1997 Technology Survey
Second Annual Technology Survey Tracks Computer Use In
Wisconsin Law Firms
By Dianne Molvig
Computers have become nearly as pervasive as telephones in today's
office settings, and law offices are no exception. The 1997 Law Firm
Technology Survey conducted by the State Bar of Wisconsin found that
among responding attorneys, nearly 98 percent reported having computers
in their offices.
What are the hardware and software trends among the
state's law firms? How do they use computers in their day-to-day work,
and how do they think those uses will change in the near future?
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Still, despite apparent widespread use, sentiments toward computer
technology remain all over the map, as reflected by survey respondents'
write-in comments. "It's overrated," stated one attorney. "The learning
curve is very high." But another wrote: "Without [computer] technology I
could not compete with even small law firms. With it, I hold my own
against the largest firms in the Midwest." And many lawyers probably can
identify with their colleague who volunteered this reaction to computer
technology: "I love it and hate it depending on whether things are going
right."
Clearly, even though computers are prevalent, they're far from
problem-free, according to the lawyers who use them. The second annual
Bar technology survey attempted to pinpoint problems lawyers experience
and track their computer usage patterns. What are the hardware and
software trends among the state's law firms? How do they use computers
in their day-to-day work, and how do they think those uses will change
in the near future?
About the survey
Surveys were sent to a stratified random sample of 1,738 Wisconsin
law firms, addressed to "managing partner." Surveys were returned by 695
firms, for a 40 percent response rate. According to the project's survey
research consultant Gene Kroupa, "This response rate is sufficient to
provide an accurate overview of law firms' technology usage."
Responding firms closely approximated overall State Bar membership
statistics in the areas of firm size and geographic location. In a
stratified random sample, the population is divided into subgroups and a
random sample is then selected from each subgroup. For the technology
survey, the population of Wisconsin law firms was divided into subgroups
based on firm size. A random sample was then selected from each of these
subgroups to obtain a representative sample based on firm size. (See Figure 1 for a breakdown of
respondents.)
Richard Rodgers, a law professor at Campbell University in North
Carolina and a nationally renowned expert on law office computer
technology, believes Wisconsin lawyers may well be at the forefront of
adopting computer technology. Contrary to what many believe, the leading
edge is not in Manhattan or Los Angeles, he contends. "The solo
practitioners are the ones pushing on the edges of what we can do with
computers," Rodgers explains, "...and that allows you to innovate. I
think you'll find more computer use among lawyers in Wisconsin than in
any state I know, except possibly North Carolina."
The remainder of this article highlights some of the findings of this
year's technology survey and opinions on what the results mean.
Getting out the words
Surveyed law firms were asked to rate the degree to which their firm
used a computer for various functions, by marking scores ranging from
"0" for no usage to "5" for high usage. Figure 2 shows the
aggregate results, along with comparisons to rankings from last year's
survey.
Not surprisingly, word processing and document assembly are the
computer functions law offices use most. The most popular word
processing software remains WordPerfect, although its usage level is
down by 12 percent from last year, while Microsoft Word is up 10 percent
(see Figure 3).
WordPerfect 5.1 use fell about 13 percent from last year, although it
remains the WordPerfect version of choice among attorneys surveyed.
"People shake their heads at how a program that's a decade old can
still be the preeminent word processor for lawyers," says Green Bay
lawyer Mark Pennow, chair of the Bar's Electronic Bar Services
Committee. "The answer is it just works. It's the lingua franca, if you
will, of word processing for lawyers."
Still, the survey numbers show that some law firms steered away from
WordPerfect in the past year - a shift also reflected in the general
population, according to computer industry observations. Industry
observers speculate the shift may be due in part to uncertainty about
WordPerfect's future since it changed ownership from Novell to
Corel.
Gary Bakke of New Richmond is one lawyer who made the switch to
Microsoft Word, although he now regrets it, even to the extent that he's
pondering switching back to WordPerfect. "We had 12 years invested in
WordPerfect," Bakke says, "but things that are intuitive for us for
WordPerfect don't exist in Word. Many people are happy with Word, but I
find that the better you were with WordPerfect, the less you'll like
Word. Nobody told me that before I bought it."
Despite such problems, the survey indicates a shift toward Microsoft
Word is under way. "Microsoft has more ability in terms of support and
development dollars that go into continued improvements and upgrades to
the product," says Milwaukee attorney Timothy Muth, who has long been a
Microsoft Word user. "So I think the universe of choices and level of
support and commitment to the product is greater for Microsoft."
Microsoft Word also has become the leader in the corporate world as a
whole. Notes Muth, "When I'm emailing documents back and forth to
clients, I don't find many businesses who have WordPerfect outside of
law firms."
On the other hand, WordPerfect committed recent strategic blunders
that have disheartened at least some attorneys. Leigh Webber of Practice
Management Institute, a St. Paul-based technology teaching/consulting
firm, refers to one of these as the "Great Betrayal." "That has to do
with the macro language," Webber explains. "If you were to add together
the total cost to law firms around the country of developing all the
macros they have developed over the years in using WordPerfect for DOS,
my guess is it would easily be billions of dollars. But the newer
versions of WordPerfect (6 for DOS, 5.1 for Windows, and so on) have a
completely incompatible macro language, which means that lawyers'
enormous investment in automation procedures has been made worthless.
That's why a lot of firms have hung on to their WordPerfect 5.1 for DOS;
they don't want to abandon all their macros."
The upshot of all of this is that selecting word processing software
can be a headache for lawyers, especially in light of how central a
function word processing is in any law firm. The debate over WordPerfect
versus Word surely will continue.
Is change inevitable?
The DOS operating system continues to predominate in law firms,
according to survey results. But while DOS is fine for word processing,
many lawyers reach a point when they want more from their computer
technology than DOS can give them - such as accessing the Internet.
Hence, Webber sees many firms that have put off buying new computers in
recent years now taking the plunge. "I've seen a lot of that in the past
year," he notes. "And of course when you buy a new computer, you can't
buy one that doesn't have Windows 95 on it."
As Figure 4 shows,
Wisconsin law firms' use of Windows 95 is up by 29 percent since last
year's survey, while use of DOS and Windows 3.x dropped by roughly 15
percent and 10 percent respectively. Another 18 percent of survey
respondents plan to convert to Windows 95 within the next 12 months.
The trend toward Windows 95 also ties into choice of word processing
software. As Webber points out, "The difference in pain between going
from WordPerfect 5.1 for DOS to WordPerfect for Windows, versus going
from WordPerfect 5.1 for DOS to Microsoft Word for Windows, is very
little. It's painful either way." That factor, plus the doubts about
WordPerfect's strategic direction, may spur more lawyers to turn to
Microsoft Word.
As for computer hardware, Figure 5 indicates that the
486 PC has become the computer most commonly found in law offices (an
average of about five per office), with the Pentium ranking second (an
average of about four per office). Pentium use gained somewhat since the
1996 survey, while 486 use stayed about the same and 386 use dropped
significantly. Of the respondents that intend to purchase new computers
over the next 12 months, most expect to purchase Pentiums.
"With the advent of 32-bit computing - that is, computing that
requires Pentiums - coming along, I think we're due soon for a second
wave of [computer] purchasing," Pennow predicts. "Lawyers who equipped
their offices with 486s and swore that would be the last computer they'd
buy for a long time, are in for a significant economic surprise in the
next couple years when support for the 16-bit applications drops off,
and the 32-bit Pentium world becomes the de facto standard."
The "Net" gains
Almost 50 percent of Wisconsin lawyers now have Internet access, a
sizable jump from last year's 30 percent figure. Another 11 percent plan
to hook up to the Internet within the next year.
Librarian Jane Colwin sees those numbers reflected in major changes
in how attorneys and judges use the State Law Library, which has long
offered a photocopy/fax information service. "A lot of lawyers used to
call us when they read about an opinion in the newspaper the day after
the court issued it," Colwin notes. "Now they've figured out how to go
to the Bar's home page and get it themselves."
The Internet provides a wealth of information: caselaw, statutes,
sources for finding expert witnesses and more. By no means, however,
does the Internet meet all of a lawyer's research needs - at least not
yet. Major proprietors of online research services and legal publishers
are moving to fill that gap.
"One of the most interesting developments," notes Ross Kodner, an
attorney and owner of MicroLaw, a Milwaukee-based consulting firm, "is
that there's enough substantive material now on the Internet and a large
enough critical mass of people using it so that the proprietary online
research services, such as Lexis and Westlaw, feel the pinch. So they're
rolling out Internet-based access to their services."
While Kodner envisions continued increased use of the Internet by
lawyers, that trend brings implications that are both "good and bad," he
warns. "What I'm referring to is lawyers whose only computer experience
is Internet-related. They don't know a lot of basics about computer
usage, but have learned to be quite adept at Internet usage."
This leads to a knowledge gap that Kodner characterizes as "genuinely
dangerous." One risk is that because others in the firm come to view
these individuals as computer power users, which they're not, they get
asked for advice they're not qualified to give. Another negative result
may be an "undue emphasis on the importance of the Internet in the
firm's overall ability to generate its work product and serve its
clients," Kodner says.
"I don't want to sound negative because I believe the Internet is an
essential tool for any firm of any type. But it's part of a whole
collection of tools that a firm uses to get its job done. By focusing a
lot of effort on the Internet, potentially to the detriment of core
production tools, firms can suffer some serious efficiency losses. You
have to put it in the proper perspective."
Barriers to using computer technology
Lack of time topped the list of reasons lawyers cited for either not
adopting computer technology at all, or not learning to use it as
effectively as they could in their work (see Figure 6). There was little
variation in the ranking of barriers to computer use even when firm size
was considered (per data not revealed in Figure 6), with the exception
of financial constraints, which was less of a barrier in large
firms.
In addition to the information in Figure 6, Richard Rodgers points to
obstacles lawyers don't like to talk about. One stems from the belief
that proficient computer usage demands being a skilled typist. "You
don't have to be a Della Street typist to use a computer," Rodgers says,
citing himself as a prime example. "When I get up [in front of a group
of lawyers] I hold up two fingers and say, 'These are the digits with
which I make my living.' My wife says I type like a pharmacist."
"The notion that you graduate from a typewriter to a computer is
wrong," Rodgers adds. "Computers aren't to be considered typewriters.
[Otherwise] you'll never get the benefit of computer technology, because
computers can do things typewriters never dreamed of doing."
Another factor concealed behind the "I don't have the time" argument,
Rodgers contends, is the fear of looking foolish. "A lawyer's ego is the
size of the Goodyear blimp," he says. "They've been to law school where
they're taught omniscience. If the computer makes a fool of me, there
will be a crack in this veneer of omniscience. That's very hard on
lawyers."
Conclusion
The State Bar will continue to track trends in how Wisconsin
attorneys use computer technology in their law practices. Why?
Information on trends may help individual members and various Bar groups
make decisions about technology use. And survey results can help the Bar
identify further opportunities to help meet members' technology and
information needs.
Dianne Molvig operates Access
Information Service, a Madison research, writing and editing service.
She is a frequent contributor to area publications.
Wisconsin Lawyer