Case Management

First Principles for Law Office Software

November 30, 2007 ⋅  Email this post ⋅  Print this post ⋅ Post a comment

Before getting into the nuts and bolts of the transition from Windows to Macs, I want to lay out a non-exhaustive set of First Principles that I think make a law office productive, efficient and a fun place to work. These principles are limited to software. (There are other First Principles relating to ergonomics, how staff treat clients, how staff treats staff, a few rules about personal hygiene–but I’ll pass over those for now.) If we’re clear about what makes a law office run well, it makes it a lot easier to evaluate the merits of moving to the Mac. So here are my Six First Principles for technological goodness in a small law office.

The First of the First Principles
The core software programs are integrated.
Integration means that (1) there should be as little duplication of data entry as possible and (2) there should be a seamless means of accessing that data across programs. If we enter a client’s name, address, telephone number, social security number, etc. in our case management software, that data (or some subset of it) should be accessible to our e-mail program, our word processor and our billing and trust accounting programs. And if we send or receive facsimiles and e-mail, they should be easily associated with the proper client or contact. Integration reduces data entry errors and speeds the flow of work.

The Second First Principle
Case management software facilitates integration.
That means that the most important program on your computer is your case management program. Case management software manages contacts, cases, calendars, documents, e-mail and faxes. It handles the merging of client and contact data with all kinds of documents as well as the transfer of data to billing and trust account programs. It does these things seamlessly and without requiring eight keystrokes to get a particular task done. It has the flexibility to store large amounts of unique data on a particular client or case, through the use of customizable fields.

Good case management software facilitates integration. Bad case management software makes you want to throw your computer out the window.

The Third First Principle
The data stored in your case management program is easily merged into letters, pleadings and briefs.
Lawyers produce tons of documents. An efficient law office merges client, case and contact data into all kinds of word processing documents. Merging is the sine qua non of a good case management program. Without the ability to merge data into sophisticated documents, law firms can still function . . . in the same way that a 737 can fly with one engine out. But it’s not the ideal.

The Fourth First Principle
The software you use needs to look good and work intuitively.
One of the most attractive features of the Mac is that its features are attractive. If you ever get a chance to browse Apple’s Human Interface Guidelines, you’ll find out why. In about 900 pages, it covers the philosophy and psychology of computer use from an Apple perspective. It’s a fascinating read. (Not that I’ve read it–I just gave it a really thorough skimming.)

The point is, there are good reasons why the Mac interface is clean, uncluttered and bright. A cheerful interface means a cheerful staff. Form (if supported with good substance under the hood) can drive better function. And that has all kinds of positive implications for your practice. Apple understands that. So Apple encourages independent developers to design products following its human interface guidelines.

The Fifth First Principle
When you hit a key or click a button, stuff happens.
The software and the OS on which it runs should produce fast, reliable responses to user input. Poorly designed software is a big drag on productivity. If your case management program, like Marley’s ghost, is bound by a ponderous coil of chain, your staff will not be happy. On our network, for example, it is not uncommon to wait 7-15 seconds to go from one client record to another client record in TimeMatters. (Could this have been one of the catalysts that led me to buy a Mac? Hmmm.) Anyway, after trying everything we could think of and consulting with the experts, we simply live with it. Well-designed software runs fast and reliably over a network.

The Sixth and Final First Principle
All all relevant data is easily accessible and all reports are easily generated.
It doesn’t do us much good getting data into a program when we have to struggle to retrieve it. Good case management software makes it easy to get data in and get data out, in lots of different forms, including merged documents, reports and syncs with PDAs.

So that’s a set of First Principles by which to judge a law office setup. I’m sure there are additional Principles and maybe a few corollaries or caveats I haven’t thought about. If I think about them, I’ll revise the list. For now, this should give me enough to (1) judge my existing setup and (2) determine if the Mac will make it better. So in the next post, I’ll spend some time comparing the Ideal law office to my own Reality.