At the start of the new year, many people take time to reflect and consider how they can improve both personally and professionally in the coming year. Answers vary for each person, but typical responses include getting organized, prioritizing health and spending time on things that really matter.
What would your organization say?
For legal professionals, managing time, staying organized and spending hours on the most valuable tasks are undoubtedly still priorities in 2022. One key solution stands out as a way for legal professionals to accomplish these important goals: online calendar tools.
Online calendar tools are embedded within legal case management software to help professionals better organize tasks, appointments and goals in a visually simplistic way. If done properly, this can streamline the activities of the entire organization. Lawyer calendar software allow users to access, edit and share electronic agendas with team members, as well as other legal professionals outside the organization through integrations with Microsoft Outlook and Google.
How to Better Manage Your Calendar with Case Management Software
The life of a legal professional is filled with tracking time, resources, tasks and events on a daily basis. Since these are necessary parts of the job, why not look for a way to make these repetitive tasks simpler and easier? Digital calendar tools within your legal case or matter management software empower you to:
- Ensure calendars are always up to date with instant notifications to the entire team.
As a case changes, you can easily make updates in the calendar, which will instantly reflect on all other calendars involved with the case. No more individually calling or emailing each person involved in the case—automatic calendar updates ensure all parties are informed of the latest case happenings while increasing team efficiency. This is a huge win for legal professionals who want to spend more time closing cases and less time dealing with repetitive tasks.
- Obtain a broad view of calendar events from multiple perspectives.
As a manager, it’s important to secure a broad view of what is happening in your organization to better plan events, meetings and resources. Using the calendar tool within your case management system enables you to see the same calendar events from multiple perspectives:
- a single user
- by team
- by department or practice area
- by type of event
- by matter
- organization wide
With this flexibility, you can more easily manage your workload and resources by gaining instant access to what’s happening across the entire organization.
- Integrate with your most-used external systems.
You can easily integrate the calendar tools your team already uses (such as Microsoft Outlook or Google Calendar) with your case management software. The case management system keeps track of all important events, ticklers (a notification system that serves as a reminder for what you must do each day) and deadlines by combining calendars, Workflow Wizards and Wizard Triggers. Using Outlook or Google, you can enter events from either system and save them directly to the case or file in the legal case management software.
- Gain 24/7 access to calendars from any device, anytime.
Gone are the days of manual-entry paper and spreadsheets for keeping track of important dates. Busy legal professionals now always need access to their calendars with on-demand, cloud-based digital calendar functionality. This streamlined way to work allows you to see everything you (or your team) have going on in a visually appealing way to plan your days better and accomplish more. With the versatility, accessibility and reliability of these online calendar tools, you can meet all your important deadlines and achieve your goals with ease.
- Utilize Workflow Wizards to better manage your calendar workflow.
Through Workflow Wizards you can set up rules, allowing you to automatically generate calendar items and deadlines when a particular event, such as a deposition or hearing, takes place. For example, when a deposition is set, the rule may automatically generate the following events on your calendar:
- Send deposition notice
- Serve subpoena
- Prepare deposition outline
- Notify court reporter
- Confirm appearance with involved parties
By establishing the rules once, you save time and simply enter the deposition. From there, the system automatically takes care of the rest of the process by creating the appropriate calendar events, deadlines and tasks. Just set the rules once and trust the technology to take care of the rest.
Calendar Features to Look for in Your Case Management System
A few of the features to look for when it comes to online calendar functionality for legal professionals include:
- Visually appealing display for calendars
- Easy-to-use, flexible software interface
- Ability to integrate with third-party software through bi-directional syncing
- 24/7 access to calendar and ability to enter events from your device
- Real-time editing across all calendar views
- Automatic notification of duplicate entries or scheduling conflicts
Managing deadlines, including statutes of limitation, filing deadlines and discovery dates, is an inescapable part of the legal profession. By taking advantage of calendaring tools, you can ease the pain of tracking and meeting deadlines while taking productivity to new levels.
Managing Your Calendar Has Never Been Easier or More Productive
Who knew better calendar use could help you achieve your 2022 goals? Using technology tools that make managing deadline dates, events and tasks easier, effective calendaring is now possible through case and legal matter management software. With a visually appealing interface and 24/7 access to your calendar on your device, you can better plan your resources, track time and execute deadlines like never before.
Legal Files calendar tools give you the ability to work more collaboratively with colleagues, clients and co-counsels in one legal calendar. Plus, with more than 30 years of experience supporting organizations across a number of industries, Legal Files gives professionals intuitive contract reminder software that can grow with your organization—no matter your size or area of focus.
“We were using a system for our juvenile delinquency practice, but its calendar was clunky. There wasn’t an easy way to view a master calendar or calendars by case type. We appreciate that Legal Files gives us multiple ways to view the same event, whether it’s by user, team, group, case, etc. Plus, the old system didn’t synchronize with Outlook, so we had to re-enter events on our personal Outlook calendars and check two systems. Legal Files’ seamless integration with Outlook is awesome.”
Kari K. Fahrenbach, Senior Assistant County Attorney
The County Attorney’s Office of Jefferson County (New York), a Legal Files Customer
Request a demo to learn more about how we help organizations like yours manage what matters to you most.