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Reid Trautz of Reid My Blog [LexBlog Q & A]

By Rob La Gatta
March 6, 2008

As previously mentioned, we’ll be helping ring in next week’s ABA TechShow with special LexBlog Q & As that feature panelists from the event. Yesterday we featured David Bilinsky; today in the hot seat is Reid Trautz, a legal consultant who serves as chair of the LPM Publishing Board and writes the law blog Reid My Blog.

Reid has a full schedule at TechShow, where he’ll be speaking on three panels:

  • “Technology for the Paperless Mobile Lawyer”, with Bruce Olson (3/13, 4:15-5:15 p.m.)
  • “Securing Your Clients’ Data While On The Road”, with Dave Ries (3/15, 9:45-10:45 a.m.)
  • “60 Sites in 60 Minutes”, with Craig Ball and Tom Mighell (3/15, 4:15-5:15 p.m.)

To learn more on Reid’s blog and TechShow panels, see our interview after the jump.

1. Rob La Gatta: How helpful has Reid My Blog been in building your reputation as a legal consultant? Has it had any substantial impact?

Reid Trautz: It has certainly widened the impact that I have, and I find that it’s best for confirming who I am and what I do as a professional: the blog gets a higher return in Google searches and Yahoo searches, so it’s what people turn to. And because of the blog posts and diversity of topics, people can get a real sense of what I do. It’s been effective, but mostly from the standpoint that it confirms a personal referral that someone else has given.

2. Rob La Gatta: Will you describe a little bit about what you’ll be speaking on at TechShow?

Reid Trautz: I’ll be speaking in three sessions this year:

  • One on mobile security, meaning: how do we protect our confidential client data and other information while we’re taking it out of the office?
  • I’ll be speaking on going mobile & having a mobile paperless office: when I’m working out of the four walls of my office, can I work as effectively in just a digital mode? What are the tools that I can use so I don’t need paper?
  • The third session is “60 Websites in 60 Minutes,” which is always great fun (but also has a lot of value, in that it highlights new and different websites that provide services and information for lawyers that will help them in their practice). I’ll be doing that with Tom Mighell and Craig Ball, and we’ve got a real good lineup of 60 sites that are both useful and productive…and some that are just plain funny.

3. Rob La Gatta: Obviously the main focus of TechShow is the application of technology in lawyers’ lives. Can you be a successful lawyer while neglecting new technology?

Reid Trautz: Well, no. I think that the demands or preferences of our staff – who can’t always come to that same office everyday – or the clients that want to have information back to them as quickly as possible are really pushing us to look at the new technology and to adopt [it].

There are some lawyers who really like to do that, and I applaud them; but there are others who are a little reluctant…and they’ve got to understand that these outside pressures are going to push us to adopt new technologies. Many of them can make us more productive and more efficient, and can make our firm more profitable.

While we take advantage of the technology, we also have to remember that there are some risks – especially given our requirements for confidentiality – [that require us] to make sure our systems are maintained, so that we don’t have confidentiality breaches.

4. Rob La Gatta: It’s funny – you see some lawyers who embrace these new forms of communication…but at the same time you see a lot of large firms or state bars that, when it comes to things like blogs, are very hesitant towards (or downright opposed to) embracing them. Do you expect this to change in the future?

Reid Trautz: Yes. I think that there is a misunderstanding on the part of ethics authorities in some jurisdictions who really don’t understand how the marketplace is shifting, both in how clients find/hire lawyers and how consumerism continues to change the way law is practiced.

We need people to look at not only what we have today, but what’s evolving and what’s changing into the future, and to make sure that our ethics rules are meeting those needs – both of the profession and of the clients we serve. And I do see that changing. I see some states coming out with advertising rules that are arcane. They don’t really understand the marketplace, and when those [rules] are given the light of day, bars need to look at how clients find lawyers. And that’s online: through websites, through blogs, that’s through asking friends via e-mail to send a hyperlink.

That’s where it’s going. they’re not going to the yellow pages anymore.

5. Rob La Gatta: Ultimately, what do you hope to gain from attending TechShow? Is there anything you want to come away with – knowledge? Personal connections? Something else?

Reid Trautz: I hope to come away with both new knowledge and new personal connections. This I think is my ninth year at TechShow, and I always learn something new.

Interested in hearing more? Recent LexBlog Q & A posts:

Or, see our full list of legal blog interviews.

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