I will be speaking at the District of Oregon Conference entitled, Innovations in the Law: Science and Technology, on Friday of this week at the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry in Portland. Speakers for the event will have 6-12 minutes to present on a number of topics including “improving the delivery of legal services, innovations in the courts, gaps in the law, and how the public’s use of technology impacts law enforcement.” Many of the speakers on the roster were involved in the ReInvent Law event in Silicon Valley last spring. I will be giving my 6 minute Ignite style talk on the consumer law revolution and how lawyers can collaborate with branded networks to increase access and delivery. If you are in Portland on Friday, consider registering for the event.
Tag: Practice Management
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Chapter from New International Report on Online Legal Services
This summer I wrote a report for Managing Partner, a UK-based publishing company focused on law firm management. The report is for lawyers who are interested in learning about and possibly adding online legal services to their law firms. Here is the Executive Summary and Chapter One.This is not intended to be an academic report so there are few citations and more checklists and recommendations for analysis and implementation. It is written for lawyers who want to focus on client-development and customer service for existing clients by adding online services in their firms. The case studies I reviewed are law firms that are successfully doing this. For example, Brilliant Law in the UK and Slater & Gordon in Australia. I’m not focusing on branded networks or companies in this report.
The chapter I wish they would have given me to share is the final one where I take a look at why online legal service delivery by firms have not been as quickly adopted or as successful as many had hoped and what I think needs to be done to see it evolve and really increase access to legal services for the public. I will try to make this the subject of a blog post soon because I think there are definitely some lessons to be learned from this research that need to be shared. You can purchase a copy of the full report here.
This report was international in scope, but I had difficulty finding firms in some areas that were marketing and delivering their services online. Some areas I neglected to write about simply because I couldn’t find anything there (Africa, South America, China, Japan, Russia, and others). I’m sure there must be some innovation in online delivery happening there, but to what extent? Already, since turning in the proofs last month, I’ve learned about a new company in Germany that is focused on online delivery. That’s the nature of this topic and why I should only write easily editable ebooks!
As always, feedback, comments, and connections to others innovating in this space, are gratefully encouraged.
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Infographic: Technology in Legal Education
This was my first attempt at creating an infographic using Piktochart. Any feedback is welcome! It’s challenging for a writer to think in terms of graphic design, but I’m trying!
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State of Online Delivery – Pre-Report Overview
Last week I finished the first draft of a report for The Ark Group tentatively titled “Online Legal Services for the Client-Centric Law Firm.” This report gave me the opportunity to review the current state of online delivery internationally by private practitioners and law firms. It was a great way to update the material I had written in my earlier book on virtual law practice.
To set some reasonable parameters for this report, I limited it to a review of only private practitioners and law firms. I did not include the many other forms of online delivery that we are seeing by for-profit companies, branded networks, and other exciting new ventures around the globe. I also excluded firms that only provide clients with online self-help tech tools, such as those for compliance, online libraries of articles, or web calculators or advisers that clients would use on their own. The focus here was on the engagement online between the lawyer and the clients to solve their specific legal need.
Overall, I was a little surprised and disappointed by the slow growth of online delivery since I started operating my virtual law office back in 2006 and wrote the book on the topic in 2010 – not just the lack of adoption by practitioners but also by the lack of truly new innovative technology solutions for delivery. This strikes me as odd given the fast pace of change in delivery of legal services from the consumer perspective. (more…)
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Center for Law Practice Technology
This week I signed on as Co-Director of a Center for Law Practice Technology which I will be leading with Richard Granat. Over the coming months, we will be working to design a core curriculum and body of courses that reflects our experience in legal tech and draws from the expertise of our colleagues internationally. We hope to bring guest lectures and experts to the Center that will not only provide practical background in law practice management and the use of legal technology, but who will also foster a spirit of entrepreneurship and innovative thinking.
I have been teaching courses related to the use of technology in law practice for several years as an adjunct professor at various law schools and have also provided many guest lectures for classes and programs. Working with law students provides a wonderful challenge and opportunity to share and learn what is needed for our next generation of legal professionals to thrive in a changed legal marketplace. This experience has also given me the chance to use various distance learning platforms, pull a few together on my own, and figure out what works and does not work from a design and teaching perspective. (more…)
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Breaking News: Major US Bank Offers Online Legal Services in Business Hub
An exciting breakthrough in online delivery is occurring through the new offering that Suntrust Bank is launching. They have partnered with a third party to create an online Business Hub which provides legal services in addition to assistance with planning, websites, data backup and finances.
From the website: “This online portal helps you create legal documents, develop business plans and generate invoices and financial reports.” It appears to be a one-stop shop for small business owners who need accounting and planning software, and even some marketing services. The service also claims to provide risk assessment services for businesses through the legal services tools.
Business Centric Services Group, Inc. is the named developer of the Business Hub according to the Terms of Service. Both Epoq Legal, a company based in the UK, and DirectLaw, a US based company are providing technology components to this project. Mozy Pro, PlanHQ, Moonfruit and Freeagent are also providing software. The link on Suntrust takes the user to a third-party website that is run by the Business Centric Services Group, Inc. All of the tools provided in the Hub cost the user $25 a month which may be debited from the user’s Suntrust account.The online legal services are provide through a product called Legal Document Builder. According to the site, this lets the business owner handle the following:
– Create legal documents for your business from a wide range of templates using a straight forward question and answer process.
– Templates include: website terms and conditions, privacy policy, tenancy agreement, debt recovery letters, shareholders agreement and many more.
– Avoid risks and disputes that could financially weaken your business and comply with Health & Safety legislation by performing risk assessments and more.
That’s a lot of practical software in one place for a small business owner for only $25 a month. I haven’t had time to dig into the details of using each product on the Hub because I have not registered yet. But as a small business owner myself and having been a solo practitioner for many years, I can certainly see the appeal of this package of unbundled legal and other services. I do not at this point see any reference to licensed lawyers providing support for the legal documents. For many small business owners’ legal needs, this would not even be necessary. However, there may be more options available once you register.
In my classes, I tell the law students to think about what happened when Intuit got into the tax business. What happened to accountants when Turbo Tax went on the market? Then I ask: “What would happen to estate planning or small business legal services if Turbo Tax added those online options at the end of the annual tax software?” How many consumers are going to go straight through that trusted brand for the convenience and the fact that their confidential information is already being handled in that space. With this new online Business Hub from Suntrust, it seems like that future is starting to get here.
How will pure-play virtual law offices serving business law manage to compete with $25/month for all of these services? I will leave that for another post.
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Minimalism & Virtual Law Practice
This will be a personal post. Fellow virtual lawyers might find my recent experience with minimalism and moving interesting. It touches on the main reason many of us are attracted to online delivery and the use of technology in law practice – more freedom and efficiency.
When I first designed my virtual law office and launched it back in 2006, a large part of my motivation was my daughter who had just been born. I needed the flexibility to care for her and was not interested in racking up the traditional lawyer hours in an office. I also loved working with my clients and thought there was a more convenient way to deliver services to them. I could also use the efficiency to lower my fees to be more affordable. I have a transactions-based practice so unbundling and online delivery made sense.
BEFORE Over the last seven years, although I was almost completely paperless and virtual, I accumulated “stuff” in my home office and my house. The simplicity of being able to work online and not get lost in the office environment was replaced with recreating an office environment in my own home. Not good.
So I decided to research minimalism. This is a renewed trend that has emerged since the recession hit. It’s a more positive way to embrace being faced with unemployment, foreclosure, debt and other situations that threaten to remove us from our tangible possessions. If you can’t afford to purchase things or are forced to sell or give up your possessions, that involves loss, but if you willingly choose to give up those things there is a greater sense of control over your life and it can be empowering rather than depressing. I like this approach to life in general. I thought I would adopt some of these principles while also doing some reading on mindfulness (a post for another day and very applicable to legal professionals). (more…)
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Connecting a Mobile Game to Real World Legal Services
Here is an update on my game project. In my previous posts I’ve explained why I believe we can use the power of games to help us engage and empower the public to learn basic laws and legal issues. I’ve also explained the difference between gamification of the law and games that involve legal topics. The next step is to explain more specifically how a game like what I’m building with my team can increase access to real-world legal services as well as educate the public.According to my game designer, this concept is a little revolutionary for the game industry and I’m guessing it will be for the legal profession as well. Please read all the way through before jumping to conclusions.
The game we are creating is intended to teach the public basic estate planning issues. These are not state specific legal issues. These are very basic. For example, level one of the game addresses this basic, simple fact: If you have children, you should name a guardian in your Will.
Yes, as a lawyer, I know full well how you can take a simple statement, add a bunch of “but what ifs” and make it the most convoluted and complex thing in the world. But that’s not what we are doing here. Rest assured there will be the usual disclaimer at the start of the game stating that this is not a substitute for legal services provided by a licensed lawyer – as if anyone would actually be misled into thinking that a mobile game featuring a time machine is going to really be able to do that. But still, just in case and mostly for the lawyers, we’ll have those disclaimers on there.
That aside, now for the fun part. (more…)
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Video: ReInvent Law Presentation
This is the video of my “ignite-style” presentation at the ReInvent Law Conference in Silicon Valley a couple months ago. I’m speaking at a super fast pace about branded networks, lawyer advertising, and online delivery of legal services.
Stephanie Kimbro – Consumer Law Revolution from ReInvent Law Channel on Vimeo.
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Writing, Writing and More Writing
A few articles to note and a request for leads:
- A Symposium on Justice, Lawyering and Legal Education in the Digital Age will be held by Chicago-Kent College of Law this week in conjunction with the CALI’s 2013 Conference for Law School Computing. Richard Granat and I co-wrote an article entitled The Teaching of Law Practice Management and Technology in Law Schools: A New Paradigm, for the symposium which has been published in the law school’s law review.
- I also wanted to point out Will Hornsby’s article in this journal entitled, Gaming the System: Approaching 100% Access to Legal Services Through Online Games, an earlier copy of which I read with great interest. I incorporated some of his research on this topic into the business plan for my game project.
- My chapter entitled “eProfessionalism” has been published this month in the new book from the ABA Center for Professional Responsibility entitled Essential Qualities of the Professional Lawyer.
- I’m collecting research and case studies for an international report on online legal services that I’ve been commissioned to write. In particular, I’m looking for examples of online delivery methods by private practitioners and law firms in Asia, Africa and South America. If you know of any studies that cover these countries, please share.
I like to write.