One Document or a Document Set? Choosing the Right Level of Word Automation The number of files is not the real question A firm may prepare several Microsoft Word documents for one matter: an engagement letter, agreement, disclosure, checklist, cover letter, and internal note. At first glance, the choice between one-document automation and multi-document automation…
Document Automation Without Authoring Tools: A Cost-Effective Way to Empower Form Users Many professional offices eventually discover that document automation raises a practical question: who should be allowed to build and change the forms, and who should simply be allowed to use them? The answer matters. In a small office, the same person may create…
While AI Hallucinations Grab Headlines, Human and Structural Errors May Still Be the Bigger Drafting Risk Everyone is talking about AI hallucinations—and rightly so. Courts have issued sanctions. Ethics opinions have multiplied. The profession is being reminded, correctly, that technology can assist but never replace professional judgment. Yet the quieter, more persistent risk may be…
Add Real Christmas Cheer: Precision, Productivity, and the Tools Lawyers Deserve December tends to make lawyers reflective. Court calendars quiet down, inboxes slow just enough to allow thinking, and the year’s accumulated frustrations come into view: the documents that took too long, the numbering that fell apart at the worst time, the tools that promised…
Legal Privilege, Cloud AI and the Ethics Gap in Document Automation Generative AI tools like ChatGPT are increasingly being used by legal professionals for drafting, brainstorming, and research. An increasing number of document automation vendors in the legal industry are integrating generative AI or cloud-based services into their offerings. But these tools are not confidential—and…
AI, Privacy, and Legal Ethics: Lessons from 23andMe and the Copyright Wars Introduction – What 23andMe and Copyright Battles Teach Us About Security What do a genetic testing company and multimillion-dollar copyright lawsuits have to do with your law practice? Everything. Once you give data to someone else, you may lose ownership. You certainly lose…
This is the second of five articles in the Series Security Considerations in Document Automation Trust is your firm’s most valuable asset. Clients depend on you to protect their information—and to get every detail right. In today’s digital world, both security and accuracy are essential to maintaining that trust. This series explores how smarter document…
HotDocs vs. Doxserá: A Lawyer’s Guide to Choosing the Right Tool When it comes to document automation for legal professionals, two names often rise to the top: HotDocs and Doxserá. Both are powerful, both are respected—but they take very different approaches to solving the same problem: how to generate accurate, repeatable documents faster and more…
Pro Bono and the Guardianship Season It was 11 years ago that Jim Calloway, then as now Director of the Oklahoma Bar Association’s Management Assistance Program and Senior Guru of all things legal management, suggested that the soon-to-be formed TheFormTool, LLC seemed to be ideally structured to actively support consumer-oriented pro bono legal services firms.…
Why I changed from HotDocs to Doxserá 1. The pandemic! I made a decision that the two lawyers in our firm would work from home and our legal assistant would work in our office. We would not see clients face-to-face and we would only see each other by video. It was a good call because…