The technology and services available today make it possible for well equipped small firms, even one-man practice groups, to provide big firm service and success to clients. In fact, if you have practiced in a big firm you know that the big firm environment has some drawbacks for clients. For example, the culture encourages billing as much as you can get away with on each task, and files often don’t get much attention unless a deadline is looming. The major advantage to big firms, such as access to extremely experienced practitioners and well trained support staff, can now be replicated to a great extent at smaller firms. So what do you need to equip your small firm? Here are some suggestions:
1. Document Management. WorldDox and SharePoint provide excellent alternatives to the big firm solutions such as Interwoven (iManage) and OpenText (DOCS). These applications are affordable and effective.
2. Sample Document Library. Big law firms can give practitioners access to thousands of previously drafted documents, but in the age of the internet, this resource is really available outside big firms. RealDealDocs contains millions of documents and clauses from the leading firms and companies in the world.
3. Legal Research Tools. Loislaw and Versuslaw provide viable alternatives to pricey Westlaw and Lexis.
4. Rules and Other Compliance Sources.Instead of subscribing to sets of books and getting pocket part all year, SmartRules provides all the information you need to draft most civil litigation documents in most jurisdictions in the state and federal courts of the United States.
5. Calendaring and Docket. LegalEx is an excellent calendaring tool.