PERFECTMy Struggle for Perfectionism: The Myths and Realities of Being a Young Lawyer is a great read, about a topic which covers one of the challenges facing our profession. I sometimes joke to audiences that one of the problems with being a lawyer is we only have two standards of conduct: perfection and malpractice. That often gets a chuckle, if not a very loud chuckle. But that is how many lawyers feel. We acknowledge our imperfections as human beings, but we also have the professional standard that all legal work should be error-free.

Wikipedia defines perfectionism:

Perfectionism, in psychology, is a personality trait characterized by a person’s striving for flawlessness and setting excessively high performance standards, accompanied by overly critical self-evaluations and concerns regarding others’ evaluations. It is best conceptualized as a multidimensional characteristic, as psychologists agree that there are many positive and negative aspects. In its maladaptive form, perfectionism drives people to attempt to achieve an unattainable ideal, and their adaptive perfectionism can sometimes motivate them to reach their goals. In the end, they derive pleasure from doing so. When perfectionists do not reach their goals, they often fall into depression.

I will note in passing the higher-than-average rates of depression, substance abuse and suicide within the legal profession.

“Perfect is the enemy of good’ is an often-quoted principle relating back to the time of Voltarie. Many business management books talk about the concept of “good enough,” contrasting it with the pursuit of perfection that actually drives down profits.

I’m not about to try and convince lawyers that their legal work shouldn’t be perfect. We all know it should be. But take a few moments to read some wisdom from a young lawyer in Wisconsin and try to make sure that your entire life is not ruled by perfectionism.

 

Having a great friend you haven't talked to in a while as a podcast guest is one of the perks of being a podcast host. Sharon Nelson and I got to do that when we interviewed Andy Adkins for his "tell all" interview Tips for Andy AdkinsManaging Technology from a Chief Information Officer on the Digital Edge podcast. (OK, it isn't really a "tell all" because he didn't share any deep dark secrets.) But I really enjoyed hearing his tale of how he went from "slowing down" into some consulting work to being a CIO of a large law firm with offices in several states. Andy is one of the most knowledgeable guys you will ever meet about law firm IT operations. His story of spending time as a big law firm CIO should be interesting to everyone because it also demonstrates that law firm IT isn't just about managing hardware and software, but also about interacting with lots of people.

Today I’m going to be a bit presumptuous. I’m going to strongly suggest that your law firm needs a retreat to better focus on changes in the legal service marketplace and how law firms should be using their technology today. This is presumptuous to some because many forward thinking lawyers who follow my blog have already made some important decisions and are undergoing some significant changes. But we know many law firms are still reacting to the need for changes very slowly. Agenda 2

This is also presumptuous because I’m going to hand you an agenda for your law firm retreat, complete with suggested reading material. My generic agenda cannot cover all of the specific needs of your firm. You will have to add in items for estimated growth and facilities need, budgeting, strategic direction and the like. And my agenda is directed towards the needs of a medium-sized or small law firm rather than a very large one, which already has administrative personnel collecting agenda items for the next retreat or partner’s meeting.

Many solo and small firm lawyers have not taken the time to systematically draft a business plan for the next five years because they are so busy taking care of their clients’ needs. But, it is well past time to take off your lawyer hat and put on your “CEO of an ongoing business” hat to do some long-term and short-term strategic planning.

So here’s a good chance to start looking at your immediate future. There are many other articles on the topics besides the ones I have written and suggested. But as I’ve noted before, I think converting to digital client files is critical and many law firms could use a client communications upgrade. Here are some great starting places for these issues and others.

Your attention is directed to my column in the Oklahoma Bar Journal, Proposed Agenda for Your Law Office Retreat I hope you find it useful and it spurs you to actually have a law firm retreat even if it is only a closed-door meeting with all of the decision-makers for a couple of hours.

Jordan Furlong returns to blogging at his Law21.ca blog after an 18 month break. if you don't know who Jordan is, you can check here. But he is well-known in my professional circles as an engaging presenter and writer on topics relating to the future of law, the future of the delivery of legal services and other changes in the legal profession. (Yes, he is one of those "scary" futurist writers.) Jordan stayed busy during his bogging hiatus as he noted in his return to blogging announcement.

I wanted to note one of his recent posts and since Jordan sometimes makes references to songs and musicians during his posts, I have, as an homage, provided a musical link below to serve as background music for your reading of Jordan's post.

The intangible law firm begins: "Remember all those ludicrous predictions you kept hearing about how law firms were someday going to invest heavily in intelligent technology that could do legal work? Funny thing about that: someday is today. Here’s what’s actually happening, right now, with advanced technology in law firms…" 

See? I told you the background music would be helpful.

Welcome to the machine….

 

If you are wondering how something can be both a cliché and a big new idea, I'll concede that is a good question. Bear with me.

Big ideas cover 2016Since 2013, Law Practice Magazine has featured its "Big Ideas" themed issue in July. I was the issue editor on the first issue and, since then, that has been my favorite issue of the magazine. The July/August 2016 "Big Ideas" issue of Law Practice Magazine has been posted. As always, it contains some coverage of some interesting and cutting edge topics in law practice management. If you enjoy this type of content, you can join the ABA Law Practice Division if you are an ABA member or subscribe to the electronic version of the magazine via the free app if you are not.

But today I want to talk about my "Big Idea," which is definitely something that has been discussed in legal circles for some time: how we can improve legal documents?

How do we avoid the trap of a longer document always being viewed as a better document? In my column, Shall We Cut to the Chase?, I ask some questions about our legal documents today. Not only is 20 page legal document more expensive to produce than a 10 page one, but it is also more expensive to consume, whether it is being read by another attorney billing for the time or a corporate executive or general counsel who also has other tasks to accomplish.

As I noted in the column, I was assigned to review a contract with a major technology company. As is common, the first several pages contained the identification of the parties and many, many definitions. I was already tiring before I got to the operative pages of the agreement.

So why would it not be a good idea to put all of the definitions in the final pages of the contract? One could include a provision at the beginning that many of the terms used in the contract are defined in section 10 or a very cautious draftsman could include a list of all the terms that were later defined in section 10 in one long sentence. It seems equally logical to review the language of any needed definitions after the substance of the contract has been absorbed as it does to place the definitions all at the beginning.

Why wouldn’t the law firm associate with a talent of summarizing any legal memorandum in two or three paragraphs be more highly prized than one who could easily crank out a fifty page memo on any obscure topic?

I also think that standardization of many types of industry related contracts could be a great thing for law firm clients. I note some experimentation by the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) in this area.

We lawyers have been trained that a legal document should cover almost every conceivable possibility. Going forward that should continue to be true with an added goal of doing so “as concisely as possible.” To end with another cliché, time is money, particularly in the legal profession.

Information Security is an increasingly important topic. It is also a subject matter where relatively few lawyers have much background or training. Lawyers do have great experience learning from the experts where all types of subject matters are concerned. My friends and colleagues, Sharon Nelson, David Ries and John Simek are experts in this field. The original edition of Locked Down: Information Security for Lawyers was a significant publication when it first came out out in 2013. There have been many developments since then (especially on the LockedDown2nd-cransomware front) and so we welcome the new edition Locked Down: Practical Information Security for Lawyers, 2nd edition. I predict you will find this a readable and useful book, even if you do not have an IT background.

So I also welcome a short guest review of Locked Down: Practical Information Security for Lawyers, 2nd edition by Molly Peacock, an attorney at Rees Broome, PC (June 16, 2016)

With great power comes great responsibility. We lawyers are required to keep certain communications and information a secret from non-clients. We need to understand, given our position of trust, that the convenience and speed of e-mail, computers, mobile devices, and the Internet come with a price. The price is our ongoing responsibility to take prudent steps to safeguard our clients’ information and communications.

Prudence, ethics, reasonableness and the law require us to have an increasing level of competence about, among other things, cybersecurity: e-mail security, backing up of digital files, secure disposal of saved information and how to reduce the risks inherent with the increasing connectivity of computers and devices. 

The second edition of Locked Down: Practical Information Security for Lawyers by Sharon Nelson, David Ries, and John Simek, gives lawyers clear guidance about the protection of law firm data and a wealth of helpful resources. In addition to its comprehensiveness, the brilliance of Locked Down is how manageably it provides technical information essential for lawyers. The authors’ writing style is readable and even enjoyable. You may have to see it with your own eyes to believe how a book about technological advances, best practices, and security must-dos (and don’ts) for lawyers in the digital age can be fun to read. 

Fun aside, the content is crucial for serious practitioners who care about their clients, their law practice, and complying with the ABA and states’ ethical requirements of competence with technology. Locked Down is ideally read cover to cover. However, it is also a reference for topics pertinent to solo, small, medium, large firms about prudent and necessary practices. The light that Locked Down shines on important technical topics (safe browsing, passwords, encryption, mobile devices, and many more), is proffered in a practical, readable way. Clearly, its authors care deeply about lawyers, their clients, and the ever evolving interplay between the practice of law and the advance of technology. Thank you to authors Nelson, Ries and Simek for your invaluable guidance!

Molly Peacock

Counsel, Rees Broome, PC

 

No PhishingHere is a guest post from my colleague Laura A. Calloway, Director of Service Programs for the Alabama State Bar. She has been a practice management advisor for a few weeks longer than I have (and, even after all these years, she never lets me forget it.) These latest spear phishing attacks that purport to be from local bar association leaders will likely be duplicated in other regions in the future. So thanks to Laura for letting us republish her sound advice on this topic.

Protect Yourself from Spear Phishing and Ransomware

by Laura A. Calloway

Some Alabama State Bar members were targeted earlier in the week by a spear phishing email with a ransomware payload, so it’s a good idea to remind lawyers be aware of this type of malicious electronic attack and to take appropriate precautions against it.  So what does this mean, in plain English?

Almost everyone is familiar by now with phishing attacks, which involve a scammer sending an email with a spoofed address.  The email is made to appear to be from someone you know or do business with,  in the hope that you will open an attached document or click on a web link within the email, allowing a program embedded in the email or link to install a virus or other malicious software on your computer.  We’ve all received an email from a bank we don’t do business with, saying that we need to log in immediately and change our password or update other information.  Those are easy to spot.  Spear phishing takes this practice to a higher level by seeking out information about the target in order to make the email message seem more likely to really be from someone he or she know, increasing the chances that the recipient will hurriedly and unthinkingly click the link or open the attachment.

In this case, it appears that the scammers obtained email addresses from several local bar associations, probably from online directories, and then targeteded email to the members, purportedly from the local bar president, stating that there was complaint for violation of the rules of professional conduct pending against the member. Needless to say, some people were tricked into opening the links or attachments.  And this is where the ransomware comes into play.

Ransomware is a malicious program which, when downloaded to a computer, encrypts all of the data on the computer’s hard drive.  The computer owner is unable to access any of his or her data, and usually receives a demand for payment, either through bitcoin or PayPal, within a certain period to time.  Often, the payment demand is structured so that if payment is not made by a certain time the ransom goes up and, after a couple of escalations, the computer owner is told that he or she has permanently lost the opportunity to have the data unlocked.

So what can busy lawyers do to protect themselves from this type of attack?  Here are a few quick tips:

  • Make sure that your operating system and all software applications are up to date and completely patched. Malicious software often takes advantage of flaws in older or unpatched software in order to download itself and run.
  • Purchase one or more good antivirus programs and make sure that both the program and the virus signatures are updated regularly.
  • Develop a good backup system, including a backup component that is not constantly connected to your system and the internet. Most ransomware programs are now capable of encrypting not just the computer they are installed on but also data on networked drives, including backup drives.
  • Test your backup system regularly, including reinstalling data from the backup to make sure that it will work in the event of an attack.
  • Most important, remind yourself and your staff to carefully review every email – especially ones that are not expected – before clicking on web links or opening or downloading attachments. If you have any doubt at all, call the sender before opening the attachment or clicking on the link.

Note from Jim: Following Laura's advice and discussing all of this with your staff can help you avoid huge headaches. Thank you, Laura, for sharing with all of us.

When I speak to lawyers about cloud computing, I still often get the question "But how do I know who is holding my client's information and whether I can trust them?" Generally speaking I tell them there are contractual safeguards so that they should read those providers of the provider agreement closely. I also note that many of the cloud-based practice management services were founded by lawyers and they all should have security and client confidentiality as critical goals.

This month's Digital Edge podcast is What Lawyers Should Know About Cloud Computing Security Standards. I am personally quite pleased to learn that the Legal Cloud Computing Association has issued guidelines on security standards for these services for legal cloud providers.

We spoke with Clio founder and CEO Jack Newton and Rocket Matter founder and CEO Larry Port about cloud computing and the new cloud security standards for legal professionals released by the Legal Cloud Computing Association. Larry explains what the LCCA is and how it formed out of a need to educate lawyers about what is happening in the cloud. Jack provides some insight into the creation of the security standards, such as terms of service privacy policies and encryption, and states that with these standards as a baseline lawyers will be able to more easily assess if a cloud computing provider is adhering to certain ethical standards. Larry also lists a few factors lawyers should consider, like where the SaaS data center is located, and the four things (vulnerability scans, penetration testing, and aesthetic code and dynamic code reviews) that the standards require in security testing. They both end the interview with an analysis of in-transit and at rest encryption and the benefits and drawbacks of zero knowledge level security.

Not Paranoid“The government is watching me all the time. They have implanted devices to eavesdrop on me.” It used to be when a client or friend made this type of statement to you, it was time to gently steer them toward a mental-health evaluation.

But after I attended several session at ABA TECHSHOW 2016, I decided to write a column for the Oklahoma Bar Journal titled “You Are Not Paranoid If They Really Are Watching You −Attorney-Client Privilege, Confidentiality and Cybersecurity in the 21st Century.” I covered several of the interesting things we learned at ABA TECHSHOW from panelists like ACLU Speech, Privacy and Technology Project Director Chris Soghoian, digital rights attorney Marcia Hoffman, Ben Wizner who is the lead attorney for NSA leaker Edward Snowden and Cindy Cohn, executive director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Let’s face it, if you are representing Edward Snowden, you should probably operate as if not just our government but also many foreign powers would love to know everything you know and read all of your files.

I cover some basic security practices in this column that are good for lawyers and everyone else to understand. For example, if your child has a laptop in their bedroom, do you know why and where applying a Band-Aid to it is a good security practice? Do you know how to make an encrypted call from your mobile phone or send an encrypted text message? Do you know about the benefits and risks of encrypting your laptop’s hard drive? Many lawyers today use BitLocker to do that. And passwords− we are not great with password security in our society.

You don’t have to be paranoid to read my column. And you can learn about cybersecurity and so much more by attending ABA TECHSHOW. Save the date for ABA TECHSHOW 2017 right now. It is March 15-18, 2017

Law Practice Magazine's May/June 2016 issue is out and, oddly, even though I am on the LP Magazine's Editorial board I have not read many of the articles yet. I'm blaming ABA TECHSHOWMay June 2016 LP Cover
for that.

Documenting the Client File is my practice management advice column in that issue. It is not an overstatement to say this is a critically important issue in today's law firms. We think of the client file as containing all of the important client documents. But of equal importance is the documentation of communications with the client. Yes, we need both documents and documentation!

This is so important because it is much harder today. Previously, lawyers communicated about client files primary in limited formal settings. The lawyer was seated in the office at a desk talking either face-to-face or on the telephone. For every conversation the lawyer had the trusty and ubiquitous yellow legal pad on which notes were taken of the discussion or negotiation. Perhaps there would be a deposition or out-of-the office meeting, but the yellow legal pad and pen for the notes was there, too. Since almost all legal work was billed on an hourly basis, there also should have been a time entry completed by the lawyer, so there were two types of documentation.

Today there are many ways to communicate, from email to texting to who knows what the kids are using today. Many matters are handled with arrangements that do not involve hourly billing. Some lawyers are not as diligent as they should be about making certain every email makes it to the client file. And text messages are even more challenging since they are on your mobile device.

Many lawyers would be surprised to learn that many malpractice actions are brought because of communication issues. In fact, in at least one jurisdiction it is the single largest category of complaints. It is possible someone might misrepresent what was said. It is also possible people remember the same event differently. If a communication later becomes contested, you don't want your response to be "Oh, that was by text message and I guess I deleted that text." Documentation of client's instructions and client decisions about their representation are very important. If you strike a trial setting where the client was demanding $100,000, you do not want the only verification to be a text message from you to the client with "OK 40K it is" where the client never replied.  Read my column. Share it within your firm. Make sure and document every communication related to a client file within the client file.

If this is a challenge, you need a practice management software solution/service to assist with this critically important task. That is one of dozens of reasons you need a practice management software solution.