When I give presentations on lawyers’ ethical duty to be competent in technology, audience members often come up to me afterwards and ask something to the effect of, “Ok, I get it, but how do I become competent in technology?”
Preparing for another such talk this week, I thought I’d put the question to Twitter, asking others what their number one piece of advice would be for a lawyer wanting to become more competent in technology.
The more than 100 responses were so good that I decided to collect them here and share them with others who did not follow the thread. They range from “play World of Warcraft” to “learn the basics.”
So here goes.
If a luddite lawyer were to ask you, “How do I get competent in technology,” what would be your #1 piece of advice?
— Bob Ambrogi (@bobambrogi) November 10, 2019
Have a “beginner’s mind” and just get started. Nothing beats being curious.
— Community.lawyer (@LawyerCommunity) November 10, 2019
I have to second @LawyerCommunity suggestion. Find a pain point, get curious about options for that pain and try (more than once) the solutions.
— Lori Gonzalez (@RayNaCorp) November 10, 2019
This. Provide yourself with an opportunity to interact with technology you’re unfamiliar with, poke at it, break it etc.
Can’t learn this from a PowerPoint slide, gotta do it.
— Cath (@drowsygeek) November 11, 2019
Take one thing in your current practice that is broken. Fix it. Lather, rinse and repeat.
— drakowski (@drakowski) November 10, 2019
Build something on your own using a no code/low code tool (eg QnAmarkup or community lawyer)
— Gabriel Teninbaum (@GTeninbaum) November 10, 2019
What do you envision as the highest value/best use of
