White Paper
ENterprise PRACTICE MANAGEMENT
EVENT CALENDARING BEST PRACTICES
FOR LARGE LAW FIRMS
EVENT CALENDARING BEST PRACTICES FOR LARGE LAW FIRMS
Calendaring important case events is a challenging, time consuming
task for both lawyers and support staff. Automating the event
calendaring process improves efficiency and accuracy of event
information. Calendaring features available in Enterprise® Calendar
Manager™ and Enterprise Practice Manager™ are used by large firms to
schedule court appearances and events, such as discovery, motions,
and settlement conferences.
Tracking changes in current law and local court rules requires close
monitoring. Automated event calendaring software features reporting
tools that allow the firm to view how lawyers use the system.
Firms can also conveniently integrate Enterprise calendaring software
with Legalex, an automated court rules system written by West®
attorney-editors and reviewed by some of the most prominent lawyers
and docketing departments in the country. Using Legalex court rules
further simplifies the event calendaring process.
Event calendaring can be deployed in a centralized structure through a
docketing department or in a decentralized structure where individual
lawyers, secretaries, and paralegals perform their own docketing tasks.
ORGANIZATIONAL SUPPORT OF EVENT CALENDARING
In a centralized docketing structure, the docketing department opens
all of the firm’s mail and immediately schedules pleadings, motions,
and other court-related notices received by the firm. Docketing can
also be assigned to the mail department. Either way, key dates are
recorded before any paperwork reaches the lawyer’s office. This
ensures an accurate and timely docketing process.
However, not all firms are set up to handle centralized docketing.
Many firms prefer a decentralized approach. With this approach, it
is up to the lawyer, secretary, or paralegal to schedule critical dates.
Each lawyer dockets events differently. Some may docket every event,
whereas others only docket key events. In terms of reminders, one
lawyer may use the same reminder timeframe for each event, or
reminders could vary depending upon the type of event.
Some firms create a hybrid approach where parts of the firm may be
centralized while other parts are decentralized.
Enterprise Practice Manager applications can manage the event
calendaring process efficiently and accurately in either a decentralized
or centralized docketing system.
ADVANTAGES OF CENTRALIZED CALENDARING
There are many advantages to a centralized calendaring system. When
mail is immediately routed to the docketing group first, support staff
uses a similar format for all events, allowing for a fast and efficient
calendaring process. This centralized setup provides a controlled
environment with predictable results. All changes and corrections
flow through one central area, so calendaring is easier to manage.
Additionally, when only a few people need to know how to run the
calendaring system, implementation is a simple process and firm-wide
training is not needed.
DISADVANTAGES OF CENTRALIZED CALENDARING
Centralized calendaring has some disadvantages. If one lawyer has
unique docketing requirements, such as earlier reminders or custom
event scheduling, firm management cannot incorporate these
customizations into an automated central calendaring system. As the
number of lawyers submitting custom calendaring requests increases,
the system becomes more difficult to maintain, and lawyers receive
their mail later than usual.
ADVANTAGES OF DECENTRALIZED CALENDARING
In a decentralized calendaring system, each lawyer relies on their
own method for calendaring events. Firms can customize reminders
by individual lawyer or calendar an event earlier than needed. Once
customized automated scheduling for each lawyer is in place, firmwide adoption of a decentralized system happens quickly, as all
lawyers and staff must participate in the calendaring process.
DISADVANTAGES OF DECENTRALIZED CALENDARING
Management must ensure that all lawyers, secretaries, and paralegals
are utilizing the new system. In order to monitor the adoption
rate, management can run reports on how often lawyers use the
calendaring system. Additionally, the firm must accommodate
calendaring delays, as there is no dedicated docketing team opening
the mail and immediately entering events into the system.
DEPLOYING EVENT CALENDARING
The most important best practice for both centralized and
decentralized event calendaring is maintaining an all or nothing
policy for the entire process. Rogue users can create delays and
miscommunication. If errors or inconsistencies occur outside the
system, risk of malpractice liability increases. Once a policy has been
set, the firm should initiate a comprehensive training program.
SETTING UP AN EVENT CALENDARING SYSTEM
Step 1: Create a Framework
The first step in the creation of an event calendaring system involves
the selection of a framework that best suits the firm’s size and
workflow. In deciding between centralized and decentralized event
calendaring, firm management should ask the following questions:
• Does the firm work best with a centralized control access point
or should individual users be allowed to determine their own
calendaring setups?
• Should the firm employ centralized control point templates to limit
the choices available to individual users?
• Should lawyers to be able to set reminders?
• Should the firm use reminder templates for specific event types?
Step 2: Team Configuration
When the first event of a given case or matter is calendared, the
default team of lawyers can be automatically accepted by the system.
Firms also can edit teams, choosing to add or remove specific lawyers
from events as needed.
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EVENT CALENDARING BEST PRACTICES FOR LARGE LAW FIRMS
Editing Teams
After the initial team edit, the revised team configuration is the default
team assigned to the case. Going forward, these team members now
receive notification of every case event. This option should be used if
the lawyers assigned to the event have permanently changed.
The team can also be edited and changed on a per event basis. This
option preserves the original team configuration, allowing the members
to change for one event only. The system reverts to the default team
configuration once the changed event takes place. This is a useful
option when the lawyer change is a temporary one.
SETTING UP FIELDS
Firms can choose from many different options when setting up event
calendaring fields:
• Branch-Division: Enter court information or other jurisdiction
information.
REPORTING: MEASURING THE FIRM’S
EVENT CALENDARING ROI
The following reports are helpful for tracking the firm’s event
calendaring success rate:
• View How Timekeepers Use the System Over Time – How are
lawyers using the system? Do they use it on a regular, consistent
basis or sporadically? If lawyers are not using the event calendaring
system on a regular basis, check their work status. Do they need
more training on the system in order to calendar all of their events, or
are they available for more work?
• View Calendaring by Event Type – Are there any discernable patterns
in the types of events scheduled? Is there an overabundance of a
certain type of event? Are certain event types missing?
• View Calendaring by Clients – Are events for all relevant clients
being scheduled with the firm’s event calendaring system?
• Location: The address of the court, deposition location, meeting, etc.
EVALUATING LAWYER PROCESSES
• Narrative: The default narrative can be used as is or configured to
meet the firm’s needs. Firms can also change the narrative for a
specific event or for all events related to a particular case.
Lawyers may want to view events on their own calendar, their secretary’s,
and paralegal’s calendar, or some other calendar altogether. The firm’s
calendaring system must be configured to place the correct type of
event (e.g., e-mail, task, appointment) on the correct calendar.
MICROSOFT OUTLOOK SYNCHRONIZATION
Enterprise applications allow firms to synchronize all or some of their
calendared events with Microsoft® Outlook®.
The first and most important step in setting up Outlook synchronization
involves determining which users need events sent to their Outlook
calendar. Not all users will need their calendaring events displayed
in Outlook. The firm then synchronizes the Enterprise system only for
lawyers who depend on Outlook for events and reminders.
Sending Calendaring Events to Outlook
If the firm is using Enterprise 3.6, events can be exported into Outlook
appointments or tasks.
YOUR PARTNER FOR SUCCESS
Thomson Reuters Elite offers an end-to-end Enterprise Business
Management Solution that allows law firms and professional
services organizations to run all operational aspects of their firms,
including business development, risk management, client and matter
management, and financial management. As an industry leader
for organizations across the globe, we understand the business
and financial aspects of firm operations, and we have the tools to
streamline processes, improve efficiencies, and provide the flexibility
you need to change and grow your business.
The firm can map specific Enterprise fields to the appointment or
task. Firms can link fields to the subject line or body of an Outlook
appointment or task.
In working with all-day events, lawyers may not want the all-day event
to show up as an all-day event in Outlook. In addition, an all-day event
can turn into a multi-day event when attendees are in multiple time
zones. Many firms require that all-day events be scheduled at 9:00 a.m.
Lawyers know that when they see a 9:00 a.m. event, it is an all-day event.
Filtering Outlook Events
The Filter option can help users select which events they want to
display in Outlook.
For more information on Enterprise Practice Manager and Enterprise
Calendar Manager or for a global list of office locations, visit elite.com.
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© 2013 Thomson Reuters L-328938/2-13