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 that one for awhile, but I think there’s application for legal learning professionals.

The User Support Peer Group track is Tuesday. I’m particularly looking forward to the afternoon sessions: Training on the Cheap, and Engaging Your Audience: Creating Persuasive Training and Presentations.

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.

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 of her personal information.

So here’s the lesson: password protect your handheld devices.  Our firm requires a login for any access to it’s resources — I’ll bet your firm does, too — but not for handhelds.  We allow firm personell to carry a device that can be easily lost or stolen.  All the “finder” has to do is turn the device on, and access your firm email.

Does your firm require passwords for handheld devices?

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. It’s a recurring theme in SLLP posts, but it’s still the most important for legal learning professionals.

Here it is: It’s the content, stupid.

It doesn’t matter how “cool” your technology is, or the delivery mechanism. Bells and whistles, dog and pony, anything “shiny” is secondary to the content you are presenting. You must always start with WHAT you are going to say before you get to HOW you’re going to say it.

Enjoy the webinar recordings. And thanks to ILTA for sharing these resources.

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.

User Support 2008 Survey

User Support White Paper: Beyond the Classroom

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 focusing on what they need and how they can best do it.

Grade:  B.  The reason this doesn’t get an A is that sometimes lawyers don’t know what they truly “need,” or make decisions based upon bad habits. IT folks may have insights into helping them accomplish tasks more effectively or efficiently, but many lawyers are not interested in exploring those avenues. It’s not enough to focus on the task that needs to be done today.  Some time has to be spent on how can the task be done better the next time.

• “Anything that takes power away from individual users and moves it elsewhere is horrible.”

Mr. Banks is ranting against cloud computing.  He doesn’t like the lack of local control in an Enterprise 2.0 world.  He then dismisses “debates about reliability and security” as if those subjects are inconsequential.

Grade:  C (and I’m probably being kind here).  Unreliable and insecure are risky, costly business behaviors.  They can ruin careers and bankrupt firms.  IT folks harp on these subjects because they are, in fact, important.  I once heard from a lawyer (in a weaker moment, apparently) that his profession likes to talk about security, but isn’t interested in doing anything about it until it hurts them. It’s why the message of E-discovery is so difficult to convey to law firms prior to a damaging suit against them.

In the same way that we should focus support on the lawyer’s tasks, lawyers should attempt to align themselves with the core “tasks” of IT.

• “Successful technology works when it mimics how people think and behave”

This was probably part of the previous pet peeve, but I think it stands on its own.  I love when technology is intuitive, seamless, magical.  Users should not have to be programmers to do their jobs.

Grade:  A.  But bear in mind that magical does not mean effortless.  IT can’t remove all the burden of performing tasks.

• “I also hate that legal technology tends to move in fads.”

IT does seem to suffer from ADD, but it’s not always their fault.  Lots if IT initiatives take place because lawyers see a shiny new toy (iPhones) and assume that it has an immediate use in the office.  Mr. Banks rightly encourages appropriate due diligence before jumping into a fad, but I’m not sure who he thinks should perform it.

Grade:  Incomplete.  I think there’s enough blame to share by lawyers and IT on this one.

When Mr. Banks is finished with his pet peeves, he highlights the root problem:

• “When we get bad products or services, often it is because we cannot communicate what we need.”

Lawyers can’t ignore technology.  Legal IT folks don’t have jobs without lawyers.  It only makes sense that we communicate with each other on what defines success for the firm.

Overall Grade:  B.

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 to others in my firm. If required to, I could walk away from Twitter and my job would not change. So for me, it’s an added benefit to network with the larger legal industry, learn a few things, and hopefully, provide some of my own insights that might help others.

In other words, it’s a micro version of what we try to do here at the SLLP.

Do you tweet? Feel free to connect with me there. twitter.com/tlhartsfield

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 experience?

• We need to get the message out to our lawyers to notify IT support as far in advance as possible to insure the best results.
• IT support people need to anticipate issues common to lawyers’ use of technology.  The best technology is seamless – “magic” – to the end user.  In many cases, we can make the magic happen when we focus more on customer service (anticipate the need) than support (step in when something breaks).

I was a little worried about how it would translate from an interactive, live presentation to a unidirectional web format, but the reviews were good.

I offered tips on career growth, using the analogy of a start up company. The outline was based upon Guy Kawasaki’s book, The Art of the Start.

Given the current economic environment, I couldn’t talk about career growth with out acknowledging the elephant in the living room.  However, the strategies of building a network, improving your skills, and documenting your processes for your current position are important factors in staying employed.

The recording is now available on ILTA’s website:

Career 2.0 SP1: Taking Your Career to the Next Level

Every professional should heed the advice, however.

Advice to Fall Recruits: Keep Your Cyberspace Clean

Check it out.

I used to ask, “When are they going to take ‘BETA’ off the logo? Aren’t they ready to release the final version?”

Now I get it.  When your business is about constant improvement, you’re always in beta mode.  Those Google kids are pretty smart.

How about your firm’s learning systems?  As soon as you complete a desktop upgrade, another one is coming down the project stream.  One training manager says that her firm is always upgrading something, so she doesn’t even call them events anymore.  Upgrade is a state of existence.

Maybe we should put the word “beta” in our Learning System’s branding.  Permanently.  Give your community the impression that you are always improving your processes, improving your content, improving your delivery of services.  You’re never done; you’re always in beta mode.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to the next project meeting.

Our story is a little odd, in that we never planned to go green, we were simply trying to apply good business practices and instructional design to our content.  In doing so, we’ve greatly reduced the carbon footprint of the training department.

We love telling our story.  You can read about it on the Adobe Customer Showcase page.

We’re looking forward to the rest of the roadshow dates.

She got an error message saying the conference server was busy, and please try again later.  Strike one.

So I had her try another conferencing site.  But she did not have the client application on her machine, and in our locked-down environment at the firm, couldn’t install it.

Strike two.

We considered postponing the meeting, but I had one last idea.  I logged into my Acrobat.com account and launched Adobe ConnectNow, a Flash-based application.  I sent an invitation to our west coast colleague, who logged in with no issues. I then enabled her to share her desktop, and we proceeded with the meeting.

What are the lessons here?  First, you need to check and double-check your web conference capabilities before the meeting time. This meeting was fairly low key, but there have been plenty of times where the audience was much more important and the schedule less forgiving.

You need to have a backup solution ready. I’m sure there are others, but I really like Adobe ConnectNow. An Acrobat.com account is free, and it allows you to connect to two other computers for a web conference. You can share files, desktop, whiteboard, web cam, pretty much all the basic things you need for a web meeting. You can delagate sharing to participant desktops, or let them remote control yours.  And all you need is a browser and Flash.  Of course it won’t be your main solution, but for basic point-to-point meetings, this is a great one.  And it’s free.  

Did I mention that it’s free?

Your lawyers, especially the ones who do a lot of web meetings, should have their own account.  It may be that last trick in their bag that saves a client conference.

While driving home yesterday, my father in-law called and asked if I would stop by to help with a project on his front porch. He’s repairing the awning, the beams are rotted and need to be replaced. He rigged a temporary cover and needed me to help him place it over the front door — a ply wood board, a shingle roll tacked on with roof nails.  He drove his pickup into the front yard and used it as scaffolding to install the cover.

What does my father in-law’s front porch have to do with Sharepoint? Tools and materials are needed to achieve a desired outcome, but somebody has to design the project. And manage it.

I like MOSS. I think it (or similar environments) are the future of the corporate world. But it is merely the frame for the work, a tool. We need to be careful not to communicate to legal professionals that technology does the Work.  A technology rollout that does not factor in the people management aspect is likely not to succeed.

As usual, ILTA produced another great conference.  Most attendees look forward to the colloquy, including me.  The peer exchange, access to experts and vendors in the legal vertical, and just plain fun make it a worthwhile trip.

The Green Initiatives theme was prevalent, from the keynote speech by Tim Sanders, to online session handouts and reusable water bottles.  Donating unused & unwanted conference backpacks to local schools was also a nice touch.

From conversations in my circles, I was a little surprised to hear that so many firms are unofficially preparing for Office 2007, but do not have it on their project calendar for 2009.  The recession economic slow-down is taking its toll on IT budgets.  Of course, as clients begin to upgrade, the pressure for firms to keep up will increase.

SharePoint, on the other hand, is King. It was fun to see what other firms are already doing with the platform.

There was also a lot of talk about law firms and Web 2.0, although I wonder if much of the buzz isn’t from the same 20 or so pundits.  “Wiki” and “blog” were tossed around ad nauseum.  It’s very clear that the legal community should pay attention to (and embrace) this wave. I say this with affection to my fellow legal bloggers, but at times I felt like I was at a Star Trek convention.  Maybe we could all gather in my folks’ basement to play D&D sometime.  I’ll bring my 24-sided die.

I had a great time presenting for the Professional Development track, and the ILTA-U session on creating Elearning for Office 2007.  The latter, however, turned into more of a how-to for Adobe Captivate than how to prepare for an Office upgrade. The Adobe booth was bombed with inquiries after the session, revealing that law firms are interested in more than just Acrobat.

It was great to see many legal learning professionals at conference. While the focus is rightly skewed to CIOs and senior IT managers (I’m always the lowest person on the food chain attending from my firm), analysts and support staff also benefit from the experience.

So thanks, ILTA, and to all the volunteers who participated. See you in DC next year.

Conference sessions are structured into a few mini-themes this year, including Office 2007.  I’ll be hosting a hands-on session on building Elearning for an Office rollout on Tuesday afternoon.  Attendees will get to play with Adobe Captivate, and it should be a lot of fun.

Several SLLP members are also presenting at conference. Great information from some of the best in the industry.

Of course, it’s a great week for networking with colleagues and vendors.  It’s the highlight of my year.  Please introduce yourself if you see me.

Tony Hartsfield

Should legal learning professionals care? Should we be proactive in facilitating the phenomenon? Should we have involvement in a subject that is not really IT?

I’m pretty sure the answer is yes.

We need to be aware of what Web 2.0 tools our lawyers are using to improve their professional standing with clients and colleagues. More than that, we should provide guidance on how to improve their online identity. Which means that, yes, we should have a well-managed online presence, too.

I’ve been noodling with social websites for a few years. You can find me on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, FriendFeed, and most recently, Plurk. I also participate in a few discussion forums. Some are targeted to learning: SLLP, ILTA, eLearning Guild, Learning Town, Content Wrangler. Others are related to hobbies and personal interests. I do it primarily because I enjoy the interaction, but I also see the professional benefits of having a Web 2.0 identity.

Where can you be found on the web? How do you represent yourself personally and professionally there? What lessons have you learned that could be shared with lawyers in your firm?

I’m interested in your thoughts on the subject, especially from those of you that are skeptical about social networking on the web, or who come from firms that frown on its use.

And if you’re on any of the above sites, feel free to connect with me.