We recently published a blog post explaining three of the most commonly misunderstood buzzwords in the legal tech sector. It went over so well that we decided to write a follow-up. Who knows? With all of the jargon we use in the legal tech sector, this could turn out to be an entire library of blog posts explaining just what we are talking about.

Our previous post discussed big data, artificial intelligence, and blockchain. All three are technologies now being used to power legal case management software applications. We incorporate some of that technology into NuLaw as well. For the record, NuLaw is built on the popular Salesforce CRM application.

With the introduction out of the way, let us get to those three additional buzzwords. Without further ado:

1. Mobility

Anyone who has grown up on technology understands mobility to be nothing more than having access to the internet with the mobile device. Your kids might understand mobility as streaming videos with their smartphones. You might understand it as being able to do things like make dinner reservations while you are standing at the curb waiting for your ride share to arrive.

Mobility in legal tech is similar in principle. However, it is more involved in practice. Mobility gives everyone in the law firm access to data and applications without regard for device or location. For example, mobility gives attorneys full access to their apps and data whether they are in the office or at the courthouse. A law firm’s accounting partners have 24/7 access to financial information.

This is accomplished by moving legal case management into the cloud. The cloud is the perfect environment for mobility because it is device and operating system agnostic. A good cloud app is accessible via any device capable of logging on to the internet and running a browser.

2. Agility

The term ‘agility’ is rather interesting when you look at its evolution. Physical agility is the ability to respond quickly to changing conditions. Software developers adopted the term more than 20 years ago to define a new development model that allowed developers to respond more quickly to customer demands. Today, agile software development is viewed as being more responsive. It is also faster than the old way of doing things.

In law, agility is a combination of the other two meanings. We define it in legal tech as the ability to quickly adapt to changing conditions without disrupting productivity or straining resources. One of our tasks as a company specializing in developing case management software is to build agility into NuLaw. Our software has to be able to adapt to the changing needs of the modern law firm.

3. Collaboration

Collaboration is normally seen as multiple people working together to achieve a common goal. In business, that takes on plenty of forms. Multiple departments within a given company collaborate on a single project. Likewise, multiple companies can collaborate on larger projects. We define collaboration a bit differently in legal tech.

Your typical law firm consists of several different departments with distinct goals and purposes. They do cooperate to a certain extent in order to make the practice run. But the real value of collaboration is allowing every member of every department to have a clear understanding of what is going on in a particular case. We designed NuLaw to encourage that kind of collaboration.

Between this post and the one that preceded it, you hopefully have a better understanding of six key buzzwords we often use in a legal tech industry. Now, if we could only learn what you attorneys are talking about.