In previous issues of Lawyers Alert, Jaffe PR has emphasized the PR benefits and improvements available to the legal industry in the movement from Web 1.0 to Web 2.0. It's time now to understand that Web 2.0 is more than merely an upgrade of Web 1.0; rather, it is an evolutionary step toward a major change to the practice of law - and the end of the bricks-and-mortar world of law firms as we know them today. The fact is that law firms spend the bulk of their fixed overhead in two areas: office space and personnel. One of these expenses, office space, can be dramatically reduced today; and personnel costs, especially on the support side, can be reduced today and dramatically reduced in just one more generation.
It wasn't but seven years ago that the COO of America's then fastest-growing and one of its largest law firms complained to me: "I keep spending more and more money on technology, but I don't see any corresponding savings in traditional expenses, such as office leases and personnel." He went on to complain further that, despite his firm's growing technology expenses, the partner/ secretary ratio was almost unchanged, and the cost of its real estate commitments continued to soar.
This conversation transpired after a huge technology boom took place in the legal profession following the introduction of Web 1.0. So where were the savings based on technology at that time, and why is Web 2.0 going to succeed today and tomorrow in lowering fixed overhead and increasing productivity, collaboration and profitability?
The answer is relatively simple and isn't all about Web 2.0, although Web 2.0 certainly moves the ball down the playing field. The two factors that are moving the pace of change faster than almost anyone can perceive are:
- The generational changes occurring today have more and more lawyers willing to accept the place of technology in the legal environment, embracing and appreciating the changes instead of merely accepting or tolerating them.
- The more user-friendly interfaces and uses of Web 2.0 allow the technology to be more readily accepted into the legal environment that abhors change, rejects risk and generally looks at the world through the precedence-based rearview mirror.
Changes from Web 2.0
As a result, there are several changes that are likely to take place with the advent and spreading usage of Web 2.0:
- The legal work environment is going to become more virtual. Why? Because it can, and because it makes economic sense to move to a virtual environment with the resultant savings in both real estate and personnel expenses. But it also allows for more and better collaboration of teams of lawyers without the bounds of physical walls and geographic borders.
- Web 2.0 allows for "real" mergers to take place based on the growing needs of clients, not because it makes good geographic and real estate sense. Smart law firms will be much more flexible than they are today and will be able to expand and contract based strictly on client demand and workflow. The days of law firms staying together because of guaranteed signatures on leases will, eventually, cease to exist - and profitability and productivity should rise dramatically.
- The virtual work environment will also improve the quality of life factor in the legal profession and will be a great gender equalizer. The technology for all of this exists in the Web 2.0 world today. The only things holding up the transition are the existing attitudes about what a law firm "should" look like, and people who can't enter this new world because they can't type and gain speedy access to the Internet. It surely isn't all going to happen tomorrow, but don't underestimate the speed at which it will happen.
- Administrative jobs in law firms won't disappear, but they will be different, and, I think, better. Yes, many of the personal perks of partnership will disappear, but lawyers will be looking at their support staff in a different light as they become part of the fee-earning and marketing team and are no longer seen only as an ongoing and fixed expense. In fact, the ratios shouldn't matter anymore, as long as the support staff is part of the team that delivers value to both internal and external firm clients and increases economic leverage for the attorneys.
- In-house counsel will receive greater value from the law firms that "get it," and will be able to communicate and collaborate on a level unknown in the legal profession of the past. The real bricks-and-mortar that now separate inside from outside counsel will disappear, as will the attitudinal walls that get in the way of the real collaborative environment that in-house lawyers are now demanding. Web 2.0 will serve in the role of the lubricant that greases the skids to make it all happen.
Lower expense
As the authors of the recent Legal Tech Newsletter article rightly pointed out: "Fortunately, the legal profession need make no great investment in infrastructure in order to enjoy the fruits of Web 2.0." Indeed, the infrastructure mostly exists today, and if it doesn't already, the good news is that it doesn't cost all that much and the prices are going down every day. The only expenses involved in moving to the 2.0 environment include education or training and a much more targeted effort to "mine" and disseminate the tremendous amount of available content that each law firm generates on a daily basis and that generally lies fallow in the firm's file servers.
Not a single firm that I have ever worked with has even begun, either practically or creatively, to get its collective hands around the issue of internally generated content management. Right now, law firms are about at the same place they were shortly after the invention of the Mosaic Browser and the creation of Web 1.0, as we have known it.
Jump on the bandwagon or get rolled over
Based on precedence, one could agree that law firms are currently at the beginning of the process and, although already familiar with the power of Web 1.0, are reluctant to move too quickly to get onto the Web 2.0 bandwagon - or the steamroller, as I believe that it is.
I would hope that more firms will be bold and jump quickly to join the Web 2.0 world, rather than moving too slowly as they did when transitioning from typewriters to word-processing equipment to computers. They will see that Web 2.0 is real and relevant today, and will immediately begin to look for ways to incorporate the 2.0 platform into all job processes and functions that exist at the firm, including the legal process, client services, human resources, finance, marketing, etc.
Web 2.0 and its tools, like social networks, are not just for children anymore. Yes, Facebook and MySpace are wildly successful social networks, but similar applications in the legal profession, such as Legal On Ramp and Martindale-Hubbell Connected, will also be wildly successful in either their current or some future form. Podcasts are here, blogs are not going away and terms such as Twitter and wiki are being used by lawyers and in businesses all over the world. If Web 2.0 is a fad, I'm certainly going to be faddish.
Jay M. Jaffe is President and CEO of Jaffe PR, a totally virtual PR firm serving only the legal profession. For more information, contact jjaffe@jaffepr.com. This article is excerpted from the original that appeared in the December 2008 issue of Legal Tech Newsletter at www.jaffepr.com. It is reprinted here with permission.