Thanks for sharing the West white paper. As a former law librarian,
former lawyer, former legal research and writing professor, and current
Internet trainer, I was extremely interested to see the authors' of the
West paper's take on training associates in online and print research.
While not completely surprised, it's concerning to me that the white
paper does not include the terms "internet" or "fact finding" or
"investigative research."
The white paper focused exclusively on "legal research." While legal
research is obviously important, it's only a part of the research we
conduct in the practice of law. Fact finding/investigative research is
just as important to an attorney's success as legal research, and I find
it distressing that it is ignored in the white paper. Since fact
finding/investigative research is overlooked in most law school
educations it certainly needs to be addressed at the law firms--not just
for new associates who are unfamiliar with the particular resources
available, but for older associates and partners who did not grow up
with the Internet.
With so many fact finding/investigative print resources now online free
on the Internet (especially public library databases that are accessible
free remotely--such as RefUSA, Gale Business Resource Center, etc.),
it's useful to offer fact finding/investigative research training to
lawyers and also to other law firm staff--such as staff in the billing,
conflicts, recruiting, and HR departments.
I wonder how many law firm librarians conduct hands-on training for both
lawyers and non-lawyers on using the Internet for fact
finding/investigative research?
This summer, I have been asked to provide seminars to 30 law firms about
using the Internet for risk management--primarily, conducting fact
finding/investigative Internet research as part of the client in-take
process (my seminars included attorneys and members from the departments
noted above, and sometimes librarians if the firm has library staff).
The feedback from firms that have offered the training has been
overwhelmingly positive. If you aren't already offering this type of
training, you might consider creating such a training program at your
firm. The seminars also touched on using the Internet for client
development and assessing potential hires, business partners, etc.
This is just my two cents on the importance of fact
finding/investigative research and free Internet resources based on my
experience in law firms, and the questions I get in live seminars.
There's so much useful information available on the Internet -- some of
which is not available at any pay database or print resource (e.g.
finding Google Groups discussion emails or info on people's
Facebook/Myspace profiles) -- attorneys can't overlook it for much
longer.
-- Best Regards, Carole Carole Levitt J.D., M.L.S. clevitt@netforlawyers.com President, Internet For Lawyers(http://www.netforlawyers.com) P.O. Box 1065, Culver City, CA 90232 phone: 310/559-2247 SEMINAR SPEAKER: http://www.livecleseminars.com/ AUTHOR: The Lawyer's Guide to Fact Finding on the Internet, ABA 2006 (http://www.internetfactfinder.com) AUTHOR: The Cybersleuth's Guide to the Internet: Conducting Effective Investigative & Legal Research on the Web, IFL Press 2006 (http://www.netforlawyers.com/prod01.htm) Past Chair: California State Bar LPMT Section (http://www.calbar.ca.gov/lpmt) -----Original Message----- From: owner-law-lib@ucdavis.edu [mailto:owner-law-lib@ucdavis.edu] On Behalf Of SKemen@KMKLAW.com Sent: Thursday, August 02, 2007 11:27 AM To: law-lib@ucdavis.edu Subject: Training New Associates -Response SummaryI was asked by several people to summarize the responses I received to the question of how (or if) new associates were trained to use print resources. The majority of responses, indicated that the general practice is to give a library tour and point out important parts of the collection to new associates. Training on print resources is generally only done on an as needed basis. However several librarians have teamed up with their Westlaw representatives to train new associates on how to do research using both print and electronic resources. Only one librarian that responded actively included a segment on how to use print resources in training new associates. I also received a very helpful whitepaper from Monice Kaczorowski, which I have attached below.
We are still deciding how to handle training new associates on print resources at our firm. However, the plan that we have come up with so far is to contact our Westlaw representative and see what exactly they can provide in terms of training on print resources. In addition, we are also considering creating check lists for how to use various print resources available in our library and posting them to the library intranet page. Thanks so much to everyone who responded, it was really a great help! Shannon ***************************************************** Shannon L. Kemen Keating Muething & Klekamp PLL One East Fourth Street Suite 1400 Cincinnati, OH 45202 Tel: 513-639-3901 Fax: 513-579-6457 Internet Address: skemen@kmklaw.com Website: www.kmklaw.com --- CONFIDENTIALITY STATEMENT --- This e-mail transmission contains information that is intended to be privileged and confidential. It is in- tended only for the addressee named above. If you re- ceive this e-mail in error, please do not read, copy or disseminate it in any manner. If you are not the intended recipient, any disclosure, copying, distri- bution or use of the contents of this information is prohibited. Please reply to the message immediately by informing the sender that the message was misdirected. After replying, please erase it from your computer system. Your assistance in correcting this error is appreciated. ******************************************************
--
Best Regards,
Carole
Carole Levitt J.D., M.L.S.
President, Internet For Lawyers(http://www.netforlawyers.com <http://www.netforlawyers.com/> )
P.O. Box 1065, Culver City, CA 90232
phone: 310/559-2247
SEMINAR SPEAKER: http://www.livecleseminars.com/
AUTHOR: The Lawyer's Guide to Fact Finding on the Internet, ABA 2006
(http://www.internetfactfinder.com <http://www.internetfactfinder.com/> )
AUTHOR: The Cybersleuth's Guide to the Internet: Conducting Effective Investigative & Legal Research on the Web, IFL Press 2006
(http://www.netforlawyers.com/prod01.htm)
Past Chair: California State Bar LPMT Section
(http://www.calbar.ca.gov/lpmt)
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Wed Nov 14 2007 - 20:47:00 PST