The perfect office is an illusory ideal that few if any of us have time to contemplate amidst the daily demands of our practices, but it is a standard that needs to be lifted up - particularly in this age of rapidly advancing technology that is transforming the way we practice law. With that in mind, in this installment of my Tech Tips column, I have taken it upon myself to sketch out for you a vision of what that perfect office might look like.

To guide us in our study, I have developed the following three (3) rules:

Rule 1. Everything must be available electronically. Rule 2. Critical information must be securely available outside of the office. Rule 3. Knowledge must be accessible to those who need it when they need it.

What follows is a broad discussion of how to implement these rules to achieve the perfect office in your office.

Rule 1. Everything must be available electronically

As lawyers, we deal in information - lot's of it. Whether it be documents, photos, legal research, emails, government forms, phone messages or objects we need to store it, access it and organize it to do our jobs. In the perfect office, all of this information must be stored in electronic format so that it is immediately accessible at each person's desktop. To do this, you typically need three tools.

First, you need to have some kind of personal information manager (PIM) to store contact information, perform calendaring, keep notes of phone conversations and otherwise provide an electronic platform for organizing file information. There are several generic programs (i.e. Maximizer or ACT) and various legal-specific practice management programs (i.e. Amicus Attorney or TimeMatters) that can fit this bill.

Second, you need to have a scanner, some type of document management program and, if you are a litigator, probably a deposition management (i.e. LiveNote), knowledge management (i.e. CaseMap), and trial presentation program. HP has a number of scanners that cost less than $1,000.00 for small offices, while larger offices may want to look into the industrial strength models available from the major document companies (i.e. Xerox, Ricoh, etc...). Whatever make or model you choose, I recommend that you purchase a color scanner with automatic sheet feed and flat bed functionality and good OCR software. Document management programs tend not to be as user friendly as most other software, but they do have the advantage of allowing you to enforce file naming, storage and security conventions across your firm, while also enabling you to search and retrieve all types of documentary and other information from each desktop. Popular document management programs include: Worldox, Inmagic, and PCDocs. Many practice management packages (i.e. Amicus Attorney) include document management functionality that may prove satisfactory to smaller firms.

Third, you need to have some type of unified messaging system that stores and facilitates the retrieval of the various types of messages that you receive - i.e. email, faxes, and voice mail. The goal of unified messaging is to make it so that the client can communicate with you in the manner most convenient to them, while centralizing the storage of those messages and making it equally easy for you to retrieve those messages and associate them with the appropriate client. This is an emerging class of software, but I can tell you (from a recent Expo that I attended) that there are excellent products available that integrate with Microsoft Outlook, Lotus Notes and most phone systems.

The beauty of making everything available electronically is that critical information is instantly accessible from your desktop. This will save you and your staff time formerly wasted walking to the file cabinet, searching for a message or waiting for someone to finish with a file that you need. It also will help you improve your service to a client, both in terms of preparedness for those unexpected phone calls from a client or opposing counsel and in marshaling your facts and the law to best represent your client. Finally, it will help you to avoid the malpractice minefield by making it harder to lose critical information (i.e. that unreturned phone message from the court and/or your client) and easier to act on it (i.e. by scheduling an appointment, a call back or directing that someone else handle a matter).

Rule 2. Critical information must be securely available outside of the office.

As lawyers, we spend a lot of time outside the office at closings, in court or even (hopefully) at home or on vacation. Having secure access to critical information at these remote locations is important to maintaining a competitive edge and keeping your peace of mind. With the advent of the Internet, the rise of wireless technology and the ever shrinking microchip there are no shortage of means to access data remotely. Presently, most portable attorneys in Vermont use three tools - a laptop, a Palm Pilot and a cell phone or pager - to access information remotely. In the not too distant future, I expect that we will see the PalmPilot and cell phone/pager merge into a single device and, who knows, maybe the laptop too. Presently, however, the perfect office requires a combination of one or more of these tools, coupled with the network infrastructure necessary to facilitate working remotely. Choosing the appropriate tools is partly a matter of taste and partly a matter of necessity. I say taste, when referring to the question of whether to purchase a cell phone and/or a pager because depending upon where your office is, the type of practice you have and your own tastes a cell phone or pager may or may not be a key component of setting up your perfect office. I say necessity, however, when referring to a Palm Pilot for once you store contact and calendar information electronically you need a device like a Palm Pilot to view or edit that information instantaneously wherever and whenever you want. The devices typically cost less than $300 and include the software necessary to synchronize with your office's databases, including email. Moreover, they are small enough to fit into a shirt pocket or pocket book so they are convenient and more powerful replacement to your old daytimer. Laptops are a different story altogether. In the perfect office, a laptop will continue to be a key tool in the arsenal of litigators and others who need to produce documents, present information and/or access the Internet remotely. This is particularly the case with litigators who can now bring an entire case file with them on CDs, capture court reporter feeds "live" and use a variety of visual aids to help them tell their client's story with the wave of a wand.

The element of remote access to information that most attorneys miss is the office infrastructure necessary to facilitate simple and secure access to office databases remotely. A part of this infrastructure can be provided by the unified messaging system discussed under Rule 1. Specifically, a unified messaging system can deliver documents, faxes, emails and voice mails to you via Internet email anywhere in the world. Similarly, many of the current breed of unified messaging products enable you to retrieve much of that same information over the phone using your telephone keypad and computer generated readbacks of your messages and/or call forwarding of faxes and phone calls. A second part of the infrastructure requires some sort of remote access to your database. Many firms use a program like PC Anywhere to accomplish this now. In the perfect office, however, this information will be accessible via the Internet. The advantage of using the Internet is that it is an easy technology to master, extends the reach of your office to most anywhere and enables you to make portions of your database accessible to clients, witnesses and other relevant third parties (i.e. insurance adjusters). In the past, the principle problem has been security, but a wide variety of reasonably priced and easy to implement solutions in the areas of virus protection (i.e. Norton Antivirus and Panda), firewalls (various hardware and software solutions exist) and encryption (i.e. inexpensive Verisign accounts) have minimized this concern.

The value of carrying with you or instantly accessing data from your main office remotely is manifold. In the perfect office, you can schedule appointments, contact people, read email, respond to messages and direct team members whenever and from wherever you want. You can also capture important information remotely when it is needed or even while it is being created and you can marshall that information to more effectively serve your client. Finally, you can improve customer service by making it easier and more cost effective to stay in touch with your clients and to share information with necessary people outside the office.

Rule 3. Knowledge must be accessible to those who need it when they need it.

As a lawyer, have you ever assigned a task to someone in your office only to have to do it yourself later because they just don't do it like you would? Have you ever wanted to present to the outside world a uniform way of handling a matter that represents the type of image that your firm is marketing to clients, the courts and opposing counsel, but just couldn't seem to get everyone "on board"? Have you ever found yourself and/or part of your staff extremely busy, while someone else in the office always seems to be in need of something to do? If your answer to any of these questions is yes, then you have a problem with knowledge management. Knowledge management is the ability to put knowledge - a scarce resource typically resident in the minds of you and your staff or embedded in your documents, calendars, emails and the like - in the hands of those who need it when they need it. In the perfect office, knowledge is managed through effective data capture, database organization and controlled dissemination.

First, data is captured at its source or as close to its source as possible and in the least costly manner possible. In some firms, this will mean capturing data directly from clients via the web. For example, client intake forms, including practice area specific questions, can be completed by clients online from home or in a kiosk at the office. In other firms and at other times, the same forms used online can be used to empower junior staff to collect the same information. Further, even in those firms where more senior attorneys and/or staff conduct the initial client interviews to gather data, the online forms can be used to enforce standards and to organize the data collected. In the perfect office, the information gathered will be captured electronically once but used multiple times in the various databases that the firm maintains (e.g. electronic rolodexes, calendars, time/billing programs, email, document assembly programs, etc...). This can be done today, with proper planning, using tools readily available like Amicus Attorney, Timeslips, QuickBooks, Microsoft Outlook, HotDocs, Worldox and WordPerfect.

Second, proper organization of your firm's databases is critical to knowledge management. Simple steps like establishing a consistent client/matter naming convention throughout the firm and all of its databases (i.e. address book, calendar, wordprocessor, time/billing program, etc...) can make a tremendous difference. In the perfect office, however, attorneys, key staff and your network administrators (most likely outside consultants) will have to work together to implement an appropriate strategy because each practice area has different needs. For example, an estate planning attorney probably does not need to scan documents, but may want to setup a file type in your practice management program to facilitate its integration with a document assembly tool like HotDocs. By contrast, a litigator may be more concerned with integrating scanned images, electronic discovery, legal research and documents with its trial practice tools. Proper organization of this information and procedures for the capturing of this information is critical to data capture, data integrity and data dissemination - both inside and outside the office.

Third, controlling how and to whom information from your firm's diverse databases is disseminated is critical to providing the best, most cost-effective customer service without violating client confidences. In the perfect office, web technology is used to disseminate information through firm Intranets, Extranets and the Internet. Client confidences are maintained by coding materials and files so as to electronically implement the appropriate levels of security. For example, you may want a client, an attorney working remotely and maybe an expert witness on a file to be able to access exhibits, court filings, deposition transcripts and the like via a password protected site accessible over the Internet (i.e. an Extranet). Similarly, you may want everyone on staff to access firm policies, client contact information and certain calendar information over the firm's internal network or Intranet. Finally, you may find it acceptable to make information about the various steps and documents typically involved in a real estate closing accessible over the public Internet for marketing and customer service purposes. In the perfect office, attorneys - even though they may not understand how the technology works - will work closely with IT specialists to develop the business rules that will govern the dissemination of information so as not to run afoul of ethical constraints.

The value of proper knowledge management is manifest. First, attorneys principally get paid for how we organize and present data, not gather it. Reducing the cost of gathering that data can dramatically enhance the value that your staff brings. Second, by properly organizing your databases you can much more efficiently produce documents, prepare for trial and respond to requests for information. This makes for happier clients because you can save them money and achieve a better result, thereby garnering more repeat and referral business. Finally, more cost effective and comprehensive dissemination of information will save you and your client money, improve customer service and enhance collaboration. All of these elements, combined together, will help you to improve your bottom line, save your client money and enhance your client's overall satisfaction.

In conclusion, I must say that the perfect office I have outlined here today was only a pipe dream just a few short years ago. The advent of the Internet, the rise of a diversity of legal specific software vendors and the incredible pace of technological advancement are rapidly making the perfect office a reality. The pace of change is intimidating to some, but the reality is that those who made investments last year have pushed much farther through their learning curve in the implementation of technology than those who have waited. Next year, the picture is sure to look different than it does today, but the legal technology markets are beginning to take shape and the vendors are moving quickly to improve their products to add the features you will need next so the time to set your sights on the perfect office is now. Don't be left in the dust by your competition.

Copyright [2003].  All rights reserved, except any article may be copied in its entirety, for non-profit usage, with proper attribution so long as a copy of said article, as reprinted, is sent to Mr. Atherton at P.O. Box 90, Northfield Falls, VT  05664.

Steven H. Atherton

The Digital Lawyer