ABA Client Centric Legal Services. Technology

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ABA Client Centric Legal Services

Technology

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Other Materials:

20 Apps To Help Provide Easier Access To Legal Help

http://www.abajournal.com/magazine/article/20_apps_providing_easier_access_to_legal_help

Are You The New Normal?

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Using Technology to Improve

Client Services

Catherine Sanders Reach

Director, Law Practice Management and Technology

Chicago Bar Association

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Introduction

Everywhere you look people are using technology. Smartphones, eReaders, and iPads surround us. You can’t watch good old TV without being bombarded by commercials for websites, games, and more technology. Consumers are accustomed to going online to look up and share

information, shop, pay for goods and services, chat, game, and well – just about everything else. No matter what type of clients you may serve it is likely that they expect to be able to use the same technologies they are accustomed to when they are working with you. Below are a few suggestions, at multiple price points, that incorporate technology into your workflow and provide your clients with enhanced – and possibly expected – options.

Location, Location, Location

Where ever you meet clients, whether that is a traditional brick and mortar office or a rented conference space, consider creating a Google Map for your website, blog or email signature to help your clients find you. Simply go to maps.google.com and type your address into the search box. Click on the “link” tool on the upper right side and you can grab a link to the map, or get the code to embed it into your blog or website. However, consider taking it one step further by creating a customized map that shows not only your meeting space, but also other locations that may be useful for your clients. Based on your practice area and your clients’ needs there may be some logical paths that you can map out to help your clients. For instance a family law practice could create a map that shows your law office, family court, child services, and the social security offices. Be creative – perhaps you could provide a map to your office, a local coffee shop, a scenic overlook or the nearest place to get gasoline. Think what would help your clients and create the map. It is easy to create the custom maps. Login to Google, go the maps page, click on “my maps” and watch the video tutorial for instructions on how to set it up. Also don’t forget to add your business address to Google Places for free. At the very least perform a sanity check on the major direction sites on the web – Google Maps, Yahoo Maps, Mapquest and Bing – to make sure that your address and directions are clear and mistake free. If you do find that the directions would have your clients driving down a dirt road you can contact the vendors to update the directions.

Google offers a couple of free tools to boost your web presence. One is Google Plus, which lets you provide a publicly available profile that includes pictures, hobbies, personal and professional interests. You can link to your webpage, blog, LinkedIn profile or anything else you’d like to share. Plus is free, and is an easy way to boost your Google ranking. Another free tool from Google is Google Places for Business, that lets you add your firm to Google Maps and create a local

business listing. Google reminds you: “It's a good idea to create a Google Places account using an

email address that you don't mind sharing with others or passing along, in case you wish to transfer ownership of your listings.” Additionally take advantage of similar local profile listings from Yahoo! Local Search, Bing Business Portal, and Yelp.

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Caring and Sharing

How would your clients react if you sent them news items of interest? For instance, if you sent an article about a new automotive plant moving into the area to a client that provides recycled aluminum? Or alert a client to legislation or regulatory actions affecting her business? A

proactive, informational update can be helpful to your clients, and keep you top of mind. Setting up alerts is easy. Simply go to Google Alerts and type in your keywords. Have the alerts sent to you by email or RSS feed for screening, then forward as appropriate to your client. Be creative and think about how you can share valuable information with your clients. This takes much less time (think automated!) than maintaining a blog, and can be tailored to a specific client, rather than broader focused newsletters.

Evernote

Evernote (www.evernote.com) is a note taking tool that helps you keep track of

information gathered from anywhere in one repository. Text notes, voice notes, websites, documents, email, links – whatever you want to save you can put it in Evernote, saved to folders and tagged. One feature of Evernote is the ability to share notes with someone else. This could be especially handy for sharing research and information with other lawyers or your clients. In the web interface (Evernote has a desktop application, web version, and mobile apps that all stay synched) simply create a new notebook and then select the arrow to retrieve the menu to reveal “share this notebook”. You can then invite specific individuals via email to share the Evernote notebook. If you have the free version of Evernote you can only share in “view” mode. For Premium subscribers you can give modification privileges. For additional security you can require that the recipient log into Evernote to view the notebook.

Evernote also lets you share specific notes with your social media profiles. If you capture an interesting article you can then share it with one click to Facebook, Twitter, email, or create a link to the note for your blog.

Status Symbol

Most airlines and travel websites offer customers the option to get flight status updates via email, voice or text. Doctors’ offices will email, text, or leave voicemail about upcoming

appointments. Why don’t lawyers? When engaging with a new client, or taking on a new matter with an existing client, discuss communication preferences. This is a good time to discuss

methods for exchanging confidential information, and generally discuss their communication preferences. Why not provide an option for them to opt-in to get reminders about upcoming appointments via voicemail, text, or email? While there are a number of arguments about attorneys communicating with clients via text messaging due to its short form and insecurity, a text reminder about an upcoming meeting may be just what the doctor ordered.

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Check Please!

There are a number of ethics opinions about lawyer’s accepting credit cards for payment. However, most jurisdictions will allow lawyers to accept credit cards for fees for services

rendered. If you are already sending invoices electronically, consider this the next step to getting paid. While there are costs associated with taking credit cards, the benefit and ease of use for the client – as well as often resulting in getting paid faster – makes this an option worth exploring. Law firm merchant accounts such as Affiniscape or LawCharge are set up to serve law firms specifically. They will deposit all retainers into your IOLTA and take any fees or chargebacks from your operating account. For earned fees some options include PayPal, although as with any major operator PayPal enjoys its share of criticism as a vendor. Many merchant account vendors now provide a web portal to allow payment through the web, and companies such as Google and Square provide technology to accept payment via your smartphone. Weigh your options, shop around, consult your ethics rules, but do consider taking credit cards. Clients often get cash back and awards for credit card use, so paying you also pays them! For a great article on taking credit cards with the mobile devices see the Jan/Feb 2012 article in GP|Solo “Accepting Credit Cards on the Go”.

For Your Eyes Only

The confidentiality of client information is an ethical foundation. While email has been accepted as a communication tool, the ABA’s Formal Opinion 99-413 states that “a lawyer may transmit information relating to the representation of a client by unencrypted e-mail sent over the Internet without violating the Model Rules of Professional Conduct” it follows that up with the caveat that “a lawyer should consult with the client and follow her instructions, however, as to the mode of transmitting highly sensitive information relating to the client’s representation”. In addition to ethical duties some states, such as Massachusetts, have statutory requirement to encrypt certain types of information in transit. Discuss with your clients options for adding extra security to electronic communication, such as employing encrypted email and document transfer. Make sure that the encryption tool is easy to use for both the sender and recipient. Your clients will appreciate your extra efforts to keep their information safe and secure.

Send Inc.’s SendSecure works with MS Outlook and web-based email, or as a standalone to send encrypted emails. The user invokes SendSecure, the message is encrypted and vaulted on the SendSecure website. The recipient receives a link, creates a free account and accesses the email. The email on SendInc’s servers automatically self destruct after a number of days. The fee based features include setting self destruct dates, message expiration dates, message auditing and more for $5 per month.

SecuRmail (from Rpost) – This email encryption solution claims to avoid storage of email in a

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automates the process of sending an encrypted PDF of the email that the end user wants to be encrypted. It works bi-directionally so the entire conversation remains encrypted. The password is sent via email too, automatically and in a separate file.

Sign Here

You probably ask your clients to sign documents. Depending on your practice area, lots of documents. In addition to signatures those documents also require certain fields to be filled, initialed, and signed. For some transactions this could include multiple signers in a certain order. The tools, until recently, employed to accomplish this workflow may have included traditional mail, email, scanning, faxing – only to find that someone forgot to initial a document and it must go out again. Enter the e-signature solutions. New tools on the market make this process much easier for your clients – and you – to get the job done. Companies like Echosign, DocuSign and RightSignature make it easy to upload documents, mark required fields and signature blocks, send to signers and reviewers, and ultimately allowing clients to “sign” the document with a mouse or stylus similar to signing for an express package from UPS or FedEx. These companies are developing apps for iPad-like devices, as well as iPhones. As with any technology used to share confidential information make sure you are comfortable with the security and privacy that the vendor has in place, and consider regulatory requirements for certain types of documents. That said, many lawyers have found ways to make these services work for them and their clients. Make Mine To Go

More often than not documents fly fast and furious between lawyers and clients. Many of these documents are sent via email. Email is an imperfect way to transmit documents as it creates copies of the document on both the sender and recipient’s local machine and servers. It can lead to problems with version control, “lost” documents and general confusion. An option is to provide secure online access to your clients to access their documents. The attorney uploads the documents she wants to share with the client and the client accesses them via secure login. The benefit to the client includes having all the documents for a matter in a single repository, with the attorney taking responsibility for document management. The client does not have to wait for the attorney to email a document, and can access when it convenient to him. The attorney can update the document and replace it, thus eliminating concerns over versions. There are many, many ways for attorneys to incorporate a secure client document repository. Practice

management SaaS vendor Clio offers ClioConnect as part of the feature set. Online document management provider NetDocuments offers some limited client document sharing, or offers full scale extranets as an add-on. Virtual law practice turn-key products such as DirectLaw and VLO count this type of functionality as a key feature. Xerdict Group and PBWorks offer legal extranets and deal rooms. There are many options and many price points, but the high availability of these products suggest that online client document repositories offer logical benefit to clients, and their attorneys.

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Box

Box (www.box.com) has many options from personal to enterprise for document collaboration. Box lets you store files and folders in online workspaces, then share the document by sending a link. Business for Box plan users can get granular control over who views and edits files, and share folders that are synced with files on your desktop computer. Share with internal and external users. Box for Business also offers document management tools, project collaboration, a sales portal, and mobile access. Box

integrates with Google Apps, Salesforce, SharePoint, EMC Documentum, as well as a free add-on for MS Office to open, save, and share files from within the native application. Business plans cost $15 per user per month and can have from 3 to 500 users with 1000 GB of storage. Security is a priority for Box, with encryption in transit and at rest

(enterprise only), SAS70 Type II Certification, and datacenters that undergo security audits and strict access controls.

Clio Connect

ClioConnect (www.goclio.com) is practice management SaaS that offers secure

collaboration with clients to share documents, communication, and allows clients to view and pay invoices. Simply choose which information to share with the client, and then they can be set up with a username and password. Lawyers can see when a client access a document or message, or paid a bill. Clio costs $49 a month for attorneys and $25 for support staff. ClioConnect is included in that cost.

NetDocuments

NetDocuments (www.netdocuments.com) is an online document management

application. The tool offers a central, searchable repository for law firms to store files that are accessible online and through mobile devices. Security is high priority for

NetDocuments, whose target markets include law firms and financial institutions.

NetDocuments offers extranet services as an add-on, such as deal rooms, to firms already using traditional (non-cloud) DMS. However, NetDocuments offers unlimited extranets in the NetDocuments Professional Edition ($38 per user per month) making it a seemless process to share select documents with select clients as part of the workflow. End users can create a ShareSpace for clients without IT administration.

MyCase

MyCase (www.mycaseinc.com) offers client integration into the core function of the software. Clients can be given access to all details of their cases and matter, with a private, secure portal for shared calendars, documents, and bills. Messages with clients can be sent and received through MyCase, and every item uploaded to the system can be commented on. MyCase is $39 for attorneys and $29 for staff/paralegals per month. Client accounts are unlimited.

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LexisNexis FirmManager (http://www.firmmanager.com/) comes with the Client Center where clients can view documents, appointments, and tasks. You can exchange messages with clients, and with granular and client-specific logins and privileges you can even extend sharing to opposing counsel. LexisNexis FirmManager is a web-based practice management tool, costing $50 per user per month. Firms using the LexisNexis Site Essentials, Site Edge and Site Exclusives website packages get the Client Center as part of the site, extending the law firm website with a client portal.

Work It!

In some practice areas the clients act as partners with their attorneys, mutually working on a project and accepting active roles to get the job done. These projects often require tremendous coordination and communication. Project management tools, like BaseCamp, Zoho Projects and Huddle create an online platform that applies project management methodologies and best practices including time keeping, tasks, deadlines and milestones. These tools incorporate

messaging, document management, wikis, calendars, even web conferencing to create a place to collaboratively work a project from beginning to end. Many offer a free trial, and offer integration with Google apps and portable devices.

Asana

Asana is a free shared task list for teams. You can invite up to 30 members to a workspace and share tasks and priorities in a simplified heart-of-the-matter approach to project management. Asana was created by two former Facebook employees (Dustin Moskovitz was Mark Zuckerberg’s business partner and roommate), and means “yoga pose” in Sanskrit. The products is a web based “to do” list that lets people create tasks, prioritize them, assign them to colleagues, and follow the work as it gets done. Instead of

individuals maintaining personal to-do lists Moskovitz aimed to help work groups create a “single version of the truth” wherein everyone could see what others were working on, and where they were in the process. For a law firm, where a team is all functioning to accomplish tasks that meet a common goal, this approach might make a lot of sense. Or say, a lawyer working on complex estate planning documents with a client, advising on the opening of a business or many other legal functions. Asana integrates with MS Outlook, Google Calendar and Apple iCal, has mobile apps, and all interaction is through SSL.

Basecamp

Basecamp (http://basecamp.com/) from 37Signals is the grandmother of web-based project management tools. Simple interface, rich but not overwhelming feature set, and reasonable pricing have keep this tool available for many years. The website claims National Geographic, Patagonia, and Polycom as clients. Pricing starts at $20 per month. Again users login to encounter a dashboard, showing them activities on their current projects, including messages, new files, due dates and outstanding tasks. Setting up a project is easy, simply choose participants (including different levels for internal and

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external collaborators), then create milestones and then tasks with deadlines for each milestone. Basecamp lets users track and report time, and provides basic reporting. Basecamp, because of its popularity, has many integration partners and add-ons, including a full range of mobile compliments.

Trello

Trello https://trello.com/ is a list makers dream. If you are constantly keeping lists of to-do items, Trello helps you organize those lists into share-able “boards”. Each list is made up of “cards” or tasks. Each card can have attachments, assignments and due dates, checklists, embedded videos, and more. You can assign cards to the individuals you invite. Trello traffic runs over SSL, and is free.

Meet Up

Scheduling meetings is often more of an art than a science. Calendars must be consulted; changes occur at the last minute, delays occur. Online appointment calendars can help with some of these hurdles. Do you offer free consultations? Make it easy for potential clients to take the next step by instantly scheduling an appointment online. Make it easy for existing clients to schedule some time to meet. Looking again at the travel industry, your clients are used to being empowered by easy-to-use online booking for flights, hotel, and flights. Online scheduling and appointment booking products like GenBook, Appointment Plus and BookFresh synchronize with your Outlook or Google calendar and display free/busy time to your clients and prospective clients. By simply clicking on a button from your website or secure portal a client can select a free time, and set up an appointment. Some offer the ability to send automated appointment reminders to the clients, others let you reschedule and automatically send out the re-scheduling information. Most of the full function vendors provide a free trial, though they do charge a monthly fee to continue.

Doodle MeetMe Page

Doodle’s MeetMe Page (http://doodle.com/about/meetMe.html) lets you create a

personal scheduling profile that you can link from your website. There is a 30 day free trial and “ideally” it is connected to your personal calendar. You can connect to a Google calendar, MS Outlook calendar (2007/2010), or Apple iCal. Once connected to your calendar you can share the link to your Doodle MeetMe page and people can request time on your schedule. Don’t worry, visitors only see aggregated availability (free/busy) and no detail. While the account is free, premium Doodle (a solo premium account is $40 per year) adds additional functionality and is ad-free with unlimited transactions.

GenBook

Genbook (www.genbook.com) is an online scheduling tool that lets people schedule appointments with you right from your website by clicking a “Book Now” button.

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GenBook also provides information to those booking an appointment like services, a Google Map and more. If you have multiple attorneys in the office GenBook can be configured to provide appointments for each one. GenBook has one way synchronization with your Outlook calendar (and iCal, Google, etc.) so that you can “accept” an

appointment on GenBook and it will appear on your personal calendar. GenBook Solo is $20 per month, and Standard with unlimited staff members is $40 per month.

BookFresh

BookFresh (www.bookfresh.com) is another online scheduling tool, similar in many ways to GenBook. BookFresh also adds SMS (text) notifications when someone schedules an appointment, and reminders via text of upcoming meetings. BookFresh syncs with Google Calendar, Android, iCal and Outlook. BookFresh also has a review function, so clients can provide reviews of your firm and people see them when they book appointments. BookFresh creates a “mini website” for your business for free, which may help with exposure online. They have added the ability to take payments online, and can send SMS and email reminders automatically for appointments. The free version is not functional enough for most lawyers, and the business plan is $20 per month.

Put Your Heads Together

Communicating via asynchronous technology like email can sometimes result in a perpetual and time consuming loop of correspondence. When a situation needs to be resolved with discussion or language in a document needs to be worked out and finalized sometimes taking an in-person meeting is the quickest way to achieve the end. However, getting together for a face-to-face meeting can be difficult, especially when it includes travel – even just across town. However having a live meeting can be productive when trying to come to conclusions and make decisions. A phone call will sometimes suffice, but to collaborate on a document or give a presentation it is extremely limiting. Enter web conferencing tools. Web conferencing tools provide the visual stimulation and human elements of a live meeting, allowing attendees to make decisions and communicate in real time. There are many web conferencing services at many price points. Free services like Mikogo offer a lot of functionality, primarily useful for sharing a document on the screen and discussing it, or giving a presentation. However, other low cost services, add whiteboards, recording, and chat to the offerings. More expansive and expensive options, like Webex and Microsoft LiveMeeting, add videoconferencing and voice-over-IP. If you just need to see “eye to eye” Skype, Gmail and ooVoo will fill that need and all you (and your client) need is high speed internet and a webcam. Most of these services offer trials so next time you need to really connect with a client try scheduling a virtual meeting.

Join.me

From LogMeIn, Inc. comes Join.me (https://join.me) is a super simple screensharing tool, which allows you to quickly share your screen with up to 250 people at once. The free version provides screensharing, chat, a toll phone conference number, share control and

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monitor selection (for those with multiple monitors) and you don’t have to register so no username and password to remember. To share your screen simply go to the website, and click “Share”. You will need to download an .exe file and once that is done you will see the control panel and a 9 digit number. Then invite anyone to also go to join.me, but instruct them to enter the 9 digit number where it says “join”. The participants do not need to download anything, and even though it is Flash based there are apps for iPhone, iPad and Android – and they work! The pro version costs $149/year of $19 per month and includes presenter swap, meeting scheduler, meeting lock, user management,

international conference lines and more. Join.me uses 256 bit SSL encryption and does not leave traces on the shared machine or recipients. The current beta version is also adding VoiP. This is a really useful, fast, and free tool for showing someone your screen in an instant.

FreeScreenSharing

From the people who gave you freeconferencecall.com comes FreeScreenSharing.com. After a free registration, you can start a meeting that provides a remarkable amount of features for free. Of course there is a built-in toll phone conference, as well as an attendees list by name, and chat feature. You also get a customizable “lobby” with logos and pictures, a meeting title, contact information and uploaded documents for your guests to see when they arrive. To invite people to attend your meeting simply copy and paste the meeting ID and link, as well as the audio conference number into an email. Screensharing features include choosing to share a screen or a specific application, as well as which monitor to share. You can switch presenters too. You can have unlimited free meetings with up to 96 participants for up to six hours per meeting. There is no “pro” or fee-based version of this tool, and it does not appear to be ad supported. The connection is https (SSL security).

Watchittoo

Watchittoo (http://watchitoo.com/) is a live streaming video collaboration platform that lets up to 25 meeting participants collaborate in a virtual video conference environment around a document or media file, as well as screensharing. There are no downloads, although it does require Flash to run. While there is a free limited 30 day free trial, plans range from $40 per month to $60 per month. Premium features include a toll free audio bridge, recording, embeddable code for your website, analytics and more. While other web conferencing sites offer some limited video collaboration, Watchittoo allows more simultaneous collaborators, with a display that auto-adjusts to show who it talking, etc. VentureBeat described it as the “best of WebEx and live streaming”.

Oovoo

Oovoo (www.oovoo.com) is a free video conferencing service for 6 way video chat. It requires a download (Windows, Mac, iOS, Android) to participate in HD quality

videoconferencing. The free version is ad supported and has no security settings. There are premium offerings which can extend the video calls to 12 users, as well as desktop

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sharing reporting tools, recording, send files, and security settings. The Pro version is $30 per month, and the Plus is only $10 per month. OoVoo for Business is priced by per user, per month, and has an administrative console, more security options, and more.

Necessary equipment includes a webcam, speakers and a microphone. Google + Hangouts

One unique feature of Google’s social network “Plus”, is a real time video chat collaborative space for up to 9 people at a time. Features include screensharing, GoogleDocs editing, and Sketchpad access for drawing. Hangouts on Air let you record and broadcast a hangout. To participate you’ll need a Google account (naturally), as well as a plugin for Google voice and video. Google+ Hangouts are not for confidential client discussions, but can be a quick way to work with co-presenters, host a marketing event, and engage your audience in Google+.

What Does It Rate?

Establishing and meeting expectations regarding communication methods and frequency will go a long way to ensuring that clients are satisfied with representation. At the end of a matter

attorneys can employ techniques such as sending a client satisfaction survey, using easy online survey tools such as SurveyMonkey or Zoomerang. Gathering data about the success of

communication and representation, despite the outcome of the matter, will help establish whether client’s needs are met. While the survey results may provide some negative feedback, prepare to use this as a learning tool for both evaluating new potential clients and serving existing ones in the future.

Conclusion

Think about how you can use technology to make it easier for your clients to work with you, and to provide better client service. Do scrutinize online services, considering your ethical and legal duties. Discuss with your clients what they’d like to see from you, and how you can make their experience better. Adapt to their needs, be open to suggestions and think about how harnessing technology can increase client satisfaction.

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Reprinted with permission from The Relevant Lawyer—Reimagining the Future of the Legal Profession, available for purchase from the ABA Webstore (shopaba.org) at http://shop.americanbar.org/eBus/Store/ProductDetails.aspx?productId=187108732, 2015 © by the American Bar Association. All rights reserved. This information or any portion may not be copied or disseminated in any form or by any means or stored in an electronic database or retrieval system without the express written consent of the American Bar Association or the copyright holder.

I. Introduction

Even as virtual law firms rapidly gain currency in the legal world, confu-sion persists on the term’s precise meaning. More lawyers, particularly the new wave of “untethered” solos, are now mobile, doing without a physi-cal office space, meeting clients at the clients’ location or a lophysi-cal Starbucks, and doing their legal work by email, cell phone, and laptop computer. But unless they deliver online legal services through a secure client portal, these untethered lawyers are not engaged in virtual lawyering. By defi-nition, practicing via the Internet, specifically, is what virtual law firms do. We now know enough about the trajectory of virtual law practice, and we can now perceive future trends clearly enough, to know that more

Chapter 7 THE FUTURE OF

VIRTUAL LAW

PRACTICE

RICHARD S. GRANAT AND STEPHANIE KIMBRO

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Reprinted with permission from The Relevant Lawyer—Reimagining the Future of the Legal Profession, avail-able for purchase from the ABA Webstore (shopaba.org) at http://shop.americanbar.org/eBus/Store/ProductDetails. aspx?productId=187108732, 2015 © by the American Bar Association. All rights reserved. This information or any portion may not be copied or disseminated in any form or by any means or stored in an electronic database or retrieval system without the express written consent of the American Bar Association or the copyright holder.

law firms—from the “untethered” solos to large establishment brick-and-mortar firms—will practice in the virtual space in coming years.

It is now clear that, for several reasons, virtual law firm technology before long will mainstream within the legal profession, as the primary law practice platform inevitably shifts from office to Internet. To engage with clients, lawyers will become increasingly proficient with the online technology tools discussed below, consistent with new legal ethics norms calling on lawyers to attain technological competence. Lawyers who do not adapt will lose market share and relevance.

The continuing ascension of virtual law firms will leave a profound mark on those who deliver legal services and on segments of society that receive them or need them. The economies of legal software applications will enable lawyers to make a living offering legal services to persons now priced out of the legal services market. Internet-based technology will enable law firms—mostly solos and small firms that serve consumers and small businesses—to offer efficient and affordable solutions relevant to a latent market for legal services. Virtual law firm technology holds the promise of a significant if not comprehensive solution to the persistent access to justice problem burdening low-income people and those of mod-est means. Technology will deliver legal help to the legally underserved, where traditional legal services market has failed.

This chapter discusses the future of virtual law practice, with an expla-nation of the origin of the concept; an exploration of the different forms of virtual law practice; and an analysis of the societal forces creating a demand for the delivery of legal services online. The impact of virtual law practice on the productivity of law firms of all kinds, from solos to big law firms, is also explored, as well as the potential for virtual law firms to serve as one solution to the access to justice problem.

II. What Is a “Virtual Law Practice”?

A “virtual lawyer” delivers legal services online through a secure web space, normally characterized as a “client portal.” Without the security of “client portal technology” where communications are encrypted and protected, the practice is not ethically compliant. It is estimated that approximately 6 percent of solos and small law firms use a secure client THE RELEVANT LAWYER: REIMAGINING THE FUTURE OF THE LEGAL PROFESSION

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portal to communicate and collaborate with their clients and deliver other legal services online. “Virtual law practice” is still in its early stages of adoption by the legal profession. Yet given the continued rise in consumer use of companies that provide online legal services, with or without the review of a licensed lawyer, the market need for virtual law offices as an alternative to traditional legal service delivery will most likely be driven by consumer demand, and adoption by the profession will increase in the coming years.

A Primer on Virtual Law Firms

eLawyering can be traced to the early days of the Internet, when early law firm websites such as http:// www .visalaw .com and http:// www .mdfamilylawyer .com first appeared. In January 2000, William Paul, then president of the American Bar Association, created the ABA eLawyer-ing Task Force. President Paul’s vision was that lawyers could use the power of the Internet to serve clients of moderate means priced out of the legal market. The eLawyering Task Force still exists today as a program unit within the Law Practice Division of the American Bar Association. With the passage of time, the eLawyering concept became associ-ated with the concept of virtual law practice. The period from 2000 to 2009 witnessed the emergence of several virtual law firms that sought to deliver legal services online directly to clients. Unlike a simple law firm website that may only have a description of a firm’s practice, bio-graphical information about the partners and employees of the firm, and some legal information, a “virtual law firm” is characterized by access by the firm’s clients to a password-protected and secure web space where the attorney and client may interact and legal services are consumed by the client. Some may include the delivery of online legal advice, legal review of documents received by the client from another party, discussions between the lawyer and the client, and the creation, assembly, and review of legal documents and forms.

In response to inquiries from law firms about what constitutes an ethically compliant virtual law practice, the eLawyering Task Force in 2009 released “Suggested Minimum Requirements for Law Firms Delivering Legal Services Online.” These minimum requirements help lawyers resolve questions about whether their “virtual practices” comply

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with the professional rules of conduct. Since every state develops and enforces its own rules for the legal profession, these requirements were advisory only. The guidelines were never submitted to the ABA House of Delegates for approval, so their authority is limited to the wisdom within the guidelines themselves, but they have affected the definition of what constitutes a “virtual law practice.”

The core definition of a “virtual law practice” proposed by the eLaw-yering Task Force in the requirements is linked to the architecture of a law firm’s website. Thus:

The basic structure of a law firm Web site that offers legal services online requires a secure client Web space that is accessible only with a user name and secure password. Without such a mechanism it is difficult or impossible to comply with the rules of professional conduct that deal with UPL, client confidentiality, establishing the lawyer/client relationship, and conflict of interest issues. Virtual law practice is linked to delivering legal services online. To protect the confidentiality and security of client information this requires a secure “client portal” accessible with a user name and password. Within the secure client portal, clients can communicate and col-laborate with their lawyers online with the assurance that their transactions are secure and ethically compliant.

A “secure Web space” that is accessible to a client is commonly known as a “client portal.” The term is most often applied to an electronic shar-ing mechanism between a law firm and its clients. The law firm provides a secure entry point that enables its clients to log into an area where they can communicate, view and download documents, collaborate on document editing, and upload private information. The portal exists only on the web and data is stored in the cloud. When data is transmit-ted between the secure portal and the client, it is encryptransmit-ted.

eLawyering can only take place within a secure web space. eLawyer-ing encompasses the tasks that a lawyer does within the “client portal” itself. These eLawyering tasks can be of many types. In an article in Law Practice Magazine for January–February 2004, Marc Lauritsen, co-chair of the eLawyering Task Force, defined eLawyering as:

all the ways in which lawyers can do their work using the Web and associated technologies. These include new ways to communicate and collaborate with clients, prospective clients and other lawyers, produce documents, settle disputes and manage legal knowledge.

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Think of a lawyering verb—interview, investigate, counsel, draft, advocate, analyze, negotiate, manage and so forth—and there are corresponding electronic tools and techniques.

The literature about “virtual law practice” often quotes lawyers as referencing themselves as “virtual lawyers” because they have no physi-cal office; they meet clients at their client’s office or at the lophysi-cal Starbucks and do their legal work by email, cell phone, and laptop computer. But since these lawyers do not deliver online legal services securely, one would not consider them true “virtual lawyers.”

This is a difference between virtual law practice and just being a “mobile” lawyer. We would characterize the lawyer in the previous para-graph as just being “untethered”—a lawyer who is mobile and free from an office location. A “virtual lawyer” is also an “untethered” lawyer, but he or she is much more than that when integrating a client portal into a virtual practice model. Making this distinction is important, because when the lawyer is evaluating his or her compliance with the Rules of Professional Conduct, different ethics issues may arise from the direct delivery of legal services to clients online that would not arise from merely using online tools to conduct legal tasks. If the lawyer is deliv-ering legal services to clients online, there may be an online form of limited-scope engagement agreement that must be properly handled securely online. The establishment of the lawyer-client relationship online through a secure client portal and use of a click-wrap agreement requires compliance with rules that a virtual practitioner must know of that go beyond the traditional establishment of the lawyer-client relation-ship. Therefore, being a “mobile” lawyer may not raise the same ethics issues or require the same level of security and attention to procedure.

III. Types of Virtual Law Practice

A. Law Firm–Based Client Portal

During the initial emergence of virtual law practice, law firms incorpo-rated into existing websites a “client portal” that was accessible with a user name and password within which different legal tasks are done. The added value of creating a client portal where lawyers can work with their clients online is a way for many law firms—from solo to large law firm—to differentiate themselves from other firms. In this model, an inde-pendent company usually provides the client portal application to the law

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firm as “software-as-a-service.” The client portal is integrated within its law firm’s website, and the client signs into the client portal from the law firm’s website using a user name and password.

B. Virtual Practice within a Branded Network

More recently, a hybrid for a virtual law practice has emerged where a third party provides a website that connects clients with law firms. The third party creates a website that is market-facing and attracts consumers who can become clients of the law firms linked to that company’s website. The consumer-facing website often targets specific legal needs, such as

estate planning, start-up companies, or divorce law, and, with advertis-ing resources and excellent content, can attract consumers who can be served by the lawyers for its network. These networks are called “branded networks” and offer the individual law firm an efficient way to market its services through the company’s website. Examples, as of mid-2014, included AttorneyFee.Com, DirectLawConnect, LawGives, LawDingo, LawZam, UpCounsel, PlainLegal, and Bridge US.

What makes this a form of virtual law practice is that the lawyers work with their clients through a secure client portal, which is also set up to be ethically compliant in the sense that communications are secure and encrypted and confidentiality is preserved.

IV. The Market for Consumer Legal Services

The emergence of virtual law firms is just one dimension of transforma-tive change now shaping the consumer legal services market, primarily because of the ascendancy of the Internet. Another is the recent move-ment of some consumers away from the lawyer-driven model of legal services delivery.

A. Direct-to-Consumer Solutions

Consumers and small business are largely served by solos and small law firms, which constitute 80 percent of the legal profession within the United States. During the last decade, a new category of nonlawyer, legal information websites offering direct-to-consumer, low-cost legal solutions also has emerged. Examples include LegalZoom, the most well-known THE RELEVANT LAWYER: REIMAGINING THE FUTURE OF THE LEGAL PROFESSION

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legal brand among consumers, although it is not a law firm, and others such as Nolo.com, U.S. Legal Forms, Inc., and SmartLegalforms, Inc., to name only a few. The legal information industry of self-help books and forms has gone online. It has the solo and small-firm segment of the legal profession squarely in its sights. A legal information solution can often substitute for the work of a lawyer. Intelligent legal documents and smart web advisors often provide a low-cost, just-good-enough solution to many legal problems without the need to incur higher legal fees. This is the new reality that the legal profession faces.

The impact of these legal information websites on that segment of the legal profession, while not huge as yet, is not insignificant either. In one area alone, no-fault divorce, we estimate that online divorce sites, such as www .completecase .com, www .legalzoom .com, www .selfdivorce .com, www .smartlegalforms .com, www .divorcelawinfo .com, www .divorcenet .com, www .docupro .net, and www .uslegalforms .com, have processed over 100,000 online divorces in 2014. If the average legal fee for an uncontested, no-fault divorce is approximately $1,500, then approximately $150 million in legal fees have been drained from lawyers’ practices on a nationwide basis. This is not a small amount and it will continue to increase—at the expense of the legal profession. These intelligent legal information sites will become more sophisticated and incorporate more rule-based, intel-ligent web applications that substitute for the judgment and the labor of an attorney. Consumers will continue to look for less costly alternatives than traditional legal services, and these software-based solutions will increase with passing time.

B. Why Do Consumers Look for Alternatives to Lawyers?

American Bar Foundation research and other research studies on consumer perceptions of lawyers provide support for the idea that consumers will avoid using a lawyer unless they really have to.

The American Bar Foundation research includes people from all eco-nomic strata in a single midwestern mid-size city. Extensive interviews probed problems but did not cast them as legal matters. Only 15 percent of those with a civil justice situation turned to an advisor for help, and only 8 percent turned to a lawyer. One out of 11 people with a legal issue

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took that issue to a lawyer. Forty-five percent of the people said there was no need for advice. Twenty-five percent said that seeking help would make no difference.

Consumers look for alternatives to lawyers because:

• They cannot afford $125-$150 per hour, or they perceive that they cannot afford lawyers because most lawyers use the billable hour, and consumers cannot budget for legal costs and fear unpredictable, high fees.

• Lawyers are inconvenient and inefficient to use.

• Lawyers can be slow delivering a legal service, as technologically they still lag behind other service professions.

• Consumers dislike hourly rates.

Rather than seek legal assistance, many consumers will search for a solu-tion that is “good enough.” Consumers will sub-optimize and seek the assistance of an independent legal document preparer rather than the full services of an attorney in the interest of economy, even though it may be far from the perfect solution.

C. What Do Consumers Want from Lawyers?

The proliferation of “lawyerless” legal services underscores the importance to the legal community of identifying, and responding to, what consum-ers want from lawyconsum-ers. The dominant theme of extensive research on that question is better customer service. More particularly, consumers want:

• information on what their case will cost; • an idea of how long their case will take; • progress updates on their cases;

• prompt response to letters and phone calls; and • prompt responses to their complaint(s).

Market research also supports the conclusion that consumers want legal advice and legal services to be delivered:

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• online, by phone, and even by text;

• out of hours—not just the traditional 9 to 5;

• linked with related services, such as the purchase of a home; and • with unbundled and ”do it yourself” legal services.

From consumers’ perspective, the system for delivering legal services must be redesigned to conform to their values by creating a new value propo-sition. A new value proposition could involve elimination of the need to go to the lawyer’s office, increasing speed of the transaction, and offering services at a flat fee. It is a waste of marketing dollars to market legal ser-vices to consumers who do not want legal serser-vices in their present form. Marketing is more than just “selling” or getting the word out about a law firm, or publishing a website that is more than a Yellow Pages advertise-ment, or radio and TV commercials that make claims about how great a law firm is. Lawyers cannot sell a product or service to a consumer if the consumer does not want to buy it. Marketing is more than “promotion.” Fixing the system for the delivery of common legal services requires more radical surgery if the migration of consumers toward less valued alternatives is to be halted. Solutions include:

1. Increasing the transparency of the transaction between client and lawyer by moving away from hourly pricing toward fixed pricing and/or pricing by result. The lack of transparency in lawyer pricing creates tremen-dous anxiety by consumers. A consumer can get a fixed price from a homebuilder to build a $1 million house (with allowances for unfore-seen circumstances), but often can’t get a fixed price from a lawyer for a relatively simple divorce.

2. Increasing productivity of the legal transaction and passing the savings on to the client. Consumers suspect that lawyers are using informa-tion technology to increase their productivity by automating more routine legal tasks such as document production. They resent that productivity enhancements are not passed along to the consumer in terms of lower prices. Without competition from other kinds of pro-viders, the legal profession has no incentive to lower prices. Instead, legal fees move up. Full-service stockbrokers were affected by online

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discount stockbrokers in price reductions. A competitive economic environment for legal services would have the same result.

3. Overcoming the inconvenience of communicating and working with a law-yer. While it is necessary to appear in a doctor’s office for a physical examination, it is unnecessary to be physically present in a lawyer’s office for the law firm to do its work. Yet the prevailing mode of doing business requires that the client give up half a day of work or more and travel to a lawyer’s office for advice at the lawyer’s convenience, not the consumer’s.

V. Capturing the “Connected Generation”

The pressures to change the patterns of delivery of legal services for con-sumers will increase dramatically in the next few years.

Whatever trends are now in place will accelerate over the coming years as “the connected generation” comes of age and matures into the age where they need legal services. The “connected generation,” often called the Millennial Generation, are those born since 1981, as of 2014 ranging in age from eighteen to thirty-three. Approximately 87 million Americans are in this age cohort. It is larger than the Baby Boom generation, and as this generation ages they will have the same legal problems and issues as any other generation. This generation has grown up on the Internet and looks to the Internet first, before checking the Yellow Pages, reach-ing for a telephone, or consultreach-ing with a professional face-to-face. This is a generation of “digital natives” with the Internet in their DNA. They shop online, play online, learn online, bank and invest online, and will expect their lawyers to also be online.

The defining cultural/historical event to distinguish this cohort is that they spent their formative years in the age of the birth and rise of the Internet. The Internet Generation has no recourse to a memory of (or nos-talgia for) a pre-Internet history, a factor that greatly differentiates them from older generations, who had to learn to adapt to new technologies.

This generation values: • innovation—the better way; • immediacy—i.e., “I want it now!”

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• authentication and trust—often established through online methods of sharing;

• interactivity defining the culture; and

• high customization—services and products that fit unique needs. Consumer behaviors emphasize:

• looking to the Internet first to seek information, alternatives, and options;

• trying before they buy;

• reliance on communities of interest where opinions and information can be exchanged; and

• interaction with a website before talking to a professional.

Law Firms Designed to Serve an Internet-Savvy Generation

Law firm websites that are highly interactive and can serve this genera-tion online will dominate the legal landscape in the decades to come. The law firms moving into this next stage are what we call “web-enabled law firms” because of their commitment to using the power of the Internet to change the way they practice law by creating websites highly inter-active with their clients.

Web-based applications that early-adopter law firms are now incor-porating in their law firm websites include:

Web-Enabled Document Automation

Within a secure client space, clients can provide data through an online questionnaire that results in document assembly through web-enabled document solutions. Enabling the client to provide the data directly into an online interview reduces the time that the attorney must spend on the interview process and results in an instantaneous generation of a draft ready for a lawyer’s more detailed review. Web-enabled doc-ument assembly enlists the client’s effort in providing the data used to create a customized document without initial lawyer intervention. Traditionally, document automation has been used by lawyers within

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the office environment to speed up the production of documents of all kinds. Speeding up internal document assembly within the law firm is important, but does not have as dramatic a change in law firm work process as client-centered and web-enabled document automation. By moving the document automation process onto the web and enabling the client to provide data online, a major increase in lawyer and client productivity occurs.

Gamification to Increase Online Client Engagement

There is enormous potential to increase engagement with clients through games for legal services embedded in a law firm website. Because the psychology behind gaming supports positive engagement, games may educate the public and provide a way for the legal profession to jump into the larger online conversation around legal services. Games may push players with rewards from gameplay from a platform like Face-book to a licensed lawyer, law firm, or one of the many online branded networks providing legal services. Not only may games increase the public’s empowerment and education about the law, they may also increase access to justice by providing the public with alternative ways to be connected with legal services online. From the lawyer’s perspec-tives, games could deliver a prospective client already engaged, better educated, and prepared to purchase legal services online or extend the engagement to in-person legal representation.

What is a game for legal services? Gamification is when you take a process, such as filling out an online client intake form, or all the steps needed to handle a case as a pro se litigant, and add game elements to that process to motivate people to complete it or handle it in a different way. Gamification uses game mechanics to influence behavior in the real world. This differs from a pure “game.” Games provide a different experience than something that has been gamified. Because games are self-motivated, they create more of a “flow.” Flow comes from a sense of accomplishment and is a result of heightened functioning. It occurs most when something is done for fun rather than for money, status, or obligation. This is why games are often more engaging tools than the gamification of an existing online process.

In other industries, including higher education, games are being

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designed as teaching tools and sources of increased online engagement. Games are an ideal conduit for sharing basic legal information and ser-vices with the public. Games can provide education in a fun way and be shared between friends and family who may also have similar legal needs. Paired up with a rewards system that encourages the player to seek online self-help resources and legal services, games may direct consumers to the appropriate online legal service provider for their legal need.

Online Calculators

Online web interview forms can be used to collect financial data that is the basis for a calculation and offers the client an immediate, use-ful legal result. This software solution provides an answer to a client without the involvement of a lawyer. It may provide estimates to pro-spective clients regarding matters where there is a statute that dictates a clear formula that the calculator applies. Another calculator might be developed individually by the lawyer to help a prospective client cal-culate the estimated cost of legal services for the lawyer’s own services.

Client Appointment Scheduling

Clients can make appointments to see their attorney directly through the website.

Client Data Intake

Clients can provide data through online forms that are the basis for an office consultation. Providing the data in advance enables the lawyer to fully prepare for the office consultation and often reduces the time required for the in-house consultation.

Interactive Legal Advisors

Some law firms are creating interactive legal advisors. As with online document assembly, the client answers questions through an online questionnaire, but instead of a legal document being created, the intel-ligence engine manipulates “if-then” statements that generate a legal answer to the client immediately.

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Online Dispute Settlement

Video- and web-conferencing applications can also support forms of online dispute settlement and mediation.

Additional web-enabled, interactive applications will continue to be developed by third-party vendors and provided to solos and small law firms through the virtual law firm web-based architecture. These law-based interactive applications power a law firm’s legal service by reducing costs, which results in more affordable fees.

VI. The Access to Justice Problem

Internet-based legal technology can help solve the justice gap problem by enabling law firms, mostly solos and small law firms that serve consumers and small business, to offer efficient and affordable solutions that relate to a latent market for legal services. Surveys across the states have put the number of U.S. consumers who cannot afford a lawyer at up to 80 percent. As a recent law review article notes, “The typical legal services con-sumer in the U.S. makes approximately $25 per hour, and is priced out of the services lawyers provide even at low attorney rates of $125–$150 an hour.”

Approximately half a million lawyers provide personal legal services to individuals and families. More than four out of ten new law school graduates cannot find full-time permanent employment as lawyers and have an unemployment rate nearly twice that of the nation. Unfortunately, lawyers who provide personal legal services all chase after the same top 20 percent of potential clients who can pay their hourly rates, or who have personal injury cases, or who are pursuing a claim for which the lawyer’s fees can be paid under a fee-shifting statute or otherwise recov-ered from the defendant.

Surveys show that fully 80 percent of low-income Americans with legal needs do not receive legal help because they cannot afford private lawyers and legal aid resources are inadequate.

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The ABA Standing Committee on the Delivery of Legal Services also reports that “[p]eople with moderate incomes don’t do much better; a large majority represent themselves, get help from someone who isn’t a lawyer, or do nothing when faced with a legal problem.”

The Legal Services Corporation (LSC) recently released a report that resulted from a Legal Tech Summit convened in 2013 to explore the many ways technology can expand access to justice. LSC President James J. Sandman, in commenting on the report, recognized the importance of online legal services in helping to resolve the access to justice problem: “It charts a path to a future where, through the smart and disciplined use of technology, the legal aid community can provide some form of assis-tance to everyone with a significant civil legal problem—and not have to turn people away with nothing.” LSC’s strategies for achieving this goal focus on the delivery of legal and information services over the web. The main components of the LSC strategy are similar to what we envision for private law firms as these firms migrate toward the Internet:

1. Creating in each state a unified legal portal that directs persons to the most appropriate form of legal assistance and guides self-represented litigants through the entire legal process.

2. Deploying sophisticated document assembly applications to sup-port the creation of legal documents by service providers and by litigants themselves.

3. Taking advantage of mobile technologies to reach more persons more effectively.

4. Applying business process/analysis to all access-to-justice activities to make them as efficient as practicable. Developing expert systems to assist lawyers and other service providers to access authoritative knowledge through a computer and apply it to particular factual situations.

By combining the power of software with the delivery of legal service, fric-tion is reduced and speed of delivery is increased, and because aspects of the legal service are automated, profit margins can increase. We call these legal services “software-powered legal services.” By combining delivery of

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human legal services with automated legal services and delivering these services over the Internet, economies of scale can be achieved that are not possible within a traditional person-to-person law practice.

To reach and address a huge potential unserved market for legal ser-vices, lawyers must learn how to power their services with virtual software technologies that result in reduced fees that expand the market for legal services. By definition, these services must be delivered within a client portal to be secure and to be ethically compliant. The concept of “the virtual law practice” is a component and application that is essential to reduction of the cost and the price of legal services.

VII. The Future of Virtual Law Practice: A Prediction

Before too long, almost every law firm will be able to work with its clients online, and its clients will expect it to have this capacity. Whether the law firm of the future incorporates virtual law firm technology into its own website, becomes a member of a branded legal network, or both, we real-ize this technology will eventually mainstream within the legal profession. The predictions of legal futurists such as Richard Susskind are finally being taken seriously by American law firms. Established firms, however, are only slowly adapting to the new legal marketplace, especially those with traditional partnership models and hierarchical business structures. In that respect, traditional firms are comparable to traditional industries and companies that have struggled to adapt to changes in their marketplace. This difficulty might best be explained by a phenomenon called “innovator’s dilemma,” described by Harvard Business School Profes-sor Clayton Christensen in his book, The Innovator’s Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail (Boston: Harvard Business School Press 1997). Christensen’s book explains why disruptive technology is less common than sustaining technology and how innovation in busi-ness models comes from outside of a company rather than from within it. Applying this to law firms, rather than spending some portion of their budget on innovation and technology, firms will be more inclined to con-tinue to invest in sustaining technology (and business methods) that have always paid off in the past. Even as the marketplace changes and a better model appears, getting a law firm to invest in making the change will be a THE RELEVANT LAWYER: REIMAGINING THE FUTURE OF THE LEGAL PROFESSION