|
My longtime, extremely competent and patient paralegal
Rose Chidester had announced her well-deserved retirement.
No longer could I simply ask Rose where she had filed
a particular document, nor expect as a matter of course
a flawless billing and accounting cycle. I could not
simply send an email to Rose asking her to work some
problems with the medical liens in a personal injury
case. The reality is, in our rural area, experienced
paralegals are few and far between. It was time to start
from scratch and to rethink all aspects of my office's
automation.
Starting from scratch entailed many decisions, including
the overall level of automation and the extent to which
I was willing to personally perform tasks formerly done
via support staff. Clearly, though, it was time to fully
implement some basic "enabling" technologies
that more efficiently perform certain tasks such as
typing dictation, and filing on a much more consistent
basis. Rather than spending a lot time and money on
frills, toys, or bleeding edge technology, it seemed
important to focus on solid, substantive ways to automate
basic day-to-day law office functions. The goal was
to both increase each person's effectiveness and also,
by reducing unnecessary effort by skilled staff, increase
my office's basic economic efficiency and cost effectiveness.
NETWORKING
Few of the "enabling" technologies discussed
below work very effectively if your office is not already
networked. As a practical matter, wiring a law office
with a highly capable local area network, whether Microsoft
or Novell, either based upon a simple peer-to-peer network
or dependent upon a central file server, is an obvious
necessity. Without networking, a law office cannot communicate
effectively and without effective communication, a law
office cannot operate efficiently.
Generally accessible data files such as case notes,
prior word processing documents, contact and conflict
of interest information, internal Email, and calendar
functionality are about the most basic networking applications
imaginable. These basic programs so greatly improve
the cost and efficiency of routine intra-office communication
that any office that has not already implemented such
programs is basically just waiting around for the giant
asteroid to hit and cause them to become selectively
extinct.
Your choice of a basic internal communications program
is not critical so long as you use a program that allows
you to dial in from outside the office to pick up messages
while you're out of the office. Many offices like Microsoft
Exchange and Outlook. I continue to prefer Office-Logic
from LAN-ACES because of its simple interface, ease
of use, and wide range of basic functions. Our office
had about 15 years of data in that program, converted
from time to time as we upgraded to newer versions.
In itself, it is a really good reason to continue using
the existing program so long as it serves the purpose.
However, given the increasing interconnection between
Microsoft Outlook and various third party legal application
programs, you might do better choosing Outlook if you're
starting from scratch.
The staff time savings from networking is not readily
quantified but is significant.
DICTATION
First and foremost among my new automation initiatives
to reduce overhead was the use, to the maximum extent
possible, voice recognition and dictation programs in
place of simply providing oral instructions to experienced
staff. Switching to voice recognition was relatively
easy in some ways because IBM's ViaVoice 10 Pro USB
model is quite effective and accurate. I found the accuracy
of IBM's voice recognition software was considerably
improved when I used the Plantronics DSP 300 headset
included by IBM as part of the Pro USB package. Dictation
accuracy improved even more when I later purchased a
higher end Plantronics DSP 500 headset. You can buy
the complete program, including the DSP300 and program
for about $220. A DSP 500 headset will set you back
another $90 or so. I found that voice recognition worked
best for me when I could use a digital recorder optimized
for use with ViaVoice. Sony and Olympus make compatible
models, costing between $190 and $300 retail.
The maximum benefit to be realized from voice recognition
technology occurs when you can simply call up voice
macros, such as your letterhead already addressed to
the appropriate person or the pleading captions in a
case. Here, unfortunately, ViaVoice continues to miss
the mark. I found that voice recognition speed and accuracy
is clearly best when dictating into IBM's own SpeakPad
word processing program rather than dictating directly
into Microsoft Word or WordPerfect. Dictation directly
into an application program tends to result in slower
recognition speed, even when used on a very fast computer,
and often results in maddening and erratic operation,
particularly, wandering cursors and unpredictable deletions.
I also found that ViaVoice speech macros could be created
only within IBM's own SpeakPad dictation program. ViaVoice
does accurately capture the text of a proposed voice
recognition macro, but completely fails as a means of
directly setting up pleading captions and letters complete
with name, address and properly formatted letterhead.
Basically, ViaVoice macros lose all font and formatting
information, resulting in a relatively useless plain
text macro. IBM acknowledges the deficiency in its program
but has not advised of any plans to correct it. Until
then, a law office's use of ViaVoice 10 will be incomplete
and frustrating. Frustrating because the program's basic
dictation accuracy and speed is so good then wastes
your time by forcing you to first manually find the
correct address or litigation caption. Finally you then
manually have to transfer your basic dictation from
SpeakPad into a WordPerfect or Word document in order
to set up your letterhead or case caption. Simply providing
font and formatting information in a ViaVoice macro
would solve this problem.
There's a second, rather obvious, solution: simply
saving almost all of your word processing documents,
even routine letters, in separate client directories
and then just editing them, or block copying portions,
as later need dictates. Experience shows us that a surprising
high percentage of letters are repetitively sent to
the same people in the same cases and that portions
of pleadings are often reusable as a case progresses.
An attorney with even modest keyboard skills, which
almost everyone has acquired by now, can take an existing
letter or pleading and directly edit it on the keyboard
as needed in the same or less time than he or she required
to dictate that same letter or pleading, given instructions
to a secretary, and then review and sign that letter
or pleading.
Eliminating manual dictation transcription saved me
about 20 staff hours per week along with a few hours
per week of my own time explaining what I wanted done
rather than doing it myself.
Next week I'll go further into this process of using
"enabling" technologies to automate daily
administrative processes. There are new tools available
to help you with digital filing, litigation support,
and case management.
Top
Joseph Kashi is an attorney
and litigator living in Soldotna, Alaska, who is active
in the Law Practice Management Section and a technology
editor for Law Practice Today. He has written regularly
on legal technology for the Law Practice Management
Section, Law Office Computing Magazine and other
publications since 1990. He received his B.S. and M.S.
degrees from MIT in 1973 and his J.D. from Georgetown
University in 1976, and is admitted to practice in Alaska,
Pennsylvania, and the Ninth Circuit and the U.S. Supreme
Court.
|
