It\u2019s the oldest trick in the lawyer\u2019s technology arsenal: You save money by buying one software license that everybody shares.\u00a0 It\u2019s kind of like how you bring on a law clerk, and everybody starts accessing his Westlaw password.\u00a0 Not that that happens . . .\u00a0 (See, I\u2019ve got your back.)<\/p>\n
If it\u2019s not one software license that gets shared, it\u2019s that law firms are buying fewer licenses that they actually need, forcing users to double up.\u00a0 Maybe there\u2019s a shared log-in for staff.<\/p>\n
Of course, this is less of a problem than it used to be.\u00a0 Modern software allows for simultaneous log-ins, so no one\u2019s getting booted anymore.<\/p>\n
However, there\u2019s one big problem with shared log-ins: it\u2019s so much harder to manage tasks.\u00a0 If there is a shared license, the name of the user to which that license is associated is irrelevant.\u00a0 That \u2018person\u2019 has become a \u2018group\u2019 of people, by definition.\u00a0 Let\u2019s take that simple example of a shared staff log-in.\u00a0 If three staffpersons are sharing a license, you\u2019ve essentially made it impossible to assign specific tasks to any one of them, because you\u2019re required to assign those tasks to the group, due to the way you\u2019ve set up your system.\u00a0 If you want to assign specific tasks to specific staffpersons, and to more effectively manage workflows, you must acquire a license for each of those staffpersons.<\/p>\n
Lawyers who want to practice at the top of their law licenses need to delegate effectively.\u00a0 Only then can you spend the most time performing those creative tasks that lawyers get paid the most to do.\u00a0 To effectively delegate to individuals, lawyers must provide those individuals with their own software licenses.<\/p>\n
The good news is that the cloud has brought down the price of software to such an extent that individual licenses are less costly than ever.<\/p>\n
See what I did there: Don\u2019t be cheap up-front, and you\u2019ll make more in the long run.\u00a0 That\u2019s a beautiful thing.<\/p>\n
. . .<\/p>\n
Liner Notes<\/em><\/p>\n Speaking of which . . .<\/p>\n \u2018The Long Run<\/a>\u2019 by the Eagles<\/a><\/p>\n This is my jam, actually<\/a>.<\/p>\n