Issue link: https://epubs.iltanet.org/i/30285
WHITHER TIME ENTRY? (OF DINOSAURS AND BUGGY WHIPS) always be the best mechanism for “Time spent will understanding a firm’s costs” PUSHBACK: IT’S JUST GROWING PAINS Who are the time-capture naysayers and what are they saying? From lawyers, we typically hear objections along a few standard lines. The first is predictably cultural and relates to the aforementioned Big Brother assertion and concerns about becoming a “cog in a wheel” or an assembly-line worker. Again, the response to this is that the industry is moving in the direction of matter, project and cost management. The trend is real; time-capture is already being used by a large community of lawyers who have discovered these concerns were unfounded. If anything, as lifestyle and work style changes occur, they have found that automated time capture supports working smarter and doing more with less effort. Time-capture can provide a better understanding of time spent on non-billable activities, both desirable and non-desirable. Finally, it can provide greater transparency to the firms’ efforts on behalf of its clients, a window on their commitment to demonstrable efforts to increase efficiency on behalf of the client, and a vehicle for more frank discussions around distribution of work. At long last and long overdue, the creative writing of time entry is morphing into the science of time management. Another concern sometimes raised by firm management is the delicacy of the data. What about its discoverability in a malpractice suit? This is a trickier question to address because it is rooted in real liability concerns. Today, firms address this concern by typically holding on to the detailed data for only one billing cycle. This works, but the short-term destruction of such valuable information creates a missed long-term www.iltanet.org Financial Management 17