Law Technology News reports that the general counsel of KIA, D. Casey Flaherty, has a "tech audit" test for firms competing for KIA's corporate work. The firms are invited to send a top associate of their choice to take it. Nine BigLaw firms have taken the test; all have flunked. The audit tests proficiency in using basic, generic business tech tools such as Microsoft Word and Excel for simple tasks. Casey reasons that if a lawyer takes 50 minutes to accomplish a task that someone skilled in Excel can do in 5 minutes, that's 45 minutes of billed time that KIA shouldn't have to pay. At this point he's settling for taking 5% percent off every bill a firm submits until it passes the test. But he's clearly on a mission beyond that -- in a keynote address at a West Coast tech conference Casey told his audience that he has just partnered with a training firm to automate his audit and make it available for free to general counsel.
HT: ABA Journal
