Articling Student Season – Summer 2007

This is Week Two for our firm’s 2007-8 Articling Students. Week One consisted of full-time training and orientation sessions. Week Two consists of part-time training and orientation, together with “free time” to take on lawyer assignments. My role was to deliver a one and a half hour session on law firm knowledge management/how to use precedents.

As usual, I find myself wondering if there is a better way to deliver so much content in such a short time. A few weeks ago, a speaker at a program on Office 2007 (not a program one can expect to see in large law firms for at least a year – but that’s another story) noted how often someone will say “you didn’t cover that in training”. Her point was that if a student doesn’t remember what you trained, you might as well not have bothered with the training.

In a large class, of couse, it is likely that a few students will remember what they are shown. The challenge remains – to figure out how to increase the effectiveness of training. In-house training in law firms appears to be a hot topic, based on the number of vendors trying to sell us their services – consulting, elearning, course management. My impression remains – there is still an issue, as there was last year and the year before and the year before that.

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