Interesting Tools - ShareO and Outlook 2007

Our office recently moved from Amicus Attorney to MS Outlook for docketing, scheduling, client contact information, etc. The upgrade costs and tech support problems cuased concerns for our semi-budget conscious firm. After discussing solutions with the Office Manager, I was charged with researching and implementing a new client management and docketing system.

Ross Kodner and Andrew Simpson presented an article titled, Outlook for Lawyers: The Case Manager You Already Have, at the 2nd Annual National Solo and Small Firm Conference, which triggered my interest in using the program already installed, but under-utilized on the office computers. Kodner and Simpson's presentation lauded the benefits of Outlook 2007 as a resource for case management, but also emphasized that "Outlook is No Substitute for a Real Legal Practice Management System." Since we only needed a quasi-practice management system, Outlook was definitely an option.

Outlook 2007 certainly is a huge improvement over any previous versions. These improvements make it highly beneficial for practice management, mainly docketing, client information, phone messaging, etc. Namely, Outlook possesses all of the capabilities that other management systems have (with similar pricing, not to be discussed now), without the hassle of integration concerns, updates, etc. The Office Manager decided that she wanted all computers/staff/attorneys to use Outlook as the primary calendaring tool by the end of the summer 2007.

At first, all of the senior partners were skeptical about the prospect of using a new system. Most complained, and continued to use Amicus or their "reliable" paper calendars. After 1 month though, all of the attorneys shifted to the new system for their office calendaring.

However, there was still problem with Outlook: Outlook contained no way to create/view office-wide calendars without an exchange server. Our solution (and one suggested by Kodner and Simpson): ShareO. This unique (and cheap) tool enables our office to connect and share attorney/staff calendars, contact lists, tasks, etc, without worrying about programming/server maintenance and huge costs.

Here's how it works in our office:

Each attorney "shares" their calendar, tasks, and contacts with other team members. If the attorney is a supervisor, then only that attorney shares the calendar, and the staff use his/her calendar to docket all events and appointments. Attorneys and staff members use Outlook's "Tasks" function to leave phone messages or other notes for the attorney. The date and time are entered, including the type of message. At the end, the message looks like this:

From here, the task is saved and sent directly to the attorney's task folder for viewing. When finished, the attorney deletes the item from the task bar. The process works the same way for calendar and contact items as well.

ShareO uses an email message to send/receive the information packets. To manage this, we just set up alias email accounts: user_shareo@domainname.com. Their name matches to the sender, and most of the users never know this email exists.

After 6 months of using the ShareO/Outlook integration, even the "dinosaurs" can agree that this is a relatively cost effective and simple solution.

There are some drawbacks that Kodner and Simpson discuss. Overall though, I am confident that small and mid-sized firms can utilize this system with relative ease and little trouble.

Next Time: PrimoPDF & Paint.NET