Legal tech is now firmly rooted in the legal landscape. Younger attorneys who are more fluent in technology may take to legal tech like fish to water. But older and tech-phobic attorneys may not be so lucky. If you’re job hunting, you may have noticed that a lot of the job requirements ask for a certain level of fluency in case-management or trial prep software.
But who’s responsible for staying current with legal tech? Can an attorney pass this responsibility along to a paralegal?
Who’s Responsible?
You already know the answer. If you’re the attorney, the buck stops with you. See ABA Rule 5.3. However, it’s important for clerks and paralegals to also be tech fluent.
Some have called the recent advancements in legal-tech the “paralegal replacement,” but we think that’s taking things a bit too far. The culture still expects a law clerk on the other end of the phone. This means that paralegals must be fluent in legal tech in order to just stay current, and attorneys must be financially prepared to cover any mistakes as a result of poor legal-tech application. It’s not the best position to be in, but those are the breaks.