Roche: Small firms could form consortium
Providers of legal software are stopping law firms from integrating their systems by failing to provide the APIs (application programming interfaces) they need to do it, a Solicitors Regulation Authority panel discussion on adopting technology has heard.
Rachel Roche, founder of Roche Legal, said one of the solutions could be for small law firms to form consortiums to develop lawtech products, where they could all have access to open APIs.
Ms Roche, whose law firm specialises in private client work from its offices in York and London, said: “We have an issue in my business with certain software providers in the legal sector not making available the APIs we need to connect our different systems together.
“There are other providers that allow that. We have a bit of a sticking point where we have got tech for some parts of the business and tech for the other part, but the tech in the middle is a bit clunky. That could be smoother really.
“I suspect that most, if not all, software providers, will recognise the benefit of having that connection available in the future, but unless you’re a developer yourself you can’t get access to that. I think that’s definitely a gap that could be closed.”
Timothy Eagle, finance and business development partner at Leicestershire law firm Josiah Hincks, agreed that integration between different kinds of software was a “key opportunity” for tech providers.
He said the firm’s “central hub”, its case management system, “doesn’t like talking to anything else really”.
He said the firm would be “super keen” to look at a case management system that opened up its APIs.
“At some point I think some of the big case management providers will open them up, because users will go to the ones that are open.”
Speaking at a recent SRA Innovate discussion in Leicester on the practicalities of adopting technology, Ms Roche said technology had “really helped move things on at pace” in her law firm over the past three to five years, “accelerated by Covid of course”.
She said lawyers should ask themselves what was the most “boring and repetitive task” they did every day and then find out how they could get artificial intelligence to do it for them.
“I think technology has really levelled the playing field for small businesses, but the time element is enormous. It hits smaller businesses harder because we don’t have the necessary resources and knowledge.
“Project management has been a really steep learning curve. There’s an awful lot of trial and error involved, which can be a bit disappointing.”
Ms Roche said tech was “really a passion of mine, which is why I keep going”.
Mr Eagle said technology was a “really useful tool” for smoothing out administrative processes, for example by allowing clients to make payments online.
His “top tip” for law firms in adopting technology was to “start small” with tech projects. “The way to build trust is to get easy wins”.
In terms of barriers to adoption, he said budgets were a “big issue” for small firms. Collaboration was a “key way” of getting over the problem and discussing tech with peers could help reduce risk.
Mr Eagle said the other issue was the level of knowledge about technology within a law firm.
Although many small firms may not have tech enthusiasts in them, there might be people “hidden” who would be enthusiastic about tech “if given the chance to take ownership of something”.
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