So, the American Bar Association says that it wants us solo and small firm lawyers to consider joining? If that’s so, it’s going to have to do a far better job of understanding the abilities and needs of solo and small firm attorneys than it has.
Consider this article, Solos Lead the Wireless Way, ABA Journal (September 2005). To the shock and surprise of the ABA, solos (gasp!) have lead the way in implementing wireless networks while midsized firms have lagged. Imagine – solos being in the forefront of technology! What’s even worse is this quote from an ABA official, trying to explain this trend
The result was one of the most dramatic trends found in this year’s
survey. "I was surprised how many solos adopted wireless in the office
or use it to get onto the Internet away from work," says Catherine
Sanders Reach, associate director of the ABA’s Legal Technology
Resource Center. "Solos typically run behind large law firms and use
bare-bones technology. Maybe wireless provides a bare-bones service
solos need."
I find it appalling that the ABA isn’t aware that solos have been in
the forefront of legal advancements including technological ones since
the beginning of time. Just a few months ago, an article discussed in
this post reported that solos were way out in front in capitalizing on the blogging trend. And I’ve discussed in my opening post
how solo and small firm lawyers have been first movers in use of email
and websites. In fact, I can’t think of a single trend, be it
advertising, marketing, web communications or paperless offices where a
large firm has been ahead of solos. And Ms. Reach does not give any
examples either.
ABA, if you want to attract solos’ hard earned dollars, you’ve got an awful lot of catching up to do to figure out what we solos want and need.
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