By Jim Calloway The end of the year is the perfect time to take stock of how your law firm did this year and set goals for the next year. A few things to review include: Gross revenues this year versus last year. Hopefully, you can break these down by practice area to help inform…

By Jim Calloway Holidays and weekends are the times when cyber criminals are most active. Not only should you and the members of your firm understand this, but you can also assist your family and acquaintances being aware of this trend. Lots of unfamiliar orders and shipping notices are coming into our inboxes from holiday…

By Jim Calloway Every year the ABA releases its ABA Legal Technology Survey Report. It is a massive work of five volumes and is quite pricey to purchase. ABA’s Law Technology Today annually provides summaries taken from the report including some expert analysis in its TechReports. OBA Practice Management Advisor Julie Bays undertook the topic…

By Jim Calloway Do you ever have trouble spotting your cursor? Since I often use three monitors, it is sometimes easy for the tiny, little cursor to get lost when I have many windows open. There’s an easy way to fix that – just make your mouse pointer a little bigger. Start with the Windows…

By Jim Calloway The  holiday shopping season is upon us and that means it is also time for our annual Tech Toys For The Holidays Digital Edge podcast. Sharon Nelson and I highlight an eclectic assortment of holiday gifts with a technology focus. We have some budget shopping items like an AIrTag lock for $15.90…

By Jim Calloway As we head into the Thanksgiving when we are encouraged to count our blessings, are you thankful for your law practice? Most lawyers undoubtedly are. Given the challenges we have faced the last few years, optimism is sometimes in short supply. But according to a recent Thomson Reuters survey, 2022 State of…

By Jim Calloway What if you copied a lot of documents to a USB flash drive for working offline and now you can’t find the drive? Do you have to report this potential breach to firm management or notify the client of this potential breach? Suppose a hacker has gotten into your laptop and downloaded…

By Jim Calloway We have certainly seen many weather-related disasters this year. How long has it been since your law firm reviewed its disaster plan? Disaster Planning: It’s Not Just for Hurricanes is our new Digital Edge podcast.  Our guest Shawn Holahan is Practice Management Counsel and Loss Prevention Counsel for the Louisiana State Bar…

By Jim Calloway If one picture is worth 1000 words, how many words does that mean a video is worth?  It is a nonsensical question. Yet we all understand that video content on the Internet is extremely popular and today many people prefer receiving their information and entertainment through apps like TikTok and YouTube. Some…

By Jim Calloway Most of us are doing business in the digital world these days, but protecting your clients’ confidential information must always be top of mind. Two recently released opinions from the Pennsylvania Bar may provide helpful guidance for lawyers. Formal Opinion 2022-500 Ethical Considerations for Lawyers Storing Information Relating to the Representation Of A…

As you likely know, Microsoft 365 provides great speech recognition built right into Word, Outlook, PowerPoint and OneNote. You just click on the microphone icon labeled Dictate and begin your dictation. But to dictate into other applications on your computer, there are other built-in options. It’s simple on a PC, just use the Windows key…

By Jim Calloway The September 2022 issue of Law Practice Today is a finance-themed issue. Among the seven features are Fundamentals of Accounting for Lawyers, Making it Rain, Eight Ethical Financial Mistakes Lawyers Make and How to Value, Sell & Purchase a Law Practice. The ABA Law Practice Today webzine is available to anyone, whether…

By Jim Calloway Can We Use Slack in our Law Firm? Some of us participate in Slack groups. Slack is a group messaging app that is simple and easy to use. As we know, group texts might work for social occasions, but aren’t great for business situations. (One reason — someone can be added late…

By Jim Calloway Every fall Apple holds a media event to highlight new versions of its offerings. This year the new features of iOS 16 have received a lot of attention. We know that upgrades are sometimes a mixed blessing. They bring needed features but also, they seem to change things unnecessarily. One new feature…

By Jim Calloway Why does your law firm need documented standard operating procedures? Sharon Nelson and Jim Calloway interview guest Catherine Sanders Reach, Director of the Center for Practice Management at the North Carolina Bar Association on the August 2022 edition of the Digital Edge Podcast, Your Law Firm Cookbook: How and Why. Catherine outlines…

By Jim Calloway Deep fakes and other fabrications of “synthetic content” (as the FBI labels them) are rapidly improving and present a potential risk to all of us. You have probably seen deep fake videos where the video shows a person speaking but the voice belongs to another. Artificial intelligence tools match the speech with…

By Jim Calloway Computer crimes continue. Lawyers need to be aware of wire fraud schemes and the many types of phone-based fraud that exist. But we also need to be aware of appropriate cyber security measures. You don’t want to be hacked. But you also don’t want clients, coworkers, friends and family to be hacked….

By Jim Calloway Microsoft Teams is a powerful collaboration tool. But it does require a bit of training. Done correctly, instead of searching through your inbox for email discussions that took place over weeks, each subject under Teams can have a different area with all the discussions and files neatly arranged. Microsoft hosts free Microsoft…

By Jim Calloway Chrome is the most popular and most widely used browser. Tessa Davis is an educator who regularly posts technology tips on Twitter. Her most recent offering is “10 simple Chrome Tips that will blow your mind.” Did you know if you have a video or audio file you want to play, you…

By Jim Calloway It has been five years since the Oklahoma Supreme Court adopted Rule 33 of the rules for district courts. This rule was to provide a framework for limited scope representation. The rule is short and simple: Rule 33. Limited Scope Representation A lawyer providing limited scope representation under Rule 1.2 (c) of…