Voice recognition software can create a tidal wave of savings for law firms

Voice recognition software (VRS) is extremely efficient and can save a tremendous amount of personnel costs, as lawyers will no longer be dependent on secretarial services to produce a document. This is, after all, just simple dictation.

For many of us who were accustomed to using products like dictaphones in the past, this is basically the same kind of thing, although instead of either yourself or your secretary having to type in the document, you are instead left, after dictation, with a draft that can then be edited without having to do the initial input in the more traditional manner.

One firm I know of has reduced its number of secretarial jobs by 30 per cent (out of a total of about 100 secretaries in the firm) by paying lawyers to learn and use VRS software. That's a tidal wave of savings for a law firm and, generally, goes straight to the bottom line.

The point, however, is not to eliminate secretarial jobs necessarily, but rather to maximise the productive time of the firm's lawyers and staff. By increasing their efficiency and effectiveness, the entire process of matter management can be improved. At the end of the day, the economic savings may just be the icing ?on the cake.

Evolution of VRS

VRS was first developed by Dr James Baker in 1975 and the first product was released in 1982 by him and Dr Janet Baker to assist the disabled. Almost immediately, the many other types of applications became known to anyone who was familiar with the software and its tremendous potential.

VRS has received a huge boost with the introduction of Siri on the iPhone platform. For a lot of users, this was the first time that the opportunity to use VRS was made available or where the opportunity presented itself.

Today, VRS is everywhere. Windows 7 Professional Edition has VRS built into the program - you can simply turn it on and off with the click of a mouse. It may not be as effective as other alternatives, but it works reasonably well.

Google's search bar also has a ?voice recognition opportunity built into it ?so that when you go to 'search', there is ?a small microphone icon in the search ?bar that, when you click on it, you're ?given the opportunity to verbalise your search request.

There is also off-the-shelf software like Dragon NaturallySpeaking, IBM ViaVoice and iListen that can rapidly convert your voice to text.

It confounds me to see people texting when they could simply be speaking into their devices to send emails and messages. But, there are certainly times when silence, privacy or confidentiality is required.

VRS for lawyers

VRS software does of course have its limitations. It cannot transcribe a meeting, for example, and it has a 'one on one' (one individual dictating at a time) limitation. But, it has multiple strengths, such as ?the following.?

• It is ideal for dictation in a car or other location away from the office. Newer versions of VRS allow a user to dictate on a mobile device via dedicated equipment, as well as to use an iPhone or a remote microphone app for Android, and then transfer the dictation to a desktop or laptop. In fact, it is a major selling point of the new software.

• Training capability is part of the product - you can spend as much or as little time as you wish on customising the program. The more it is used and the more it 'learns' your particular style of speech (speech patterns and/or accents), the more effective it can be.

• There are versions of software that have been especially developed for the legal community. Words such as 'replevy', 'inter alia' or other fairly esoteric Latin or legal phrases are already part of their vocabulary. ?

Tom Berman has been advising law ?firms on practice management and professional liability issues for over 20 years (www.bermanassociates.net)