A generous amount of this month’s issue of
Canadian Lawyer is dedicated to technology and the law. Technology in its various forms and permutations have and continue to transform legal practice and while this issue began with a plan for a special report on e-discovery, it organically morphed into a much wider discussion — one or all of which are going on throughout the profession.
Woven through the cover story, “
The next frontier,” are examples of how technology is changing the practice of law, creating new areas of practice, and moving traditional practice areas off in other directions. The effect is two-pronged: the questions the law is asked to resolve as well as the way in which lawyers work to resolve both new and traditional legal matters. The rise of social media has given way to all kinds of issues, from using Facebook to serve folks, to questions about conducting discovery on text messages. The courts are addressing many of these questions but it’s up to lawyers to know and understand how new technologies work in order to make clear arguments to help the courts decide. And it’s not just local law anymore either, social media is global, the Internet is global, privacy issues are global, business and almost everything about it has the potential to be global, and crime and security issues also know no boundaries. As many of the lawyers quoted in the cover story point out, this new and complex world also means more work for lawyers, sometimes in areas no one could have predicted even a decade ago.
As such, it’s clear traditional legal education and training are not exactly keeping up. Some schools and law professors are teaching in areas such as gaming law and other evolving sectors but there’s also a dearth of leading-edge education in others such as e-discovery. In Canada, there are some courses offered in the area but there is no comprehensive program devoted to it. That leads to the types of stories I’ve heard too often, particularly from lawyers (and paralegals or any other professional) involved in e-discovery — an integral part of the litigation and overall data management process at law firms and large businesses. Even the best in the country admit they know what they know through trial and error and teaching themselves — and as quite a few have said to me recently, that method of learning can lead to mistakes, costly mistakes. In the same way IP and litigation lawyers are well trained starting from early on in law school, e-discovery and other technology-based areas of practice need to get their due in the hallowed halls of academe.
Client expectations and an incoming generation of lawyers weaned on technology, gaming, and the Internet, are forcing the traditional law firm and ways of practice to change. As Jim Middlemiss notes in his column on a recent study from the International Legal Technology Association: legal business when compared to other — maybe all — industries “has been slow to adopt technology that re-engineers fundamental work processes or helps firms analyze data to enhance operations and provide value-added services. That’s where the next wave of technological developments are headed: things like predictive analysis, indicative analysis, collaboration tools, dashboard-driven tools, the “appification” of law, and greater mobility and personalization.” It’s already important but once the door to alternative business structures is open here, and it will, dramatic and fast-paced change in the profession are inevitable.
The ILTA report is quite clear: put clients first, leverage the lawyers you have to build on processes for the future, re-engineer processes, and most importantly innovate to differentiate.
Promoting a culture of innovation and technology starting in law school but also importantly carrying through to both practitioners and all other departments in law firms of all sizes as well as the courts will serve lawyers, clients, and society in ways we don’t even know yet. The only thing that is for sure is the train has pretty much left the station and if you want to get to the next stop, you better make sure you’re jumping on board.
