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Category Archives: Office Management

Great Resource About Dropbox for Lawyers

Posted on April 30, 2015 by Ben Stevens Posted in Apps, Office Management, Technology 1 Comment
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dropbox for lawyersDropbox is one of the most often discussed pieces of legal technology for lawyers, and their uses of and opinions about it vary wides. When I give presentations on cloud computing, it’s always among the most frequently asked questions. Some trust it completely and use it daily, some use it with overlays (like Viivo or Boxcryptor), while others take a wide birth or only use it for limited purposes.

What is Dropbox (and its companion Dropbox for Business)? Simply put, it’s a cloud-based service that allows you to save files on one or device and then access them from anywhere. In other words, you can save a file on your desktop computer, have it synch (virtually in real time) to your laptop, your assistant’s computer, your iPhone/iPad, etc. A copy of your files is also served on Dropbox’s server, so you have a backup there too, and you can log into and access your files from any computer anywhere.

Tim Baran recently published at article at the Legal Productivity blog about Dropbox for lawyers, in which he listed some of the leading tech gurus’ thoughts about Dropbox. My comments in his article were:

My firm has not had a physical server since 2009. Instead, we’ve relied on Dropbox to act as our firm’s “virtual” server, which has made us incredibly more productive. Having our documents stored in the cloud makes them accessible from anywhere and its smartphone apps enable us to literally have all of our files with us all the time. Knowing that a copy of our documents is stored offsite also provides peace of mind in case the unthinkable happens. Dropbox also has many built-in features, such as versioning, sharing, and searching and its integration with numerous other apps, all of which make it invaluable to us. Suffice it to say that we love Dropbox and it’s one of those tools that we can’t imagine practicing without.

Some of the other attorneys interviewed were Jeff Richardson, Lee Rosen, Tom Mighell, Jeffrey Lewis, Martha Sperry, and Scott Grossberg, and as mentioned above their opinions on Dropbox varied widely, with many different viewpoints offered on the issue of security. Is Dropbox right for you or your firm? Only you can answer that question, but even after surveying the other products and services available today, we still believe Dropbox for Business an invaluable tool in our arsenal and something that enables us to provide high quality legal services to our clients no matter where we are.

Source: “How Lawyers Use Dropbox” by Tim Baran, published at Legal Productivity.

The Hidden Costs of Attorneys Handling Their Own IT Needs

Posted on April 16, 2015 by Ben Stevens Posted in Guest Posts, Office Management, Technology 2 Comments
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hidden costsI am providing this post to advise my fellow family law attorneys of a huge mistake I made for the first two decades of my legal career – handling most of my firm’s IT needs myself. For instance, when one of our computers had a problem (and when we used PCs there were many), I thought the best course of action was to try to solve it myself instead of having a professional do so – as it would “save money.”
All of that changed late last year when we (finally) realized that the best course of action was outsource certain functions in order to allow us to spend more time doing what we do best – handling family law cases. We started using GlobalMac IT for our computer and network needs, and we are beyond pleased with the results. The following article from Tom Lambotte addresses many of these misconceptions that could be costing your firm more money than you ever imagined:

The hidden costs of wearing the IT hat.

Are you wearing the IT hat? Know someone who is? If so, I’d like you to consider this article an intervention, an attempt to compel you or that someone to get help. I define “one who wears the IT hat” as the person who is the primary go-to person for IT issues in their firm. This individual deals with the bulk of IT issues and prides themselves on the cost savings in doing it themselves. They often have an hourly IT person to call in dire needs.

The hidden problem is that the costs of taking care of IT yourself for your firm, far outweigh the perceived benefits. In most cases, this is in fact costing your firms tens of thousands of dollars per year. Most people calculate the perceived savings by simply looking at their P&L and seeing close to nothing on the line for IT services. This overly simplistic way overlooks the soft costs which quickly eclipse the cost of paying for proper IT services.

There are four primary concepts that need to be understood in order to help overcome and break down the limiting belief that doing IT yourself saves money. The first is an analysis of time spent by the one wearing the IT hat. The second attempts to quantify the hidden issues lurking in the shadows and their overall impact on employee productivity. The third relates to what I call the hobbyist principle. And the final one is the far-reaching impact of time spent (or not spent) on the highest ROI activities for the firm.

Time Analysis

The time analysis takes two parts into consideration. The first is simply the time spent per month dealing with IT related tasks. In most cases, the one wearing the IT hat is a senior partner or founder of the firm, since they set things up from the start and are the only one that understands how everything is setup. The time he spends dealing with IT primarily consists of running software updates (Adobe, Microsoft Office, Java, Flash, Apple/Windows software updates and security updates, etc.) and basic, daily troubleshooting. Based on many years of supporting law firms, this is an average of 1-2 hours per computer, per month. For a firm with a staff of 5, that is 5-10 hours per month.

The second part of the time analysis is the impact of interruptions. Because everyone in the firm is dependent on this person when there is an issue, they are forced to interrupt that person to get their issue resolved. Some are quick, easy ones (5-15 minutes), some take more time ‘Googling’ around (15-45 minutes) and others take hours before eventually being given up on, at which point the IT person is reached out to (and is hopefully able to help in a timely manner). All these little interruptions add up. Let’s whip out our calculators here to properly comprehend the impact. Research shows that when interrupted, it takes an average of 23 minutes to get back to the previous task. Let’s be ultra-conservative and use 15 minutes and one interruption per day, which adds up to 300 minutes, or 5 hours per month.

Adding up the two parts of the time analysis above shows us that the person handling the IT in a small firm with a staff of 5, is actually spending about 10-15 hours per month on IT. With a conservative rate of $300 per hour, that is a loss in billable wages of $3,000- 4,500. One more point about time, viewing it form a different angles touches on work/life balance. You see, in most cases I have come across, the person wearing the IT hat cannot justify doing the updates and system management during prime daytime hours, so they end up doing it in the evenings or on the weekend, either way, they are taking away irreplaceable personal and family time.

“We’ll just deal with it.”

Without fail, every firm we have supported where someone has been wearing the IT hat internally, there are always a laundry list of problems that have been unreported and eventually surface. Potentially masking issues that can develop into bigger, more impactful problems and could easily be avoided with proper maintenance. Not once have I come across a firm where people sit around twiddling their thumbs waiting for something to do. The support staff and other attorneys are well aware that the person running the firm and, in this example also wearing the IT hat, has both important and urgent items that needs be addressed that take precedence over dealing with IT issues. This develops an “I’ll just deal with it” mentality; if they can find a workaround to the IT issues, they will seldom report it and just deal with it. Because of this, when we take over IT support, we are very proactive in coaching and teaching everyone in the firm to tell us about every issue, big or small. As this coaching process is repeated on our end, people always step forward with things that have bothered them for years. Small, medium and big issues that have just been dealt with.

A client in Texas recently told us they had a Secretary quit because of IT issues that could never be addressed. Let’s whip out those calculators again and calculate the cost of the impact to your staff’s productivity has on your firm’s bottom line. Payroll is, for most firms, the biggest cost by far. If people are wasting 10 minutes a day due to bugs in the setup, inefficiencies with the server, calendar, email, printers, etc; things they have just found workarounds with, that adds up to 200 minutes a month per person. With 5 people, that is 1,000 minutes, or 17 hours per month. What is your firms’ average fully burdened cost for a staff member? At a very conservative cost of $50 per hour, that is $850 a month. Over the year, that is $10,200.

The hobbyist.

Jack-of-all-trades, master of none. As cliché as this is, it is so true. When an attorney is taking care of IT themselves, unless it is the thing they do the most, they will always be a hobbyist and hence, never develop mastery. In most cases, how do things work out when your clients try to represent themselves and practice ‘Google” law? I’ll go out on a limb and assume these often end up being major ‘cleanup jobs,’ where it could have taken only 1/10th of the effort if you had taken on the case from the beginning. Why is that? Because you have developed mastery in your domain over the years, which allows you to assimilate all the details and think of the majority of possible angles. A ‘greener’ associate does not have the insight and experience as a seasoned attorney. Developing this mastery takes years and thousands of hours of focus. You will never be able to develop mastery in IT, when it is one of the many things on your laundry list of responsibilities.

The cost of being a hobbyist with your IT can be massive. The things you don’t know you don’t know will be far too long. For example, it could end up costing you your license, by not being able to convince a board of ethics that you took the proper preventative measures in securing your client’s data. It can cause hours or days of downtime for your firm with an issue that could have easily been prevented with proactive maintenance. It can cost you all of your client files and data because you setup a backup yourself that was ‘automatic’ 9 months ago, but did not realize the drive became disconnected 5 months prior.

Hobbies are fun, but I would not choose to be a hobbyist with something that has a huge financial impact on my business and personal life. Most people use a tax accountant because they are up to date with the current tax law, know what questions to ask and how to maximize their deductions. TurboTax cannot provide me with these insights. I do not want a tax hobbyist taking care of my taxes, nor attempt doing them on my own. I want someone who has developed a mastery in tax law, and that I can count on when I need guidance with a tax related question or event. I surround myself with experts and have built a team of superstar advisors, because I understand the value that can be added to me and my business using this approach. If you want a hobby, pick up cooking, fishing or golf, but leave the things that have a big impact on your firms to experts.

ROI in IT

What activities within your law firm generate the highest ROI? Driving the vision, focus and direction of the company? Working on the most profitable cases and clients? Or is it interrupting time spent on the above to running a software update or fix an email problem someone in your firm is experiencing? This last and final cost, the opportunity cost, is rarely reflected upon. The cost taking care of IT yourself is far, far greater than just the fact that you are spending 10-15 hours per month on IT. If you invested these newly freed up 10-15 hours per month on your highest ROI generating activities, what impact would that have on the bottom line of your practice?

In closing, I hope this intervention has been successful in helping you question previously limiting beliefs you or someone you know may be holding onto, by doing the IT for their firm themselves. Having an expert IT company with developed best practices for your firm can shift the role of IT from just something that has to be dealt with, to something that adds value to your firm. Through a holistic approach, the right IT firm can provide proactive support and implement solutions that can impact your bottom line and free up you and your staff’s time. Through a two-prong approach, they can first seek out, then address the root cause of the primary bottlenecks in your operations, help hidden issues surface to the top and address security concerns and implement better procedures. Then they can look at your firm as a whole and then work on implementing solutions that increase everyone’s productivity.

About the Author: Tom Lambotte is CEO of GlobalMac IT, the only company in the world that specializes in providing IT support to Mac-based law firms. His methods are based on close to a decade of research, testing and real-world refinement of Best Practices, working directly with Mac-based law firms and firms switching from PC to Mac, across the country and around the world. Tom is the author of Hassle Free Mac IT Support for Law Firms and a highly sought after speaker at national events such as the ABA Techshow and MILOfest, a Mac Lovin’ Lawyers Event. Learn more about Tom and GlobalMac IT at www.globalmacit.com, and readers of The Mac Lawyer can obtain a free copy of Tom’s book, Hassle Free Mac IT Support for Law Firms, at this link.

 

Avoid Waiting on Hold via FastCustomer

Posted on January 28, 2015 by Ben Stevens Posted in Apps, Did You Know?, Office Management, Online Resources, Product Reviews Leave a comment
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fastcustomerDo you enjoy wasting time on hold while listening to elevator music? Me neither. FastCustomer can (thankfully) make that experience a distant memory.

Simply let them know the name of the company that you would like to talk with (via call, text, or search), and they will have a customer service agent from that company call you. Voila! No time wasted and no elevator music.

FastCustomer is available via website or its iOS and Android apps. Among the thousands of companies that participate in this service are Apple, Verizon, AT&T, Bank of America, Southwest, Citibank, Mastercard, Visa, Discover, Sirius/XM, USPS, Walmart, Costco, etc.

Great Resource About Evernote for Lawyers

Posted on January 21, 2015 by Ben Stevens Posted in Apps, Office Management, Technology Leave a comment
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evernoteYou use Evernote, don’t you? If you don’t, you’re missing out. Evernote is an easy way to help busy lawyers keep track of all sorts of information and easily find it when needed. It can be used for all sorts of things, as evidenced by Tim Baran’s recent article discussing how lawyers utilize it.

Tim asked legal technology gurus from all over how they use Evernote, and his list included my good friends Tom Mighell, David Sparks, John Harding, and Katie Floyd (among many others). Better yet, his article includes links to many other resources discussing many best practices and uses for implementing Evernote into your practice.

So what two things do I use Evernote for on a regular basis and what makes it invaluable to me? You’ll have to read Tim’s article to find out, but trust me, it’s well worth your time. I want to offer a huge thank you to Tim for providing this excellent article and resource about Evernote for lawyers.

Source: “How Lawyers Use Evernote” by Tim Baran, published at Legal Productivity.

Switching from PCs to Macs in the Law Office

Posted on January 7, 2015 by Ben Stevens Posted in Mac vs. PC, Office Management, Software, Switching to Macs Leave a comment
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mac vs pcIt’s no secret that Apple products continue to gain traction in the legal field, and that they are a great option for many attorneys, particularly solo and small firm lawyers. However, changing operating systems or learning a new computer may seem like a daunting task, particularly to a busy lawyer. So what is it really like switching from PCs to Macs?

My wife and law partner, Jenny Stevens (a/k/a @MrsMacLawyer), was recently interviewed by Heidi Alexander on The Legal Toolkit to discuss “Making the Transition from PCs to Macs in Your Law Office“. Jenny discusses her switch from a PC law office to one using exclusively Apple products, and she shares her thoughts as to how easy it is to switch, some of the resources available to those considering making the move, and what software that we use at The Stevens Firm, P.A. Family Law Center.

The Legal Toolkit is one of the leading legal technology podcasts, and if you don’t already listen to it, this would be a great episode to begin doing so. Click here to listen.

Take Control of Your Email with Boomerang

Posted on November 19, 2014 by Ben Stevens Posted in Apps, Office Management, Online Resources, Product Reviews Leave a comment
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boomerangWhat if you could take control of your email? You determine when emails appear in your Inbox or when they were sent to your recipients. What if your email could automatically remind you if don’t hear back from a recipient?

All of this – and more – is possible thanks to Boomerang, a plug-in for Gmail and Outlook that can help you transform from email novice to email ninja in no time. This plug-in helped me reduce the average number of emails in my Inbox to less than 10 (down from a number that I’d be embarrassed to mention).

It is not an understatement to say that Boomerang is one of the best and most helpful applications that I have ever found. It enables me to control my email instead of it controlling me. Boomerang has many more features than I can cover in this article, so please visit their website to learn what all it does and to view demonstration videos. However, I have highlighted some of the best features below:

boomerang 2Make emails reappear. One of the best features of Boomerang is its ability to take emails from your Inbox and then make them reappear at a later time. For instance, if you receive calling instructions for a meeting next week, you can set it to return 15 minutes before the start time instead of allowing that email to clutter your Inbox in the interim. You can even add a note to the email to remind you why you wanted it to be returned.

Send emails later. You can schedule an email to be sent at the perfect time. When you finish writing the email, the “send later” button enables you to determine exactly when the email will be sent. Even better, you can specify the desired time in many different ways, whether that’s “in 10 minutes”, “tomorrow morning”, or at a specific date/time (12/03/14 at 5:34pm).

Remind you to follow up. You can tell Boomerang to return an email to your Inbox if you don’t receive a reply within a specified time, if the email is not opened within a designated time frame, or if you just need to see it again as a reminder. It also enables you to get “read receipts” and track when emails have been opened – even in Gmail, which doesn’t provide this functionality natively.

Rocket Matter Releases iPad Edition

Posted on September 29, 2014 by Ben Stevens Posted in Apps, iOS, iPad, Office Management, Product Reviews, Software Leave a comment
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Rocket MatterRocket Matter created the first cloud practice management software for the legal community in 2008, and since then it has become the premier total law firm management software in the cloud. My law firm has used Rocket Matter since the day it launched, and we couldn’t be happier with it.

However, the folks at Rocket Matter are not ones to rest on their laurels, as evidenced by the numerous new features and refinements rolled out in recent years. Now, they have released their new iPad edition, and they are once again leading the way with the first and only tablet platform for today’s busy, mobile lawyers.

portriat-1This release (shown at right) heralds a new era of legal practice management software with a dedicated tablet platform that’s fast, easy-to-use, and accessible both online and offline. Lawyers can now enjoy legal iPad software that delivers incredible productivity gains and at the same time has the beauty and the simple elegance of the iPad itself.

Larry Port, Rocket Matter’s CEO, says

We’re excited to announce today our evolved platform and sleek new look. The Rocket Matter iPad Edition is not just a mere ‘app’ – it’s an entire tablet-based solution that ties into Rocket Matter’s cloud data storage. We’ve carefully watched how lawyers, law firms, and bar associations have all eagerly embraced the practical advantages that tablets can provide. We took these observations, combined them with direct suggestions from our lawyer partners, and did what we do best: built software that is simply unmatched in legal practice management.

You can learn much more about Rocket Matter’s iPad edition and see a video of it in action here. Lawyers with Rocket Matter subscriptions will be able to download the iPad Edition from the Apple iTunes store starting today.

Small PDF Solves Most of Your PDF Needs

Posted on September 19, 2014 by Ben Stevens Posted in Office Management, Online Resources, Technology 4 Comments
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Lawyers all work with PDFs on an ever-increasing basis, and we will only do so more in the future with the advent of electronic filing.  Small PDF is an online “one stop shop” for almost all of your PDF needs (for free), including:

  • small pdfCompress PDF – Dramatically reduce the file size of your PDF
  • Merge PDF – Combine several PDF files into one single file
  • Split PDF – Create a new document from selected pages
  • Word to PDF – Convert your Word documents to PDF format
  • Excel to PDF – Excel spreadsheet conversion to PDF
  • PPT to PDF – Converting PPT presentations to PDF files
  • JPG to PDF – Convert images to PDFs exactly the way you want
  • PDF to JPG – Convert pages to images or extract pictures from your PDF
  • Unlock PDF – Unlock (some) password protected files

If you want to learn more about what Small PDF can do for you and your practice, visit SmallPDF.com. It’s easy to use, and remember – it’s free!

The Mac Lawyer at SC Bar Solo and Small Firm Conference in Greenville

Posted on September 17, 2014 by Ben Stevens Posted in Mac vs. PC, Office Management, Presentations, Switching to Macs, Technology Leave a comment
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SC Bar SSF 2014

The South Carolina Bar’s Solo and Small Firm Conference is being held in Greenville this Friday, and its theme is “Reinventing Your Small Firm Practice: Strategies and Solutions.” We’ll investigate the latest trends in technology and explore alternatives to traditional law practices.


Ben Stevens
will be giving two presentations at this conference:

  • Are You Mac-Curious? If Not, You Should Be!
  • Amazing Apps, Practical Practice Pointers, Terrific Tech Tips & Wonderful Websites

If you haven’t made plans to attend, you should. If you do attend, please find me and say hello.

Solo & Small Firm Conference Is Coming to Greenville

Posted on August 20, 2014 by Jenny Stevens Posted in Mac vs. PC, Office Management, Presentations, Switching to Macs, Technology Leave a comment
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SC Bar SSF 2014Each year the Solo & Small Firm Conference is the place to be for all SC attorneys who are solo practitioners or practice in the small firm setting. From networking to marketing to picking up tips on how to incorporate the latest technology into your practice, you’ll find it at the Solo & Small Firm Conference.

This year’s theme is “Reinventing Your Small Firm Practice: Strategies & Solutions” and it will feature three tracks of programs allowing you to completely customize your conference experience.  With topics such as “Cloud Computing: The Good, The Bad, and The Ethics”; “A Systems Approach to Small Firm Practice”; “Are You Mac-Curious? If Not, You Should Be!” and “Essential Skills & Strategies for Legal Research” (as a sampling) – it is sure to be an information-packed day which will measurably improve your practice.

The special guest speaker, a friend of our firm, and a nationally known author and speaker, Nerino Petro, is a regular contributor to local, state and national publications and has a wealth of knowledge to share with all SSF Conference attendees. He will be presenting three separate sessions, as well as joining the always popular Tech Tips & Practice Pointers panel at the end of the day along with other featured speakers, Courtney Kennaday, Dave Maxfield, Ed Walters, and our own, Ben Stevens.

The early bird registration for this fantastic seminar starts at $205 for Section Members and $230 for Non-Section Members, but this special rate ends September 5, so register now (Click Here for Registration Information).

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