Post by Gustavo Rocha, lawyer and consultant in management, IT and quality for law firms. He’s the author of Gestão.Adv.br (content in Portuguese only):

When asking themselves this, everybody has in mind a software solution that does it all: it can manage matters, it organizes the firm, it will sort all that in your practice can be delt with in the cloud and still keep your business from fallling into chaos.

Foolishness!

Prior to solving the management of your office with a software comes the need to manage your practice.

What do I mean?

Any software solution will enable you with data, swift search (assuming it is provided with a comprehensive database), issue reports, etc. However, for a streamlined performance it will need for its data to be logged  within a certain logic and pattern. Reaching this implies that an advanced acquaintance with the app is a given, i.e. understanding its features, possibilities and actual implementation cost, so that an assessment of its cost/benefit ratio can be realized.

Some myths on legal apps are:

The complete solution

All app developers claim that their soltions are the bench mark of the market, they will meet all your practice needs. The reality is that apps will only do what they were programmed to and without an in depth try out,  there’s no way to find how suited for the task they are or not. Apps will enable you with countless resources that won’t do you any good if you don’t know how to make use of them or those resources are not suited for your needs.

Before buying software ask yourself the following:

• What is my area of business?
• What sort of data will be most usefull for my clients?
• Can I access and log data at any time, from any place (from my cell phone for instance)?
• What area the areas of my practice that the app will manage (matters, fiscal, documents, etc)?
• Can I afford to invest in an ideal software solution or do I have other priorities?

The point is, before thinking of apps you should actually be thinking of management.

Managing matters versus managing your office

This could be a blurry issue. Taking matter management for practice management. Dangerous blunder.

Managing matters is a part of the legal practice. But that’s what it is: a part. Lawyers ought to be a part of their clients businesses, part of their decision making by acting preventively. Matters are important but not the sole purpose of your practice.

If they’re not your only goal, why turn them into the core of your office? No way. You got to manage  finances (bills to pay, invoices to receive, cash flow, costs, etc), e-documents (digitize everything, contracts, bills, etc)  clients and prospects management and so on.

If you still think that there is no app for that, you must have been out of the Earth for the last years. The market has to offer solutions that will serve for general office management and not just concerning matters. Don’t be dazzled with matter management, for it needs to be a complete one in order to be effective.

Implementation

This where lots of firms lose money. Believing that an app will solve all their problems, lawyers leave to the people in charge of implementing, fundamental decisions about their practices.

Not to demerit IT consultants and pros, however very few of these take business management really into their interest. The success of their app implementation in your office is their actual concern. How the data is going to be managed and used is not their aim.

This is the real issue here. Management comes before any sort of app implementation. Sort what routines in your firm are the most suited for the present reality and within a year’s time. You’ll have to know what an app can do, to assess it in your firm’s daily practice.

Once you’ve got this down, IT people can come over to train you and your employees, to implement and check on the reports that your management has previously determined and so forth.

To conclude: software will have to work for your firm and not be it to set what can be done or not. You paid for it, it should be working for you and not the other way around.

To be or nor to be web-based

Some by fear, others by prejudice and others by being oblivious of it, do not use wed-based software.

I am totally for it. More good than bad (if any) comes from it. Available from anywhere (even from your cell phone) you have data, documents, court sentences all within the reach of a LAN connection.

Is it safe? Quite safe. A hefty effort is put into web safety. To be true they invest more into safety than any one single law firm would. It is their business to be safe, isn’t it? And yours is to practice law.

So, is there such thing as “the perfect app for the legal practice”? Of course there is, but it is up to you and not to the app to say so.

Post by Daniel Nunes, muchBeta’s Chief Financial Officer:

A client current-account represents the financial situation before a lawyer or law firm.

That being said it’s all very clear: when I (lawyer) issue a billing sheet to clients they owe me money, therefore I will log that debtor position on the current-account. By the time clients pay billing sheets, they no longer owe me any money, i.e. they now have a creditor position before me (lawyer). Thus, clients payments are always credited on their current-accounts. This is why, whenever a money provision is advanced for fees and expenses, I have to credit the client’s current-account.

Yet, a current-account that just reflects financial movements and responsibilities is not enough. A practical example:

A lawyer starts a new matter for a client and asks for a fee provision of $2,000. The current-account shows a creditor balance of $2,000.

Throughout one week, a lawyer has input 20 hours of work into the client’s matter. If that lawyer charges a $150/hour fee, what is the client financial position then?

For any usual billing software the answer would be: the client is creditor of $2,000. According to that application all is OK regarding this client.

But if that lawyer were a LawRD user, when checking the client’s current-account the information would have be:

LawRD displays two balances:

• A green one shows the amount of $2,000 representing a credit to the client, for the advanced provision.
• A red one with the negative amount of -$1,000.

This red -$1,000 stands for the real financial situation of the client towards the lawyer. By the end of the month LawRD will read the client situation as:

$2,000 (provision) - [20 hours input x $150] = $2,000 - $3,000 = -$1,300

LawRD displays two diverse concepts of current-account:

• The traditional, i.e. one that reflects the issuing of billing sheets and the client payments.
• And another, we call Global Current-Account, which mentions tasks and expenses already logged on the matter, but not yet issued  and billed to the client.

Given the scenario on the example, a lawyer faces two options: either a new provision is requested or all debts are billed to the client so that the balance is altered.

Looking at the first option and that a new provision of $2,500 has been added, the current-account will show a positive balance of $4,500, if only financial flow is considered. A positive balance of $1,500 is shown if the total input of tasks already accomplished but not yet billed is taken into consideration, though:

That $1,500 balance equals about 10 hours worth of work ($1,500 divided by $150) that the lawyer may use for that matter. Once that happens, the client will be in debt before the lawyer, again.

Should the lawyer bill all work to the client, the balance in both accounts will be the same: a negative -$1,000:

LawRD displays as negative and in red all the client’s debtor positions. This is a way to red flag the client’s debtor positions to the matter manager or anyone in charge of the administration.

So, what is the upside of showing two concepts of current-account? Here’s one: the client financial situation to the lawyer or law firm is displayed in real time. Billing never keeps up with the work actually done. By using LawRD, users are informed earlier when the client’s financial position is negative… and real time info is valuable for it allows swifter decisions without having to wait on the administrative time it takes for billing sheets to be issued and only then being able to decide.

LawRD is valuable data for your valuable time.

Post by Nelson Teixeira, muchBeta’s Chief Data Officer:

LawRD’s reports are devised so that any law firm manager gets an immediate answer on data submitted to the system.

To that end, we’ve identified in the system, the main Entities to which data is associated to. These are: Clients, Matters, Lawyers, Rainmakers and Performance. These entities can be individually used as value aggregators or combined as data filters.

Next, we’ve also identified all numerical Pointers on: how much we have forecast on costs, how much are we actually spending and how much are we profiting. We have also crossed these basic pointers with invoices status and the partial amonts of these dedicated to expenses and tasks. This data allows us to know, among other important issues, the Net Worth logged in the system the Plan Accomplish Ratio or the Time Productivity.

This data analysis will enable the end user with a tool for spotting, in an analytic fashion,  the causes for an atypical billing period, a decrease on revenue, growth or slowing trends. When examining the issues we’ve mentioned, LawRD’s reports will tell us about: Who, to Whom, What, When, Brought by Whom, under Whose Responsability and the ever wanted HOW.

In order to ease the equation of problems, reports are sorted by Entities, each having four analysis groups: Money, Time, Profitability and Productivity. Every group contains a set of pointers clustered by the entity previously chosen. If willing to do so, users can also filter data through a form containing all six entities.

Example: lawyer John presents a 25% decrease on productivity for this month. Given his quite up to standard and regular performance over the past few months, I’m having some trouble pin pointing what is the cause for that. The issue may present three possible angles:

• John is losing focus and is just not keeping up with his usual performance, as the productivity report states.
• The firm is going through a rough spot. That can easily be concluded by the time line of the report on Turnover.
• Jonh is working on a matter that turned out to be a black hole. To check on this case, I must select the matter entity, the Time analysis group and the filter lawyer John. A discrepancy between the logged time and the billed time will sort the cause for this problem.

Given the large amount of data used in every report, which involves nearly all application’s data structures, we had to devise a strategy of data cache in order to simplify and streamline data selection. The sole minor issue here is that, data is not displayed in real time (updating happens every half hour), but when it is imperative, users can override this by manually updating it in a single click.

Post by Susana Gonçalves, lawyer, partner at Advogados Associados and LawRD user since 2009:

“When I first started my practice, I was the youngest in a newly found firm and for that reason I was assigned to be the middle person with the IT service that we worked with, assuming that being the youngest equaled to be the most apt to understand IT’s procedures and language. To put it into context I’m talking
about 1993, the time when Windows OS was starting off in Portuguese offices - and on its way to be the universal tool it is now - and emails were timidly sneaking into our routines.

For this reason I was compelled to become acquainted with computers and programs, solely from the user’s view point. By the time I started my own practice, experience had taught me that I couldn’t do without an effective management program, but the ones available were expensive and very limited, which led me to give up IT completely and go back to the good old timesheet on paper, later turned into Excel when it was time to bill, with all inherent lapses.

However, when I found LawRD and the help I get from its support team at muchBeta, the scene changed and now I have and effective control on all relevant management elements, effortlessly and with no significant time cost, checking on data further than I used to be able to, in the little time I have for my practice management, withstanding the assessment of team work and profitability of the resources allocated.

It stands to reason that in order to get results from LawRD there is a need for discipline when it comes to submitting data, but pretty soon it became as natural as checking my email for new messages.

One of its qualities that I couldn’t let go without mention is the easy access it enables at anytime, anywhere, thus allowing me to log any task, even at night from my home and away from the office’s bustle.

And of course I have to stress the pricing: unbeatable and the most inexpensive.

LawRD makes it easy for me to fill in billing sheets, objectively assess performance and make more time for a much better work.

Thanks muchBeta!”

With this entry the Quick Guide is updated once the matters feature had a big improvement, as referred in New Features- Summer 2009 Collection.

One of the new features matter type categorization aims at two goals: sorting matters by type and allowing Flat Fee billing.

One acesses to the matter’s  type configuration by clicking Configuration when the Matters tab is selected:

Within the Types of Matters option an array of types is defined to which a matter can be assigned to, when it is added later. Such types have to be sorted before adding a new matter:

Types of Matters can also be used to set the flat fee value which is a new way of defining fees. For instance, if the firm has a standard pricing or has a specific one for a client, these are to be inserted in the Amount field and it should mention wether or not in that amount are included expenses, checking the Expenses Included box.

The second big update deals with billing methods. Now it is possilbe to:

• Bill matters by the hourly rates of each intervening lawyer or by the value specified to that particular matter. Billing by the standard pricing of the firm or by a client’s specific amount, still remains. It is also possible to bill a success-fee which will be settled when a new matter is added, being it adjusted by the time of issuing the billing sheet:
  
• Flat-fee. This option has a pre-defined by the lawyer database with services which relates to a payment plan, as said before:
  
  Configuring payment plans happens in the Configuration menu, when the Matters tab is selected and whithin Payment Plans a calendar for issuing the billing sheets is set:
  
  With this billing method, the matter’s manager is able to check its profitability and keeping up with issuing of billing sheets. In the following example, an installment is overdue and this matter’s networth is negative - the light green column on the chart on the left - the total time spent times the hourly rate of the employee assigned to the matter is superior to the amount already billed:
  
• Contingency fee. A percentage of the recovery amount can now be charged (it can be adjusted when issuing the billing sheet):
  
  Profitability check keeps on being available to the matter’s manager and the contingency is a quick glance away:
  

Finally, there is a new help  Wizard when adding new matters.  These can be added by the following modes: Quick Add and Advanced.

In Quick Add mode the new matter is billed by the hour (be it the standard firm pricing or a specific one for that client) wherein the employee assigned is its manager.

The Advanced mode enables all the possible options for a matter (team assignement and other contacts related to the matter) and is also the way to change or complete the settings of a matter added in Quick Mode:

A handy feature is the name suggestion that can be selected when the client´s name is being inserted in (it works on both modes):

The deployment of IT in legal offices is usually related to big investments on expert labour to install, upgrade and maintain. Simultaneously it is demanded from the staff time and availability to attend training, to get acquainted with the features, to streamline procedures and to make the most out of the applications.

Taking the human factor at its core, LawRD is an intuitive tool allowing users to fully and immediately use it, with no need for training.

LawRD doesn’t aim to do everything. It’s goal is only the essential in a simple and effective way:

• Register all billable and non-billable, tasks, expenses and resources in a newer, easier and swifter way;
• Team work and data sharing from anywhere at anytime;
• Improve Customer Relationship Management, create timesheets and schedules, manage tasks and costs;
• Permanent control and update on clients, files, bills, current accounts and on employees’ productivity;
• Management reports on: billing, profitability, billable hours and risk and safety management alert system.

All of this through an Internet connection.

You’ll be the judge of that. Try it for 30 days, free and fully functional.

Welcome to LawRD … it’s now online to pro-fit your practice !
   
LawRD is a SaaS application aimed at lawyers and legal office managers, as well as those who run companies’ legal departments.
  
Get permanently updated reports on clients, files and employees, on the fly. Control efficiency, profitability and costs.

Any internet connection stops low activity times and allows for “Productivity 2.0″.
   
Being web-based, it’s safely accessed from anywhere at anytime, enabling team work to users. LawRD aims lawyers’ ever growing demand for mobility and their need to instant access to data in an easy and simple way.
  
Register for a free try now!
 
The LawRD team.