Technology – don’t talk to me about technology – I use email for goodness sake

My last piece yielded the usual noisy comments about how lawyers are not averse to using technology as if I was accusing them of using quill pens. How do I put this politely, suggesting that people use Mailmerge and email. This technology has been around for 40 years.

Ask yourselves the following

How do you know if your lawyers are too busy?

How do you know which ps1s are going to expire?

How do you know if you are on a panel?

Just do a bit of research and then listen

In a recent podcast, I explained that if software providers wanted to be more successful selling to lawyers, they should spend more time learning about the issues we actually face, not what they think we face.  A few hours later, I was watching a technology demonstration over Zoom, and whilst not a direct criticism of the individual involved, it was a fairly typical experience and offers a partial explanation as to why lawyers are hesitant to adopt new technology.

Things didn’t get off to a good start.  The person demonstrating the product admitted he’d only been at the company for a few months, having come from estate agency, so this legal stuff was new to him.  Given that many lawyers are wary of agents, this definitely put him on the backfoot in building confidence and trust.

He asked us what we were looking for and our expectations; we explained we had a genuine interest in technology that would improve the updating process between us and the agent. He nodded and then spent 30 minutes showing us something that had nothing to do with this.  The primary focus of his speech was the ease of use of the product and how much better it was than the competition.  He even went so far to say that this meant because his product was better, he didn’t actually have competitors.  Which we did find a little curious.   

When he stopped to draw breath and asked us what we thought, we had to break it to him that, as we had told him, we were looking for another aspect of his platform. Which was obviously tricky, because he then explained that they had focussed on building what he had shown us, because “many other law firms have this issue”.  Only, like every other one of those law firms, we have own special and issues and need technology to help solve those – not what he was showing us.

Then things got worse

It was when I pointed out that the solution he had presented was just one of many available, that things started to go downhill.  Clearly frustrated that we weren’t blown away by the brilliance of what they had built, the sales person took the ill-advised step down the well-trodden path of arguing with us. Which, when you’re trying to build trust and confidence is not a good look.  Unfortunately, this was not the first time we’ve seen this and it adds further credence to those who complain that people selling technology do not understand our issues.  When people don’t listen or pick arguments with lawyers, it’s rarely ends in a sale.   We have turned away some really promising products that could genuinely reduce our risks and improve our productivity, due to a salesperson being argumentative or just plain dismissive.

The sad reality

Unlike other sectors, our specific part of the legal industry has been chronically starved of investment in new technology due to a lack of demand and margins to afford the spend on this.  This has resulted in more established firms struggling to invest in new products due to the overheads involved in managing the existing client base who have not been able to move to their latest versions.

The vacuum left creates opportunity for startups to develop solutions who proceed to do their best to gain adoption and traction whilst building a brand new product.  Owners of these firms are often self-funded and offer stock rather than salary and predictable commission, which can make attracting seasoned salespeople a challenge.

If lawyers are going to adopt technology, vendors need to be more effective at understanding the problems they face, build solutions to solve them and hire people to communicate this.  For this they will need funding and training, which needs to be spent on development and experienced sales people – unfortunately, it’s usually marketing where this money ends up. 

Which does mean that sadly, we should all expect to see the technology adoption drought continue, to the detriment of us all.

Peter Ambrose is the owner of The Partnership and Legalito – specialising in the delivery of transparent and ultra-efficient conveyancing services and software.

Peter Ambrose: pambrose@thepartnershiplimited.com, 01483 579978

Press enquiries: Tracy Holland, tholland@thepartnershiplimited.com 01483 579978