want to hear, rather than what they actually feel.

I can’t count the number of times I’ve cautioned against considering all research valuable or even accurate. But there are ways to ensure that your findings are sound when undertaking research among your clients, your organization members or your markets.

Here are five tips for making sure the research your firm is using is useful:

1. Know your Goals

I know you’re thinking, “Of course, we need goals!” but, alas, research can be initiated for nutty reasons. My personal favorite: “Everyone else is doing it.” That everyone else is doing it may make initiating a new study an excellent recommendation, but you still must match your research goals to your business goals. Do you define success by a measurable return on the research investment, or do you just want to touch your most loyal clients? Are you trying to guide or justify a specific marketing expenditure or, more loosely, gauge awareness in a particular market? Knowing what you want to achieve is crucial to obtaining the data you need. Detailing the specific information you want to know, even using hypothetical statements of finding, can help you to make your objectives clear. In this case, the cart (what you wish to carry away from the research) truly comes before the horse.

2. Fully Define Your Target Audience

Do you put stock in those general market studies that “rank” your business better or worse than others? Syndicated studies are great gossip and provide fodder for your website’s homepage

(“We’re #1 in reputation for excellence for the third straight year!”), but there is limited value in being considered number one for anything if those who provide the ratings do not purchase or even influence the purchase of your services.

When conducting research, or using research conducted by someone else, you need to ensure that respondents include individuals whose opinions you really need to know. Do you want to know what your top 25 clients think, your clients with the highest potential or your clients who seem to be fading away? Are you looking for guidance from prospects for a specific service, in a specific geographic area, or from a certain type of business? If existing research was conducted among exactly the right group of individuals–excellent! If not, you’ll need to conduct your own research to get what matters to you.

3. Select the Best Methodology

As popular as they are, focus groups are one of the most misused research methodologies. They are a qualitative research method, statistically invalid, which necessarily makes them ill-suited for drawing conclusions about habits or actions. Whether you conduct one session with 10 individuals or 10 sessions with a total of 100 individuals, they are never conclusive. Focus groups are, however, an excellent way to come up with ideas about proclivities or intent that can later be tested with quantitative surveys. Focus groups can help you discover undetected problems with an ad campaign, potential challenges of a new service offering, or the usability of a website design. But when you want to understand what is most important among a number of choices, what really drives client loyalty, or how to best position your business in a market—these objectives require a quantitative method that can provide the metrics you need.

4. Ask the Right Questions the Right Way

Another common problem with focus groups and other forms of research is how easily respondents can be led to particular responses, and how hard it is for them to accurately assess and report their own motivations. When you develop your discussion guide, in-depth questionnaire or survey instrument, you need to make sure the questions are not leading, that your respondents are not primed to answer in a particular way. (In fact, when conducting focus groups, I often ask participants to write down their initial impressions before discussion even begins.) For telephone or in-person interviews, make sure your interviewers are skilled in the techniques that will bring even subconscious motivations to the surface.

5. Interpret with Caution

How do you know if your findings are truly reliable? Even if you’ve clearly laid out your goals, comprehensively defined your target, picked the best methodology, designed an effective research instrument, and used excellent interviewers, the results can still be misleading if your interpretation of the findings is flawed. Reliable interpretation begins with proper analysis of the data, which requires understanding how the target population was selected and ensuring that your resultant data includes the information needed to feed your conclusions. Perhaps the most common problems are conducting quantitative analyses with too few responses, or having a response rate that is too low–both of which beg the question: How do the non-respondents differ from those who are included in the research?

So, is research misleading? It certainly can be, but by using these guidelines, you can take the necessary steps to ensure that your research will more accurately provide the information you need.

©2011 Greenfield/Belser Ltd.

 

Law2020™- What Will It Take for Law Firms to Thrive?

The Business of Law guest blogger at the National Law Review this week is Meredith L. Williams of Baker Donelson. Meredith examines three areas:  Law firm Technology, Firm Characteristics and the Skill set Lawyers and makes educated predictions on how successful will look.  

Law2020™ is the brainchild of Bryan Cave’s Strategic Technology Partner John Alber and the International Legal Technology Association (ILTA).  I have had the privilege of working with John and the ILTA organization over the past 4 years as a part of the conferencing planning committee.  This year I am serving as a Conference Vice-President for the upcoming international conference being held in Nashville, TN from August 21st – 25th, 2011.

The concept of Law2020™ is based upon an anticipation of the legal industry encountering the same market dynamics that have challenged the newspaper industry since 2000-2010.  The online environment changed newspapers’ production, employment and consumption.  The ACC Value Challenge has placed law firms under a microscope like that the newspaper industry is under, thus requiring the legal industry to make strategic changes to meet the new needs of clients.  Will law firms see a similar shift due to the economy and the changing client landscape?  What can law firms learn from the newspaper industry and those papers that survived?   The real question for forward-thinking law firms is not what will it take for law firms to survive in the year 2020, but what will it take to thrive?

We will look at this concept from 3 perspectives:

1.       What technologies will successful law firms need in 2020?

2.       What will be the characteristics of successful law firms in 2020?

3.       What will be the skill set of successful lawyers and staff in 2020?

What technologies will law firms need in 2020?

Technology will continue to play a large role, as it does today, in the advancement of law firms in the year 2020.  The key trends of technology will center on legal project management, alternative fee arrangements, transparency, and mobility.

The majority of law firms are starting to look at legal project management and alternative fee arrangement  tools.  Although these are new concepts for law firms, the thought process behind both is not new.  Lawyers are already using use many tools to help manage their files.  However, the idea of pre-planning is new;  taking a step back and visualizing the entire case or deal and mapping out the various steps and risks to reach an end result, as well as the cost of each step.  Tasking, budgeting and knowledge management tools will continue to grow exponentially over the next 10 years as a result of client desire for more understanding and control.  Intranets, budget tools, tasking applications, and other project management tools will be in high demand.

A lesson learned through the WikiLeaks scandal is that transparency of information is now expected, not just desired. The same can be said of law firm clients.  Clients crave both an advocate and a partner.  They want to understand everything that a lawyer is doing for them, they want the lawyer to fix problems, and they want the lawyer to help manage risk. Tools such as extranets provide the client with a full view of all case and deal materials; these are now being  used by many law firms in the U.S.  Over the next 10 years, clients will have access to risk management tools via these legal service platforms.  Clients will be able to use online legal services provided by law firms to run their businesses and comply with new regulations and laws.

The number one trend law firms must deal with is mobility.  The IPad, IPhone, Blackberry and other mobile device growth over the past few years is an indication of what individuals will be expecting in the coming years.  All people, including clients, want to access their applications and information when, where, and how they want.  As mentioned earlier, extranets and information sharing will increase over the next decade.  In addition, video capabilities and cloud computing will be prominent technologies for all law firms.  Law firms are expanding; however, there is a desire to cut expenses but keep the personal interaction.  Video via conferencing, web cams, etc. can make this happen.  Law firms are also looking to the Cloud as an opportunity to cut slim expenses and create complete mobile enviroments.  Whether a firm chooses to place all critical application in the Cloud or only a few,  Cloud use will continue to grow in the legal industry.

What will be the characteristics of law firms in 2020?

As technology changes over the next 10 years, so will the characteristics of law firms.  Much of this will be a result of the changing landscape of clients. Additonally, management will shift to accommodate a new generation with different expectations.  Other new resources include the virtual law firm, outsourcing, partnership track changes, increased risk sharing with clients and possible investments by non-lawyers.

Virtual law firms and lawyer mobility will increase.  Brick and mortar buildings will not go away, but we will see an increase of lawyers choosing to work for a firm while at home or in a different location.  In addition, legal process outsourcing will appear in law firms over the coming years.  Many firms are venturing into this field with document review and other e-discovery tasks.  Clients are pushing to keep expenses low and no longer want to pay large costs for firms to do document review tasks, when these can be outsourced for half the cost.

As noted in the alternative fee arrangements and transparency discussion, clients are looking for a partner to help bear some of the risk with their representation.  Many clients will not pay the typical billable hour.  They want to hire firms that are willing to share this risk and allow for different methods of payment.  Some want flat fees with exceptions or bonuses based upon the efforts of the law firms.  With these new methods of revenue for a law firm, the traditional path to partnership, currently based primarily on billable hour requirements, will change.  How law firms react to this will determine whether they retain their lawyer resources.

One law firm characteristic available in other countries is the ability to have law firm investment by non-lawyers.  Allowing non-lawyers to invest in the firm creates more loyalty to the law firm and the work the non-lawyer is doing for the firm and clients.  It is something US firms will consider as the economic shift continues to reshape law firms as we know it.

What will be the skill set of lawyers and staff in 2020?

We have now taken a look at what technologies will be used by law firms in 2020 and what a law firm will look like.  The bigger question is what skills will be required by lawyers and staff in 2020?  Efficiency of the law practice, a streamline business model, relationship building and marketing via social media and the capability to work via a new legal service platform will dominate the skills of lawyers in 10 years.

As discussed above, the economy and client expectations will drive many changes in the legal industry, including the skill sets needed to practice and support the practice. To be specific, lawyers will begin to hone their practices to increase efficiency.  This will be mainly a result of the increase in LPM and AFAs.  By breaking down different areas of law into steps and risks, lawyers will better understand each step and will find ways to deliver a better quality work product at a lower cost.

In addition, law firms will begin to consider streamlining certain tasks through administrative staffs to create better business processes.  For example, layering secretaries with 5-6 attorneys and then creating an additional level of executive assistants to provide project management and client communication is something new that law firms will consider.  This will allow new alternative paths for legal staff.

Lawyers also need to learn to market and build relationships via social media. This is the biggest change we have seen over the past few years, and the usage is drastically increasing.  This new form of communication and collaboration needs to be harnessed for a lawyers to reach certain clients with younger and innovative leadership.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the legal profession will see changes over the next decade.  How a firm adapts to the changes in the practice of law and client needs will determine whether that firm will survive.  For additional information regarding Law2020™, please visit the International Legal Technology Association Peer to Peer Magazine on the concept.

©2010 Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell & Berkowitz, PC. All Rights Reserved.