Leveraging the Assets of the Law Library

The appearance of Yahoo was an exciting moment for early users of the Internet, among whom were law librarians. (For those who may not understand the current market value of Yahoo, this history will be interesting. Yahoo was an early search engine that acquired many of the other early and excellent search engines, such as AltaVista and Dejavu. If you are interested in this fascinating history, see www.dejavu.org.)

Consolidation of Online Resources

One of the great things about the Internet ' and particularly about free access to information by skillful law librarians ' was the competitive environment and target market it created for Lexis and Westlaw, today's principal sources of consolidated legal information in electronic format. Some of the information is available elsewhere and some of it is available free, but Lexis and Westlaw continue to provide one-stop shopping for law firms, particularly those with a highly diversified practice. The individual development of each of these companies is fueled by an important international information firm, and their competition with each other fuels a fight to take over other Web resources, as well as publishing companies. Some independent resources, like www.lawcrawler.com, a search tool for lawyers, became part of Findlaw, a one-time competitor in the field but now one of some 442,401 Web domains owned by ThomsonReuters, parent of Westlaw. Lexis and Westlaw had mastered the art of acquisition by mastering the art of pricing the rental, not the sale, of information. This topic alone will be the subject of an upcoming article.

Cornell Law still prides itself on being one of the best resources for free legal information on the Internet. It operates as a not-for-profit organization and takes contributions. It is extremely well designed and managed for your benefit at www.law.cornell.edu.

Along the way, it became clear that print resources were at risk for survival. Younger lawyers became exposed to online legal research in law school through Westlaw and, later, Lexis. They expected these services to be available in their firms. Librarians would be the ones trained as trainers in the full range of available electronic content and the best way to search it. Despite the apparent limits to free resources, a good reference librarian is usually willing to bring a lawyer or law firm what is needed at the lowest possible cost. A former law librarian, Sabrina Pacifici, was a thoughtful pioneer in assembling reviews of resources. Started in 1996, you can still subscribe to her newsletter at www.bespacific.com.

This glimpse into the rise of online information is not entirely without purpose. As more resources became available online and through the now common arrangements with Lexis and Westlaw, law firm executives and information managers began to question the physical space and personnel attached to once highly prized law libraries. Subscriptions to print materials, specialists shelving books, and large unused space now seem like elephants that display the sign, “Cost Center.” Law firms began looking for a return on investment. As firms grew and offices multiplied, the question had to be asked: Were libraries to be multiplied across all offices as well? Many had, and still have, multiple copies of resources where resource-heavy departments, like tax, are spread across offices nationally and internationally.

Reassessing the Assets of the Law Library

Rightly understood, books are necessary as long as lawyers depend on them and law firms are willing to subscribe and accept delivery of them. It is not until costs became an essential driving force that the cost of print collections and unused space are called into question. Where IT departments manage the library, they are able to initiate a new era in streamlining.

As computing issues grew at the turn of the century and complex networks developed, IT departments were called upon to solve problems of filing, searching, distributing and collaborating. The information management activities in the law firm began to explode. Nothing could be done or accomplished without IT specialization and support, and this is even truer today. An increasing number of specialists have found a niche once occupied by other operating departments. Even in 2000, with Y2K resolved, legal research had already taken on sufficient electronic dimension to move many firms to make the IT department an umbrella to the library.

Many law firms still maintain library space, but much of the activity of librarians is computer-based. Larger firms even maintain online card catalogues integrated with access to a world catalogue of books from interlibrary loan collective, OCLC. (OCLC is thoroughly described at www.oclc.org.)

Law libraries have always been a mystery to the law firm, but in those early years of confusion, mergers, acquisitions and salespeople flogging the benefits of commercial systems like Lexis and Westlaw, it is easy to see that law librarians might become fearful that law libraries would disappear and their operation outsourced.

In reality, law firms have already outsourced their libraries by renting most of their resources from Lexis, Westlaw, Bloomberg and other services. They spend huge sums of money to use these systems as needed, rarely considering the duplication among them or the elements of the contracts they really use. Real ingenuity must be exercised to make sure that print materials are not a compulsory part of good research contracts and that research contracts complement, rather than duplicate, online services. Vendors have purchased massive content from publishing companies and must update it regularly. They work to make it as proprietary as possible, and their marketing strengths make them difficult to resist.

While the physical assets of the law library may be the focus of cost reduction for the IT group, it behooves the IT specialist to understand two essential facts. One is the dependence of contract value on the mix of resources itemized in that contract; the other is the rich resume of the librarian who is well-versed in searching and finding content. Storing and delivering information can use the IT hand. Most librarians today have a deep understanding of what is available via the Internet, commercial services and on the free Internet and can work with the IT department to take advantage of what is there to create a dynamic resource library.

Many IT managers now have librarians incorporated within their own departments. There are no substantive assets in the law library without them. They are independent and tenacious. There are few markets for law books, so all that remains is the unique asset called the law librarian. IT managers have a real opportunity to expand the services of the IT departments by expanding the responsibilities of well-qualified law librarians.

Creating a Path to Leverage

The path to leverage requires some analysis. IT leadership will want to get a handle on the workload by understanding the nature of the work. There are a number of ways to assess the use of resources by analyzing the use of online services. Librarians can help do this so there is no need to depend on the spin of online service vendors. But librarians are often ignored when their work is not understood.

Law librarians have various qualifications. Reference librarians are primarily content specialists. Most schooled librarians have Master's degrees. They may not perform financial analysis or crunch statistics, but they know what takes up time and can provide the details. In larger firms reference librarians often develop a subject specialty and work regularly with a particular practice group or lawyer. There is an obvious advantage from a customer service and marketing perspective to assigning a reference librarian to the busiest and most productive practice areas and providing a billing number to charge his or her time. There was never a better time to turn what once was a cost center into a profit center.

Reference librarians in law firms are quick studies who can easily master a subject area. Of all the personal traits most emblematic of the profession, responsibility is one that stands out. Assigning a librarian to a practice group or groups is like assigning an ambassador from the IT department. Since practice groups often include lawyers who prefer research over client contact, that person often has a library relationship and can best serve as a great liaison, working with the reference librarian to respond to the group's information needs from all available resources.

In the next installment, we will see how practice group assignments can create a marketing advantage for the IT department as well as the firm.

The first installment of this series, in the August 2012 issue, discussed contract terms with online research providers. This installment discusses the role of the law librarian in the IT department.

During the last 20 years, enormous changes have occurred in the information industry. This has enormously affected not only libraries, including private law libraries, but also law librarians and IT staff. As in most things, law firms were slower to adapt and, once adapting, individually chose differing paths. Most firms wait for others to be first. When activities are as sensitive to regulation and procedure as law practice, it takes time for a firm to develop the boldness to be first.

But as boldness developed, online research vendors took advantage of the environment. In the early 1990s, the rise the Internet was still somewhat unbelievable. It also was unstructured. Early experimentation made an enormous variety of information freely accessible ' and also free of charge. This included specialized search tools for listservs or blogs (www.DejaVu.com) and a free search engine to find individuals and busineses (www.FOUR11.com). (The Computer Encyclopaedia refers to www.FOUR11.com as “[a]n e-mail address search site that was acquired by Yahoo! See Web white pages [www.answers.com/topic/411-1].”)

The appearance of Yahoo was an exciting moment for early users of the Internet, among whom were law librarians. (For those who may not understand the current market value of Yahoo, this history will be interesting. Yahoo was an early search engine that acquired many of the other early and excellent search engines, such as AltaVista and Dejavu. If you are interested in this fascinating history, see www.dejavu.org.)

Consolidation of Online Resources

One of the great things about the Internet ' and particularly about free access to information by skillful law librarians ' was the competitive environment and target market it created for Lexis and Westlaw, today's principal sources of consolidated legal information in electronic format. Some of the information is available elsewhere and some of it is available free, but Lexis and Westlaw continue to provide one-stop shopping for law firms, particularly those with a highly diversified practice. The individual development of each of these companies is fueled by an important international information firm, and their competition with each other fuels a fight to take over other Web resources, as well as publishing companies. Some independent resources, like www.lawcrawler.com, a search tool for lawyers, became part of Findlaw, a one-time competitor in the field but now one of some 442,401 Web domains owned by ThomsonReuters, parent of Westlaw. Lexis and Westlaw had mastered the art of acquisition by mastering the art of pricing the rental, not the sale, of information. This topic alone will be the subject of an upcoming article.

Cornell Law still prides itself on being one of the best resources for free legal information on the Internet. It operates as a not-for-profit organization and takes contributions. It is extremely well designed and managed for your benefit at www.law.cornell.edu.

Along the way, it became clear that print resources were at risk for survival. Younger lawyers became exposed to online legal research in law school through Westlaw and, later, Lexis. They expected these services to be available in their firms. Librarians would be the ones trained as trainers in the full range of available electronic content and the best way to search it. Despite the apparent limits to free resources, a good reference librarian is usually willing to bring a lawyer or law firm what is needed at the lowest possible cost. A former law librarian, Sabrina Pacifici, was a thoughtful pioneer in assembling reviews of resources. Started in 1996, you can still subscribe to her newsletter at www.bespacific.com.

This glimpse into the rise of online information is not entirely without purpose. As more resources became available online and through the now common arrangements with Lexis and Westlaw, law firm executives and information managers began to question the physical space and personnel attached to once highly prized law libraries. Subscriptions to print materials, specialists shelving books, and large unused space now seem like elephants that display the sign, “Cost Center.” Law firms began looking for a return on investment. As firms grew and offices multiplied, the question had to be asked: Were libraries to be multiplied across all offices as well? Many had, and still have, multiple copies of resources where resource-heavy departments, like tax, are spread across offices nationally and internationally.

Reassessing the Assets of the Law Library

Rightly understood, books are necessary as long as lawyers depend on them and law firms are willing to subscribe and accept delivery of them. It is not until costs became an essential driving force that the cost of print collections and unused space are called into question. Where IT departments manage the library, they are able to initiate a new era in streamlining.

As computing issues grew at the turn of the century and complex networks developed, IT departments were called upon to solve problems of filing, searching, distributing and collaborating. The information management activities in the law firm began to explode. Nothing could be done or accomplished without IT specialization and support, and this is even truer today. An increasing number of specialists have found a niche once occupied by other operating departments. Even in 2000, with Y2K resolved, legal research had already taken on sufficient electronic dimension to move many firms to make the IT department an umbrella to the library.

Many law firms still maintain library space, but much of the activity of librarians is computer-based. Larger firms even maintain online card catalogues integrated with access to a world catalogue of books from interlibrary loan collective, OCLC. (OCLC is thoroughly described at www.oclc.org.)

Law libraries have always been a mystery to the law firm, but in those early years of confusion, mergers, acquisitions and salespeople flogging the benefits of commercial systems like Lexis and Westlaw, it is easy to see that law librarians might become fearful that law libraries would disappear and their operation outsourced.

In reality, law firms have already outsourced their libraries by renting most of their resources from Lexis, Westlaw, Bloomberg and other services. They spend huge sums of money to use these systems as needed, rarely considering the duplication among them or the elements of the contracts they really use. Real ingenuity must be exercised to make sure that print materials are not a compulsory part of good research contracts and that research contracts complement, rather than duplicate, online services. Vendors have purchased massive content from publishing companies and must update it regularly. They work to make it as proprietary as possible, and their marketing strengths make them difficult to resist.

While the physical assets of the law library may be the focus of cost reduction for the IT group, it behooves the IT specialist to understand two essential facts. One is the dependence of contract value on the mix of resources itemized in that contract; the other is the rich resume of the librarian who is well-versed in searching and finding content. Storing and delivering information can use the IT hand. Most librarians today have a deep understanding of what is available via the Internet, commercial services and on the free Internet and can work with the IT department to take advantage of what is there to create a dynamic resource library.

Many IT managers now have librarians incorporated within their own departments. There are no substantive assets in the law library without them. They are independent and tenacious. There are few markets for law books, so all that remains is the unique asset called the law librarian. IT managers have a real opportunity to expand the services of the IT departments by expanding the responsibilities of well-qualified law librarians.

Creating a Path to Leverage

The path to leverage requires some analysis. IT leadership will want to get a handle on the workload by understanding the nature of the work. There are a number of ways to assess the use of resources by analyzing the use of online services. Librarians can help do this so there is no need to depend on the spin of online service vendors. But librarians are often ignored when their work is not understood.

Law librarians have various qualifications. Reference librarians are primarily content specialists. Most schooled librarians have Master's degrees. They may not perform financial analysis or crunch statistics, but they know what takes up time and can provide the details. In larger firms reference librarians often develop a subject specialty and work regularly with a particular practice group or lawyer. There is an obvious advantage from a customer service and marketing perspective to assigning a reference librarian to the busiest and most productive practice areas and providing a billing number to charge his or her time. There was never a better time to turn what once was a cost center into a profit center.

Reference librarians in law firms are quick studies who can easily master a subject area. Of all the personal traits most emblematic of the profession, responsibility is one that stands out. Assigning a librarian to a practice group or groups is like assigning an ambassador from the IT department. Since practice groups often include lawyers who prefer research over client contact, that person often has a library relationship and can best serve as a great liaison, working with the reference librarian to respond to the group's information needs from all available resources.

In the next installment, we will see how practice group assignments can create a marketing advantage for the IT department as well as the firm.