New lawyers here’s some useful information (and free CLE)
Posted by Ernest Svenson in Presentations, Webinar on January 20, 2012
A few weeks ago I announced that I was shifting from the full-time practice of law to full-time work teaching lawyers how to make better use of technology (with the side-benefit of also offering them CLE credit, in Louisiana at least). Today, let me tell you about one important focal point of this move.
I want to do more to help mentor young lawyers.
Law school education has for a long time failed to provide truly practical information to budding lawyers. This is especially true when it comes to information about how to use technology to do a better job in the practice of law. So folks graduate from law school devoid of any sense of how to use technology.
New lawyers are also devoid of money after they pay all their law school bills.
So, here’s how DigitalWorkflowCLE plans to help. First, we’re going to focus some of our attention on helping new lawyers learn practical skills. And we’re going to do it for free. Our first CLE program of the year will be a one hour webinar on Social Networking for Lawyers, and it will only be offered to Louisiana lawyers who’ve been in practice for three years or less.
The February 3rd webinar is limited to 15 new lawyers. Again, it’s completely free and we provide 1 hour of CLE credit (includes Ethics credit). For other lawyers we’ll be doing the Social Networking seminar a week later, on February 10, but we’ll be charging $30 for the CLE credit (Ethics).
Louisiana Law Dictionary – useful
Posted by Ernest Svenson in books, iPad, iPhone on January 12, 2012
Louisiana is a civil law state, as many lawyers know (hopefully all of them in Louisiana know this!). And to lawyers outside Louisiana it invokes unease, mostly because the terminology is often different. Google has not tweaked its translator tool to include a “common law to civil law” converter, and probably won’t anytime soon. So what’s a poor civil law lawyer to do?
Well, you can buy the Louisiana Civil Law Dictionary, which was created by two Louisiana attorneys: Gregory Rome and Stephan Kinsella. It’s $25 from Amazon, and worth it for Louisiana attorneys and those who are trying to understand the lingo used by Louisiana attorneys. It’s even available in a Kindle edition for just under $10, which is handy if you want to have it on your iPhone or iPad.
Why is our company called “DigitalWorkflowCLE”?
Posted by Ernest Svenson in Our Company on January 10, 2012
Lawyers need CLE credit and are supposed to learn things that help them do a better job for their clients, and that improve the profession as whole. Increasingly, that means learning how to use technology better. But most CLE is boring and unhelpful. What if it wasn’t, and what if CLE helped lawyers solve some of their most insidious tech problems?
Dane and I have both been practicing law for over 20 years, and we’ve been trying to use technology to do a better job for our clients. We found out a lot of lessons the hard way, but sometimes we found some tools that worked reliably and weren’t hard to learn. We figured other lawyers would want to know some of the things we learned, and so we started doing CLE programs focused on technology in law practice.
Our CLE programs are technology focused, but they’re also practical, informative, and entertaining. Our goal is to make it easier for you to find the useful, reliable technology. We also show you how to incorporate it into your practice, so you can concentrate on being a great lawyer. If you work with digital data (e.g. have a computer, use email, use a smartphone) then you have a “digital workflow.” Why not figure out how to make that digital stuff flow more smoothly, and get CLE credit to boot?
That’s what we do, and that’s why we named the company “DigitalWorkflowCLE.”
Beginner’s guide to Twitter
Posted by Ernest Svenson in Social Media on January 10, 2012
Understandably, there are many lawyers not yet willing to invest time messing around with Social Media tools like Twitter. When we do our CLE program on Social Media for Lawyers a core theme is that lawyers should pay attention to these things because their clients use them (often to get into trouble), and opponents try to discover them in litigation. If you don’t know anything about them it makes it harder to do your job, unless you work in an area of law that is completely insulated from social media.
For those of you that are willing to try some of these tools, we suggest Twitter as the most valuable tool for rapid information gathering. And for those of you just starting out, here is an excellent article entitled A Beginner’s Guide to Twitter. It explains what those weird symbols are (e.g. RT, DM, and hashtag or #something), and it even suggests some good software tools to use to gather in twitter posts (“tweets”).
Vermont lawmakers push to decrease reliance on paper.
Posted by Ernest Svenson in Paperless lawyering on January 4, 2012
From a Vermont news source, comes this story:
Each session brings new challenges for lawmakers. There are books to balance, laws to write and keeping constituents in the loop. Keeping it all together takes money, organization and paper.
“We spend a lot of money on printing and a lot of money on paper. This is one approach we could use to deal with it,” said Duncan Goss, the Statehouse Technology Expert.
Enter the iPad project.
Nice to see government embracing technology to be more efficient and cost-effective. And, of course, lowering the burden on the environment.
Articulate Advocacy – how to gesture when presenting
Posted by Ernest Svenson in Presentations on January 2, 2012
At our recent CLE seminar Dane Ciolino did a great session on effective speaking techniques, freely admitting that he was mostly pulling information from Brian Johnson’s book The Articulate Advocate. Dane addressed the issue of gesturing, and gave some examples. Here’s a three minute video of Brian Johnson talking about gesturing.
Where is the “digital lawyering” angle you might ask? Well, there is none. We aim to provide information that helps lawyers do a better job practicing law. The key to a great presentation isn’t built on technology. Technology can help, but only if you have the basics down first.
Casemap – Digital Case Management
Posted by Ernest Svenson in Casemap, Digital Workflow on December 31, 2011
If you’ve attended any of Dane Ciolino’s seminars on digital case management you know he’s a firm proponent of using Casemap. For those of you who want to review the benefits of Casemap, or who want more in depth explanations of how it can help your law practice, check out these videos that Dane created. They were done for a law school class on Practical Lawyering, but also they’re useful for lawyers who want to learn how to use Casemap better.
Why Twitter matters
Posted by Ernest Svenson in Social Media on December 29, 2011
During our recent two day seminar we spent some time trying to convince the lawyers in attendance of why Twitter is something worth trying. Here’s a great article from someone who craves useful information about sports, and has decided that Twitter is indispensable. If you don’t care about sports maybe you’ll find it hard to relate to his explanation of why Twitter is invaluable. So we’ll have to point you to someone who is using Twitter to follow something you care about.
But for those of you that like sports, you’ll hopefully be persuaded to try Twitter for that reason. Then it’ll be easier to convince you to use it to get information relevant to your law practice. Twitter matters, if you care about efficient information gathering. But it’s up to you to learn how to use it so that you get the news you want. If you want to follow us on Twitter go to this link and click follow (after you sign up, that is).
Digital Lawyering – Two Day CLE in New Orleans (Dec 28 & 29)
Posted by Ernest Svenson in Uncategorized on December 21, 2011
If you attended our two day seminar on Digital Lawyering (Dec 28th & 29th) click here for the written materials (right click and choose “download as” because it’s a large file and if you just click it will take your browser too long to render it). To see the slides used in the presentation (or similar versions), click on the presentation name. If you didn’t attend, but want to be assured of being notified of such seminars you should subscribe to the weekly newsletter (basically you’ll get an email with all of the blog posts from that week, which is not usually just one or maybe two posts).
Wednesday (Dec 28th)
Digital Case Management
E-Discovery panel (no slides)
Digital Office & Consultants – (no slides)
Thursday (Dec 29th)
Articulate Advocacy
Little Big Firm – Tips for small firm lawyers
Half Day New Orleans CLE Seminar on Paperless Lawyering
Posted by Ernest Svenson in Acrobat, Live CLE Seminars, Paperless lawyering on November 22, 2011
In addition to our two day seminar on more advanced technology information for lawyers, we’re also offering a half-day intro to paperless lawyering. Here’s the schedule. (Click here to sign up)
09:00–10:00 am – Creating a paperless law practice
Creating a paperless practice involves picking the right scanner, and then setting it up for the common, everyday scan jobs. Setting up a reliable file-naming, and storage system is critical, preferably one that allows file access via the Internet. There’s only one “right” scanner, and we’ll tell you what it is.
10:00–11:00 am – Maintaining a paperless practice
Maintaining a paperless practice is about dealing with digital documents. Mostly, it’s about getting proficient at using PDFs, and making notes and highlighting key information. Transitioning away from fax machines and printers is also important. So is creating a digital signature. We’ll show you how.
11:00–12 noon – Workflow & logistical issues
Some workflow issues are different for each firm, and it’s important to tweak those to suit your firm’s particular needs. There is no technology issue that can’t be overcome by someone with sufficient knowledge, but often the stumbling blocks are human nature and psychological. Come with questions; we’ve got answers.
Contact Us
Email: digitalworkflowcle@gmail.com
Phone: (504) 613-4253
