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Only a third of lawyers are satisfied with their firms’ tech

RICHARD WEINER
Technology for Lawyers

Published: August 26, 2022

Because of course. Because, after almost 30 years of me and my fellow legal tech writer friends telling you folks to get with modern times, you still resist. And everybody notices.
Oh yeah—and this includes courts (you know who you are).
The latest issue of Artificial Lawyer brings us news of a survey of 560 by Dashboard Legal which shows that 37 percent of attorneys are satisfied with their firms’ technology.
This likely starts with the fact that a prior survey by the same firm showed that lawyers spend up to two-thirds of their time with emails.
The survey was divided into two parts—the state of the respondent’s current office technology, and a wish list for future office tech.
Sixty percent of lawyers expressed dissatisfaction with their current tech stack. But interestingly, those same lawyers feel that their tech is in line with their peers’ technology. Virtually every lawyer knows that the state of legal tech is less than satisfactory.
Beyond that, the survey lawyers responded to questions regarding the firm using technology to make them happy in the definitive negative.
That’s a retention/hiring problem, right? Bad tech; unhappy workers. How many lawyers ask about the state of a firm’s technology in a job interview, especially in this era of worker shortages? Even if it’s a small percentage, it is something.
The survey lawyers wanted future tech in their current firms to address unmet issues of preventing missed deadlines, automating repeatable tasks, and improving their own tech skillsets. In other words, they want to get more control over their own workflow.
There’s nothing very esoteric about this. Not a bunch of AI programming. Also, these tasks are easily accomplished. There are robots that can accomplish every repeatable task. There are smart contracts (a better use of the blockchain than cryptocurrency). There are any number of workflow/ interoffice communication platforms that can keep a simple calendar.
Good tech will equal happy employees who don’t waste their precious billable time on repeating tasks that a cheap robot can do. This is 2022, not 1952. Come on, lawyers in charge of firm technology. Make your professional staff happy for a change. It’s good for everyone in the firm.
The survey is here, if you want to read it: https://dashboardlegal.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Attorney-Tech-Satisfaction-Survey-June-2022.pdf


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