The Evolution of Information Governance

May 16th, 2013 → 9:38 am @ Ari Kaplan

I spoke with Garth Landers, the Director of Product Marketing at EMC, a global information management provider, who is responsible for the company’s pervasive governance portfolio.

We discussed the evolution of information governance, its trajectory, and key trends that are impacting that direction. He noted that organizations are increasingly focused on litigation readiness, realizing a measurable return on their e-discovery investments, and drafting practical data policies.

The key challenges are aligning the various custodians of the organization’s most important information and bridging the disconnect between legal and IT.  He highlighted that many companies lack the ecosystem for optimal information governance because ownership and accountability are often muddled.

Listen to our interview below:

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Document Review – There is an App for That

May 13th, 2013 → 1:11 pm @ Ari Kaplan

I spoke with Michael do Rozario and Brian Borskjaer, Special Counsel and Director of the firm’s Legal Technology Solutions team, respectively, at Corrs Chambers Westgarth, a prominent Australian law firm with offices in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, and Perth.

We discussed Casefolio, the firm’s new award-winning document review app, its development, and the user experience, among many other topics.  When it received the Lawtech Award For Innovation in Legal IT at the 7th Annual Chilli IQ Lawtech Summit & Awards in 2012, one judge noted: “This iPad app is simply clever, innovative and delivers a truly ingenious and effective solution to the vexed litigation practitioner.”

Casefolio is available for free trial download in the US, UK, Canadian, and Australian iTunes stores. Corrs has also developed a converter that allows documents and metadata to be exported and imported from a range of litigation support databases, including Ringtail, Relativity, and Summation.

Learn more about Casefolio at http://casefolio.net and listen to our interview below:

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The Secret For Avoiding Suicide Pricing

April 29th, 2013 → 5:06 pm @ Ari Kaplan

I spoke with Dr. Jim Hassett, the founder of LegalBizDev, which helps law firms increase client satisfaction and profitability by improving project management and business development. Dr. Hassett is the author of 11 books, including his most recent: Legal Project Management, Pricing, and Alternative Fee Arrangements (Amazon Digital Services, Inc., 2013).

He highlighted that large and mid-sized law firms are dealing with three key pricing concerns:

1. How to price high enough to make an acceptable profit, but low enough to get the work [aka Suicide Pricing].
2. When are alternative fees the best arrangement for the client and the firm?
3. How to manage the profit once the work commences.

Dr. Hassett suggested that although robust legal project management is helping professionals address these concerns, few firms are making meaningful progress.  “There is a gap between what people are saying for PR and what is really going on,” he advises, predicting a drop in overall pricing, a rise in alternative fees, and improved project management.

His advice for lawyers interested in gaining a competitive advantage in a changing marketplace:

• Don’t over-analyze; just do it.
• Take chances and be more like an entrepreneur.

Listen to our interview below:

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This is How to Get a Job at a Small Firm

April 22nd, 2013 → 3:40 pm @ Ari Kaplan

I spoke with Samantha Williams, the Director of Employer Relations at Arizona State University’s Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law, where she focuses primarily on small firm outreach and employer development. Williams is the co-author (with Linda Calvert Hanson) of Small Firms, Big Opportunity (LawyerAvenue Press, 2012), which provides readers with practical steps to identify where jobs are, how to get hired, and how to succeed in the new legal economy.

Williams shared tips on why law students and recent graduates should be focusing on smaller firms as potential employers, the best resources for those seeking employment with small firms, and the single most important concept to be aware of when looking for job opportunities with small firms.

Learn how to get started by listening to our interview below:

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Reinventing Marketing With a Rocket

April 18th, 2013 → 2:07 pm @ Ari Kaplan

I spoke with Larry Port, the founder and CEO of Rocketmatter, a cloud-based legal practice management and time and billing software product, about Rocket X1, the company’s new Internet marketing agency and hosting platform.

We discussed the company’s mission to combine public relations, website design, search engine optimization, and marketing.  Port noted that by building accountability in marketing, leveraging analytics, and structuring a creative message, users will realize unprecedented results.

Listen to our interview below:

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The Rising Adoption of Law Enforcement Technology in E-Discovery

April 16th, 2013 → 7:51 am @ Ari Kaplan

I spoke with Peter Mercer, the founder and managing director of Vound, an Australia-based software development company focusing on forensics and e-discovery, which is the maker or Intella, the company’s signature tool for processing, searching, and analyzing electronically stored information.

We discussed the growth in user-created data, the trend of law enforcement technologies being adapted to e-discovery, and the increased focus on productivity, which Mercer noted is driving the adoption of this technology. He predicts that the rise in cloud adoption and the interest in reviewing data more simply will help to transform the forensic and e-discovery industry in 2013.

Listen to our interview below:

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Proof of Finding Philanthropy in E-Discovery

April 5th, 2013 → 1:57 pm @ Ari Kaplan

In the fall of 1990, I interviewed for a job that ended up changing the course of my life. The ad to which I responded was for a tutor in the then 1-year old Intergenerational Literacy Project, a collaboration between Boston University’s School of Education and the Chelsea Public Schools in Chelsea, Massachusetts. I had no experience, but wanted a work-study job that was meaningful and rewarding. It turned out to be both. 23 years later, this program continues its mission to improve the reading skills of adults and the literacy knowledge among pre-school and school-aged children.

When I learned about the release of Proof Finder, a unique venture by Nuix to offer its e-discovery and investigation software to users at $100 per year (limited to a maximum case size of 15 gigabytes), I interviewed its CEO, Eddie Sheehy (below), to discuss the endeavor as 100% of the proceeds from all sales are given to Room to Read, a global non-profit organization focused on literacy and gender equality in education.

In addition to serving as the foundation of a successful philanthropic endeavor, Proof Finder offers:

• Mobile device forensics with support for Cellebrite and Micro Systemation XRY mobile images.
• File system forensics including carving out full and partial deleted files and slack space.
• A hex viewer to examine the binary structure of files.
• Expanded clustering and near-deduplication capabilities.

To date, the results are remarkable as the company has donated:

• $44,000 toward the construction of a school in Nepal and the publication of local-language school books.
• $35,000 to help Room to Read build a school in Sri Lanka.
• $7500 to sponsor 30 girls to complete their secondary school education.

Watch the video below in which David Sitsky, Head of Development for Nuix, and John Wood, the founder of Room to Read, discuss their partnership and the release of Proof Finder 4.2:

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Reinventing Legal Training

April 4th, 2013 → 1:06 pm @ Ari Kaplan

I spoke with Desiree Moore, an attorney and the founder of Greenhorn Legal & Greenhorn Bold. Moore is also the author of: Thrive – A New Lawyer’s Guide to Law Firm Practice (American Bar Association, 2012).

We discussed her venture providing what she describes as “the foundational information law students and lawyers need,” her motivation for writing Thrive, and the launch of her on-demand practical skills training series, which focuses on professionalism, time management, communication, networking, and marketing, among other core competencies.

Listen to our interview below:

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Reinventing Cloud-Based Collaboration

March 28th, 2013 → 7:53 am @ Ari Kaplan

I spoke with Eric Hunter, the Director of Knowledge, Innovation & Technology Strategies at California-based Bradford & Barthel, as well as the Executive Director of Spherical Models, a business model innovation consultancy.

We discussed his firm’s transformation to a completely Google Apps environment and his team’s efforts to create a social media-like atmosphere the leveraged internal champions to motivate this shift by 100 lawyers and over 250 users. He recommends developing a clear workflow and to give users time to adapt. Hunter also discussed how his success at Bradford & Barthel fueled the creation of Spherical Models.

Listen to our interview below:

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Disrupting Legal in Six Minute Increments

March 21st, 2013 → 7:33 pm @ Ari Kaplan

I spoke with Matt Homann and JoAnna Forshee, producers of the annual LexThink.1 legal innovation conference, which is being held in Chicago on Wednesday April 3rd on the eve of the ABA Techshow. Homann is the well-known founder of LexThink, a legal innovation consultancy, as well as the creator of the popular [non] billable hour blog. Forshee is the CEO of InsideLegal, which she describes as “the insider’s guide to doing business in legal technology.”

Homann noted that LexThink.1 started 4 years ago as Ignite Law. Participants have 6 minutes (as in one-tenth of an hour of billable time) and 20 slides, which rotate every 18 seconds, to convey their ideas on this year’s theme -  disruption. Prior sessions focused on the future of law, the future of legal tech, and client service. (I had the privilege of participating in the inaugural event in 2010, with a session called: What I Learned About the Future of Legal Marketing From Playing Wii Bowling With a 4 1/2-year old.)

Ten speakers selected by “more than one thousand votes cast” online will cover a variety of topics ranging from Big Data or Big Brother (Eric Hunter) and Don’t Do What You’re Good At (Jay Shepherd) to Knowing the Unknowns (Roe Frazer) and LegalZoom is Eating Legal’s Lunch (Mark Britton).  The only participant, who has appeared in all four productions is Will Hornsby, who will be discussing Gaming the System: Are lawyers ready to game-up?

Forshee notes that speakers typically rate the difficulty of the experience at about an eight on a ten-point scale and Homann suggests that in addition to practice, participants should focus on their transitions to get comfortable telling a story in equal segments.

Those interested in following the sessions on Twitter can search for the Hashtag: #lexthink.

Listen to our extended interview below:

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