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Innovation in family law: Where should small firms start?

All law firms should be on the lookout for new ways to improve their clients’ experience of the law, writes Talya Faigenbaum.

user iconTalya Faigenbaum • 27 August 2020 • SME Law
Talya Faigenbaum
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For family lawyers, the need for innovation is particularly pressing. We’ve all heard about the broken family law system: its endemic antagonism, the lengthy delays, the price gouging and exorbitant costs to pursue just outcomes for families. There is much about the system that we can’t change, that we need our legislators and decision-makers to own up to and invest in critical infrastructure and resources. 

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But as lawyers, we can critically analyse our role in the system and think about what we can do to improve our client’s confidence in the family law system.

From 10 years of listening to family law clients’ gripes about the system, I believe that the best examples of innovation in family law to address those concerns come from:

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  1.       Emphasising alternate dispute models and techniques to resolve conflict
  2.       Offering fixed fee pricing structures and unbundled services (to allow cost certainty)
  3.       Using technology to minimise inefficiencies and reduce costs to clients
A lot has been written about how firms can move forward with the first two of these. But how should a firm decide whether to adopt a new technology?

Firstly, shiny new technologies should never be adopted for their own sake, but only when a law firm considers it will actually improve their clients’ experience of the legal system. 

Unlike BigLaw business structures, boutique firms can more quickly adapt to accommodate changing client needs and environmental demands. But because cash flow can be leaner than bigger firms, boutiques need to ensure that the technology they select yields strong returns and is seen by clients as adding value, not just cost, to their end bill.

In family law this couldn’t be more important, where costs and complexity can both escalate to leave clients disgruntled and unhappy with their outcomes. Family lawyers can also become frustrated with the monotony of data input and the tedium of financial discovery.

At our firm, when we look at integrating any new solution into our practice, we ask the following questions:

  1.   Will this product make it easier for clients to engage us?
  2.   Will this product delight and make the process easier for our clients once they have engaged us?
  3.   Will this product only work for some clients? For example, busy professionals might appreciate an artificially intelligent webform to provide initial instructions but an elderly client may not. Further, a system that requires clients to have knowledge of their financial affairs won’t work if they don’t.
  4.   Will this product empower our lawyers? 
  5.   Could we create the experience offered by this technology without paying for this technology? 
  6.   If the answer to Q4 is yes, what would this cost compared to the cost of this technology? Include both the financial outlay and the time it would take you to create your own version.
  7.   How long will it take to be up and running with this technology?
  8.   What do all members of the team think of it? A lawyer who works with vulnerable clients will have different concerns to the legal assistant who will be the first port of call for questions about how it works.
  9.   Is there an easy way to trial it? From my experience, testing a tool with actual clients and staff members other than the person spearheading the innovation is far more valuable than a mere demonstration by the product’s sales team to an already technologically savvy lawyer.
  10.   How does it fit with our existing processes? Bonus points if it integrates with the technology that is already being used to prevent double handling of information.
If any Australian family lawyers are using their time in lockdown to experiment with how they offer their services, there has been a recent flurry of excellent technological innovations in the Australian family law space. 

I encourage all lawyers who are thinking about experimenting with any such developments to take a curious but critical approach. Ask the right questions. Have no expectations about the answers. And always come back to asking: does this new shiny technology actually improve my clients and my team’s experience of family law?

Talya Faigenbaum is a senior family lawyer at Nest Legal.

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