Society of Legal Learning Professionals

Society of Legal Learning Professionals now Mobile!!!

March 2, 2010 – 11:42 am
Now you can cleanly browse SLLP's blog from Apple iPhone / iPod touch, Google Android and other touch-based smart phones.  No more excuses for not quoting Tony at all the fashionable parties!

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ILTA ‘09 Day 1

August 24, 2009 – 1:13 pm
The annual conference for ILTA has begun. I've seen two sessions so far. The first was Greening the Law Office: Why It Makes Cents, presented by Joan Krajewski of Microsoft. Joan had some interesting statistics regarding the costs of business behaviors, and ways to reduce the corporate carbon footprint. Her slides (pdf) have some good resource material for your green initiatives. On a much different note was Blogs: A Discussion of Current Trends, Benefits and Pitfalls. Panelists brought opposing views (polar opposite on some points), but the end result was a lively, divergent conversation from some leaders in the legal blogosphere. Today's keynote by Tom Koulopoulos was also quite interesting. My favorite line dealt with innovators and their target audience. "Ask them what they want, and they will only tell you about what they have." Innovators create products that people didn't know they needed. Going to have to mull over ...

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CFO Magazine Article Addresses Training

June 22, 2009 – 2:35 pm
A colleage referred me to a recent article in CFO Magazine titled, Live and Learn - Companies get better at using technology to use training dollars more efficiently. The short article highlights that while training budgets are decreasing in most businesses, learning opportunities do not have to be sacrificed. In fact, because online content development has gotten cheaper to produce in recent years, your firm can get a bigger bang for your training buck. Content developers have to work smarter though, targeting specific user needs instead of generalized instruction. Good Stuff.

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Passwords and Handheld Devices

June 19, 2009 – 11:29 am
This isn't related to legal learning, but there's an important lesson here. Last week I joined a team from my office to migrate one of our remote offices to new systems.  As we left the restaurant after dinner one night, a team member noticed that her Blackberry was missing. "I just had it at the table," she said as returned to retrieve it.  She didn't find it. It was already gone.  So she contacted her provider to suspend service. She called the restaurant a little later, and sure enough, someone had turned in her Blackberry. When she picked it up, she noticed that someone had attempted to use it, but since it was password protected, they couldn't and left it. My colleague wisely set a password on her Blackberry, and that probably assisted her in retrieving it.  At the very least, it kept an unwanted party from accessing her firm email account, plus all ...

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Recommendation: Two ILTA Webinars

May 20, 2009 – 10:29 am
Whether or not your firm is an ILTA member, you really should take advantage of the materials they offer. Of particular value are the webinar recordings.  You'll find them on the archives page of their site. I'll highlight a couple of recent recordings.  First, Jenn Steele presented on ILTA Social Networking: Twitter & Facebook & Blog.  It's a great overview of social networking tools used by legal professionals.  Jenn has a great easy-going style, but is a sharp, insightful presence in our field.  Check out her blog, Leading Geeks. The second is a webinar that I presented, E-Learning Creation with Adobe Captivate. If your firm is still on the fence elearning initiatives, this webinar is an introductions to the basics of recording online content.  Other than the shameless self promotion, that's not why I mention my webinar. Instead, I want to highlight one of the points I made early in the presentation. ...

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The New Classroom

February 26, 2009 – 11:15 am
ILTA's latest issue of Peer to Peer Magazine is out (and online). The issue theme is Green Initiatives, and includes a great article called The New Classroom, written by Gina Buser of Traveling Coaches. Gina reiterates what we've said here as well, that good training product is already green.  "One option is to create a 'Green Learning Plan' - online, of course - with content on how to modify print options for draft printing, steps for double-sided printing, how to create digital documents, advanced search techniques to more easily find documents digitally and remote-access skills for efficient telecommuting." She also has tips for for responsible resource use while in the traditional classroom setting.  Definitely worth a read.

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ILTA User Support Survey and White Paper Available

January 13, 2009 – 8:51 am
SLLP's very own Tony Hartsfield, Char LaMaire, and Donna Payne all appeared in the survey and white paper from the ILTA User Support Peer Group.  There's a few things to ponder, but for now, go read them.  Tony's article on alternative learning strategies is on page 5 of the white paper, by the way.  You can find Donna on page 11 and Char on page 18.  That's right kids....half of the articles are written by SLLP members. User Support 2008 Survey User Support White Paper: Beyond the Classroom

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A Lawyer’s IT Pet Peeves, and My Response.

January 8, 2009 – 10:34 am
Ted Banks, former chief counsel for global compliance at Kraft Foods, vented his spleen in a recent Law.com article, What Steams Me About Technology. I like to hear what lawyers think about legal IT.  I don't know Mr. Banks, but I hear echoes of his pet peeves in comments by other lawyers in my environment. Below I'll review his list, and as a trainer, grade them. "First, why do so many IT folks focus on the software itself, instead of the task it should accomplish?" Mr. Banks starts with a good one. IT sometimes forgets that what they do needs to be useful outside of our cubes. We support a community that is using technology to perform non-technical tasks.  Even trainers, who are supposed to be advocates for users, can get lost in the features of the software. We want to show them everything, and every way to use everything, instead of ...

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Do You Tweet? Here’s Why I Do.

January 7, 2009 – 10:43 am
I joined the Twitter ranks last summer.  The micro-blog site experienced explosive growth in 2008, which continues today. As a legal learning professional, I've discovered colleagues in my field, as well as several other legal experts who inform me about the industry.  Do they all relate to my training role? No, but they help me understand some of the people that I provide training to. And I'll be honest, it's fun. My teammates tease me about "emphatically twittering," but I think they're just jealous. Some of the people I follow on Twitter have hundreds, thousands of followers, while I have a few dozen. Some that I follow are huge influencers.  Some Twitter as a marketing tool for their services or products.  In 140 characters, they can present ideas and opportunities to a previously unreached audience. But I'm not a marketer.  I don't need to sell where I work to the world. That responsibility belongs ...

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Lessons Learned from a Web Conference Experience

December 10, 2008 – 9:11 am
A partner called, asking for assistance setting up a web conference with a client.  It was Thursday, and his meeting was the next Tuesday.  I know what you're thinking: A partner called 4 business days before a meeting to set it up? Really? But it's true, and we commended him for his foresight. And it turns out we needed those days to work out the details for the web conference.  What computer or laptop will we use in the conference room? Does it have the hosting software installed? Does the partner know his account info for setting up and hosting the meeting?  Are there any issues with internet access in the conference room? I'll lessen the drama by stating that meeting went without a hitch, but not without some trouble-shooting beforehand.  The story could have been ugly had the partner requested assistance an hour before the event. So what are the lessons from the ...

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