LawCPD was the first company in Australia to deliver continuing professional development to lawyers online, on any device. At the time we launched, the only option lawyers had for completing their CPD was face-to-face events held during office hours in major cities.

This created significant challenges for lawyers working in regional and remote areas, and for lawyers who worked part-time. It also meant that lawyers had to sacrifice billable hours to complete their CPD, which isn’t ideal for any busy lawyer.

The co-founders of LawCPD are all passionate about using technology to improve access to education and training. With no ready-made solution available, we developed the entire ecosystem for delivering online CPD training to lawyers, making LawCPD a pioneer in both education technology and legal CPD delivery.

How has the company grown since its conception?

LawCPD started out providing interactive online CPD to lawyers in Western Australia, but quickly grew to deliver training to lawyers throughout Australia. Today, we deliver online CPD to thousands of lawyers Australia-wide and this number continues to grow each year.

We also currently offer the largest catalogue of interactive online CPD in Australia, and count over 50 leading experts in law as contributors.

We have also expanded our corporate offerings to help law firms manage their lawyers’ CPD compliance more easily. Firms of all sizes engage LawCPD to keep their lawyers CPD up to date through our interactive online courses and easy CPD tracking solution.

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What are the company’s key goals for the 2021 calendar?

Our goal for 2021 is to continue simplifying CPD compliance for lawyers, whilst offering the best learning experience.

We have just released a brand new learner dashboard to make it significantly easier for lawyers to track their CPD compliance, and will be rolling out more new features this year. We will also be modernising our course delivery platform, and exploring new ideas to improve the learning experience for lawyers.

How is LawCPD looking to revolutionise its offerings this year?

For us, the focus is more on continuous improvement than revolution. We are constantly working to improve our courses and the learning experience for lawyers. Every year we explore new ideas, collaborate with experts, and invest in technological change to achieve these goals.

What feedback has LawCPD received from courses this year?

We are already receiving very positive feedback on our new learner dashboard, and continue to receive fantastic feedback about the user-friendliness and flexibility of our website. Each year we also receive excellent feedback on the content of our online CPD courses.

Lawyers consistently comment on how informative, engaging and well presented our courses are, as well as how convenient they find it being able to learn online when it suits them.

Here is a selection of feedback we received from lawyers recently about their experience with LawCPD.

General feedback

“I have used the LawCPD many times now and it is always great value, really helpful, easily accessible and practical. I love the format.” (Glenn Atkinson, legal practitioner director) 

Course-specific feedback

● COVID-19, remote court hearings and automated decision-making

“The prospect of being quizzed at the end keeps one alert. The method used and the flexibility of attendance were new to me and very good.” (James Higgins, solicitor)

● Remote work for lawyers: Ethics and cyber risk

“I found the course material and videos very clear and helpful. This course has prompted me to reflect on my practice as a sole practitioner to ensure I am complying with my duties.” (Gemma Varley, sole practitioner)

What are the main areas lawyers are wanting to upskill themselves in this year? Why do you believe this is?

Lawyers are definitely focusing on developing their soft skills in 2021. We have found some of our most popular courses are those that focus on emotional intelligence, communication, conflict resolution and time management.

The popularity of these courses with lawyers seems to be driven by a desire to be more effective and valuable in their current roles – or more appealing to prospective employers so they can secure a new role.

We have also seen increased interest in courses on legal innovation, technology and remote work. These have been hot topics in the legal profession for some time, but the current crisis has accelerated the rate of change in these areas and has led to more lawyers actively learning about these topics.

How has the COVID-19 pandemic changed the way in which education providers need to go about their offerings?

The last year has been particularly challenging for the legal profession, with most lawyers experiencing significant levels of uncertainty and disruption due to COVID-19. CPD providers have needed to be responsive to the restrictions placed on seminars and in-person activities, and moved to offering more content online.

LawCPD has seen an increased number of lawyers switching to completing their CPD online in 2020, and expect this trend will continue in 2021. We have also received a greater volume of questions about how many points lawyers can claim completing different types of online CPD activities.

In response, we have focused on developing free resources to share information with lawyers about how many points they can claim, and how changes to their local CPD rules during COVID-19 impact their CPD obligations. We have been sharing these resources through our blog, emails and social media channels and have received a positive response from lawyers.

As an online-first provider, we have always been ideally set up to support lawyers completing their CPD online. However, we have found we needed to scale up our support services significantly in the final weeks of March as it seems the pressures of the pandemic are pushing more lawyers to complete their CPD at the last-minute.

Since you’ve been in the market, what changes have you seen with respect to how lawyers like to complete their CPD points? 

When we launched in 2008, the only available option for lawyers was to complete their CPD by attending face-to-face events like seminars and conferences.

The first cohort of lawyers who chose to complete their CPD online with LawCPD was motivated to find an alternative to these in-person events – mainly due to their location or work situation. But as the years have progressed, we have found an increasing number of lawyers are now choosing to complete their CPD online because of the added flexibility it offers.

We have also seen a significant increase in the number of CPD providers with online offerings – particularly in the past year due to the need to respond to COVID-19 restrictions.

Most of these are live webinars that require lawyers to be in front of their computer for a particular period of time, or audiovisual recordings that lawyers can usually only claim limited CPD points for watching.

We find lawyers continue to choose our courses because they are both interactive and available on demand – which means lawyers can claim unlimited CPD points and complete the courses when and where it suits them. The feedback we receive from lawyers shows this is a key reason they come back year after year.

What are the primary benefits lawyers have by partnering with LawCPD?

Lawyers are constantly under pressure to deliver for clients, but also need to keep up to date with the latest developments in the law. LawCPD’s online courses enable them to learn from the leading experts in law in an engaging and flexible format, which maximises knowledge acquisition and learning outcomes.

What words of advice do you have for lawyers yet to complete their points this year?

If you have left your CPD to the last-minute this year, know you are not alone as it’s been a very pressuring year for most lawyers!

The first thing you can do is to check whether you still need CPD points in the mandatory areas – ethics, skills, practice management and substantive law. Next, you need to choose a CPD option that will mean you can earn all the remaining points you need. This means making sure the CPD activities you select are recognised in your state or territory, and that you can realistically fit them in around your other commitments.

One of the main reasons so many lawyers choose LawCPD is that they can earn unlimited CPD points by completing the interactive online courses, and they can do these anytime that suits them to fit their schedule. We also offer One-Click CPD Compliance Packs, which cover all the mandatory CPD areas and are tailored to suit a range of different practice areas.