Category Archives for "Modern Law Library"

Is your library budget ready?

By Michael Feit | Budgeting , Modern Law Library

Budget season is here. Are you ready?

Budget season is here, and 2018 expense is right around the corner. While no one enjoys the necessary number-crunching of budget preparation, annual budgets are an important tool of modern-library metrics. The library budget, a microcosm of projected expense within the larger organization, should be meaningful by helping you to understand how you spend firm dollars. Your budget, broken down by categories of material, or service, or major vendor, should allow you a framework to monitor expense.

When preparing the budget, utilize all tools at your disposal. Annual budgeting should never be done in a vacuum. Talk to Finance to get a better idea of the firm’s strategy for the upcoming year. What is the firm’s fiscal goal for the new year, and what does that mean for the library? Is this a year of zero-based budgeting? Are there plans for a new office or strategic downsizing firm-wide? Is the firm planning to right-size practice groups? If so, then performing an office-copy audit becomes a valuable tool of budget preparation. Addition or deletion of attorneys and staff affects library spend and seat licenses, so make sure you are proactive in understanding what the firm is planning. If you have an Electronic Resource Management (ERM) tool in place, pull usage reports, and analyze user data and actual ROI of electronic subscriptions helping to support renewal or cancellation decisions. Don’t forget to survey your user population to make sure their needs have not changed and the firm is subscribing to the right content. Make sure you are current on legal-vendor offerings and haven’t overlooked new vendors with the same content but a better value.

The Modern Library requires individuals to change their mindset from maintaining the status quo to becoming open to new ways of doing things. Consider how you will shape your budget to reflect new solutions that you want to present to your organization. Whether it is new software to improve workflow or hiring a consultant for upcoming contract negotiations, the budget should reflect the library’s needs and projects for the upcoming year. If you are proposing something new, consider adding a business case as a supplement, providing the needs assessment and ROI derived from the new solution. For the law firm administrator that is often a numbers person, hard-budget data turned into informative charts and graphs will tell your story in a visual way that is powerful beyond just numbers. The law library budget should be well thought out and reflect your needs and expenses for the upcoming fiscal year.

Innovation and Value: The Modern Library

By Michael Feit | Modern Law Library , Surveys

Cutting-edge… State-of-the-art… Unconventional… Using the most up-to-date techniques, technology and metrics…

While all these ideas are traits of the Modern Library, the first step to modernization really starts with you, the administrator. Flexibility and an openness to change are necessary traits. Ask yourself: How can I change my habits to actually facilitate change? How can I move out of my mindset of “but we have always done it that way“? What can I do differently to steer the law library team in a new way? Can I provide the space/opportunity for the law library team to innovate and transform?

While law firms have always depended on library and information professionals to support the research needs of their lawyers, the Modern Library is undergoing a paradigm shift. Success now depends on the library taking a more active role in the organization to help support the day-to-day business of law. The law-firm administrator is instrumental in paving the road for that new role.

It is no secret that the legal sector is in flux and change, which is the only constant in our organizations. There are changes we can forecast, and there are those we must be able to react to in order to function as a fiscally responsible unit in our organizations. The Modern Library, a business within a business, is not passive in its approach, but rather utilizes metrics and analytics to forecast, predict and analyze data as changes occur.

Rather than be a target of downsizing or outsourcing, the Modern Library is innovative and forward-thinking. Librarians have a variety of skills that can be utilized in innovative ways such as:

• Conflicts support for new business intake
• Partnering with marketing to provide competitive intelligence to support the RFP process
• Partnering with IT to identify and beta-test software
• Driving Knowledge Management

Allowing the law library to collaborate with other departments is a win-win for the library and the firm.

The Modern Library is a trend-setter, evaluating and embracing new techniques, ideas and technology to help support business processes. It strives to carve out new roles within the organization while showcasing the value of resources and staff.

Feit Consulting is interested in learning how modern you see your law library, and what obstacles stand in the way of modernization. Click here to get started on our 10-minute survey.

The Modern Library Defined

By Michael Feit | Librarians , Surveys

Cutting-edge…state-of-the-art…unconventional…using the most up-to-date techniques, technology and metrics…

While all these ideas are traits of the Modern Library, the first step to modernization really starts with you, the librarian. You need to be flexible in your approach and meet change head-on. Ask yourself, “How can I change my habits to actually facilitate change? How can I move out of my mindset of but we have always done it that way? What can I do differently to offer value to my organization and make them see me and my library in a new way?” While law firms have always depended on library and information professionals to support the research needs of their lawyers, the Modern Library is undergoing a paradigm shift. Success now depends on the library taking a more active role in the organization, to help support the day-to-day business of law.

While librarian skill sets remain the same, the methods used to apply those skills are vastly different from those of the past. The Modern Library is a nexus for interdepartmental support, including, but not an exhaustive list:

• Embracing new roles in Conflicts Support for new business intake
• Partnering with Marketing to provide competitive intelligence to support the RFP process
• Partnering with IT to identify and beta-test software
• Driving Knowledge Management

Be enthusiastic about new ideas. The Modern Library is a trendsetter, evaluating and embracing new techniques, ideas and technology to help support business processes.

It is no secret that the legal sector is in flux and change, which is the only constant in our organizations. There are changes we can forecast, and there are those we must be able to react to in order to function as a fiscally responsible unit in our organizations. The Modern Library, a business within a business, is not passive in its approach but rather utilizes metrics and analytics to forecast, predict and analyze data as changes occur.

Preparing and monitoring annual budgets and working with Finance on cost and recovery of client-related research are important fiscal initiatives. With the cost of resources continuing to rise, data-analysis tools such as Electronic Resource Management (ERM) are invaluable in analyzing usage, preparing for contract renewals and general collection development. No longer a nice-to-have tool, ERMs are essential as the Modern Library moves away from print towards virtualization.

Rather than be a target of downsizing or outsourcing, the Modern Library is innovative and forward-thinking. It strives to carve out new roles within the organization while showcasing the value of resources and staff.

Feit Consulting is interested in learning how modern you see your law library and what obstacles stand in the way of modernization. Click here to get started on our 15-minute survey.

Leveraging LinkedIn for Law Librarians

By Michael Feit | Best Practices , Librarians

Consider the value of using Linkedin, the largest professional network, as a tool in the modern library arsenal for both research and professional development.

Locate expert witnesses. Both Lexis and Westlaw have robust expert-witness information tools, but LinkedIn can supplement that research.  In the general search box, type “expert witness” and select people with the skills, which will pull up a listing of expert-witness profiles. You can then narrow your search by keyword, location, industries, etc., to help you find relevant profiles. In most cases, they will have a profile photograph. In addition, you can usually see their connections to better gauge if there might be a conflict of interest in hiring them.

Build your professional network. Add your colleagues, associates, and clients. Stay apprised of your connections’ updates, position changes, and work anniversaries. Need an introduction at a company or firm? Search for the company to see if you have any first-degree connections, and ask them for an introduction.

Perform due diligence on individuals. Many .aw librarians assist with performing background checks on potential clients and new employees. LinkedIn can be an important tool in that process. Depending on an individual’s content and volume of activity, you might gain powerful insights. Don’t forget to consider the candidate’s online recommendations, featured skills and endorsements.

Professional Development. LinkedIn is one of the easiest ways to stay abreast of the latest trends and news in your field and beyond. Follow companies, associations, and thought leaders/influencers to ensure your feed is full of relevant updates to keep you in the know.

Competitive Intelligence. Follow a company’s personnel announcements and highlighted new product features and introductions. Examine job postings for company growth. Don’t overlook LinkedIn for intel on private companies. By examining the number of employees listed and their titles and positions within their profiles, you can develop core insights into hard-to-find data.  

Determine who the employees were at a certain time in history. Have you been asked to find out who was working at a company or organization during a particular time period? Use the general search feature and filter by “past companies”, which will focus on all employees who worked at a particular entity. You can then cross-check the dates on individual profiles to determine who worked at the company during that time.

Join groups or create your own. Follow group conversations and chime in. This is a great way to showcase your expertise and contribute to the law librarianship field. If you don’t have LinkedIn Premium, join groups! This is a great workaround to be able to send free messages to people on LinkedIn within the same group that you aren’t connected to. There is a limit. You are only allowed to send 15 free 1:1 group messages to fellow group members each month. And if you create a group, group managers can send up to one group announcement per week to members who have chosen to receive such emails. Groups are also a great place to advertise job openings.

Client Development. Follow your firm’s top clients and any prospective clients to keep on top of any news they share via LinkedIn. Furthermore, receive alerts when they are mentioned in news articles. Monitoring client activity underscores LinkedIn’s worth as a cost-effective current awareness tool.

Identify contacts. Search for a company, and see a listing of employee profiles. You will be able to do a keyword search (title, first name, location, etc.) of all of its employees who have LinkedIn profiles.

Pull clean copies of an individual’s profile. Need to pull clean copies of profiles for a case, interview, or upcoming meeting? When you are in an individual’s profile, simply click on the three small dots to the right of the profile and click “save to PDF”. You can download this clean PDF, which contains a person’s educational background and work experience. Please note that this will not include the person’s profile picture.  

Create and share content. Share updates, photos, interesting articles or write your own. Use hashtags to optimize your user audience (e.g., #lawlibrarians). Hashtags are indexed by the social network and become searchable/discoverable by others.

Use LinkedIn Jobs. Need to post a library position? You can pay by setting a daily average budget, and you will only be charged for the number of job views you receive. Even if you aren’t in the job market, the job descriptions in job postings can give you ideas on how to innovate within your own organization. Have you had the same job title for the past 20 years? Maybe it’s time for a change. Job postings can give you great ideas.

Budgeting to Maximize ROI

By Michael Feit | Budgeting , Modern Law Library , Resources

Will you play it safe or take a risk for greater returns?  

The Modern Library requires individuals to change their mindset from maintaining the status quo and becoming open to new ways of doing things. Budget season is here. Now is the time to consider how you will shape your budget with new solutions to your organization’s anticipated changes in 2018.

• ERM (Electronic Resource management system): If your firm doesn’t already have an ERM, it may be time. Read more here.
• Content Aggregators: Influencing the firm’s bottom line with current awareness on clients and potential business.
• Library Membership Fees: Save on subscription costs, fill content gaps at a lesser cost, access to archival and historical collections and just-in-time document delivery.
• New Software: Consider software that offers newer efficiencies, extensive analysis and taming big data.
• Outside Services: Budgeting for value-added insights on those special projects, allocating funds for consultancy services or to purchase resources that will provide critical insights on pricing, creating efficiencies and library modernization to name a few. Tap into Feit Consulting’s white papers or other consultants’ resources.
• Conferences and Events: Be smart in which topic class or conference you decide to attend. Think about who may also attend as networking is as valuable as the content offered. Specialized topics covered by ILTA or the Ark Group offer valuable takeaways on timely topics that will affect your bottom line. Discounts available for multiple attendees from your organization.
• Staffing: Do your foresee a need to add staffing capacity? Will it be a short-term need or long-term? Hiring temporary or permanent staff is one option as well as outsourcing depending on how each option delivers return on the expense.

Don’t Jump Back Into Your Everyday Routine: Transform Knowledge Into Power

By Michael Feit | Associations , Events , Librarians

At the core, librarians utilize knowledge and resources to answer questions and solve problems. We possess a multitude of skills, and have much value to offer our organizations, beyond performing legal research. The American Association of Law Libraries’ (AALL) conference this month reminded us of our abilities, and more so the importance of transitioning from guardian of books to ‘linchpin librarians’. In short, we as librarians need to showcase the true value we possess and can offer our organizations. The question now is, “How will you transform the knowledge and empowerment gained at AALL into action steps at your firm or organization?”

Checklist for transitioning knowledge into action:
– Brainstorm what new step(s) you can take to build high-level collaboration and interdepartmental support at your firm or organization.
– Determine the best avenues to grow your visibility within your organization.
– Ask yourself, “How can I change my habits? What can I do differently that offers value to my organization?”
– Plan a lunch or phone call with colleagues inside and outside your organization to brainstorm what cutting-edge solutions you can bring to your organization or firm.
– Reach out to your new networking contacts. Choose one each week with whom to connect.
– Develop a Conference Recap to show management the value of attending; highlight program sessions and vendor products that support current and potential organization/firm initiatives.
– Include conference benefits in the library’s annual report to Management.
– Take Feit Consulting’s Library Modernization Survey.