Two more data points in the legal news recently (Canadian Lawyer, to be precise) to support the idea that we’re going about this “articling” thing all wrong.

• Former Law Society of Ontario governor Peter Wardle criticized the articling system for failing to ensure sufficient, consistent, high-quality experiential training, as well as the law society for again failing to tackle these problems effectively.
• The Law Society of Alberta is recruiting law firms to join a new program to place articling students who were driven out of their previous firms by discrimination or harassment, a program that’s straining under increased

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In legal as in all service-based industries, client feedback can be a powerful tool that shapes a firm’s reputation and play a significant role in the firm’s success. We often look at feedback solely from a client perspective and how we can improve that client’s experience; we may be missing out on trends that our clients share. When we look at feedback at a macro level, there is information we can take away for prospects, management, competition, and clients.

For prospects:

Client feedback reflects a law firm’s general performance. Positive testimonials and reviews contribute significantly to building credibility, and potential . . . [more]

The Hague Convention on the Abolition of All Forms of Legalization (known as the Apostille Convention) is now in force in Canada. Here is a link to the text of the Convention.

The practical result is that to use Canadian public documents (including confirmation of notarial status and signatures) in about 120 foreign countries, one will not have to go through the two-step process of getting the document authenticated by the province (and/or the federal government) and then ‘legalized’ by the consulate (or embassy) of the country of destination. Here is a list of the countries that are parties . . . [more]

Many people in the legal sector are working toward making the legal profession, and society as a whole, more equitable, which has led to calls to increase diversity in the legal profession. Employers and educators have tried to achieve more impartiality by integrating quantitative metrics, such as LSAT scores, grades, and litigation statistics, into their selection processes. This is better than selecting candidates based primarily on criteria like family legacy, but these processes still aren’t perfect. The selection of athletes a a good comparison. Elite athletes are a group of people with well-defined and generally available statistics going back to . . . [more]

There are a number of resources that provide the text of international arbitration cases. If you do not have access to any of the paid resources, free resources include:

• United Nations Commission On International Trade Law (UNCITRAL) CLOUT database. This was established “​​to collect and disseminate information on court decisions and arbitral awards relating to UNCITRAL texts”. Each case in CLOUT includes a short summary.
• Unilex. This is a “database of international case law and bibliography on the UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts and on the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods

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“Cash rules everything around me, C.R.E.A.M. Get the money. Dollar, dollar bill, y’all” – Wu-Tang Clan

While it gets skewed on tv, mediation involves the mediator having no interest in any particular outcome of a dispute. That scene in Friends where Ross “mediates” a quarrel between Monica and Chandler to keep them on track to move in together so that he can live with Rachel isn’t true mediation. A mediator would have nothing to gain whether Monica and Chandler live together or not. In real life, sometimes someone with a specific outcome interest takes on what may present as a . . . [more]

More than a year after the public release of ChatGPT, excitement continues to build about the use of generative AI in the delivery of legal services. Notes of caution persist, too, as examples of lawyers using AI badly continue to trickle out (see, e.g. here and here). Although the full impacts of generative AI on the work of lawyers are yet to be seen, there is clearly an immediate need to discuss the responsible and ethical use of AI by legal professionals. Canadian lawyers have a general duty of technological competence. In previous Slaw columns, I’ve discussed two ways . . . [more]

Alex said with a sigh, “January is like Groundhog Day with billable hours reset to zero, and it all starts over.” This wasn’t the first time I had heard this said. For many lawyers, the New Year comes with a sense of fatigue as the billable hour cycle starts anew. They have a point. The billing cycle is starting again, and the starting point is zero. And yet, how we think about the world defines our experience. If you are interested in coaching yourself through this malaise, read on. Start with a reframe. “The billable hours may reset, but your . . . [more]

Receiving notice from a regulator that there has been a professional conduct complaint against you can be overwhelming and stressful. Many lawyers’ minds jump to the worst-case scenario: Am I going to lose my licence? Fortunately, this is a rare outcome. But lesser penalties or remedial consequences can still affect your career, and even if the complaint is dismissed the process can be lengthy and challenging. Most conduct complaints are resolved without proceeding to discipline at all.[1] This is the goal upon receiving a complaint, and it is often attainable. Your response—or lack thereof—plays an important role in determining . . . [more]

Some recent court decisions have focused more attention on double patenting in Canada. Double patenting occurs when someone obtains two patents for the same (“co-terminus”) or similar (“obvious-type”) inventions. If challenged, granted patent claims can be found invalid if they are found to be double patenting over another patent owned by the applicant.

The Supreme Court of Canada has cautioned that, “If a subsequent patent issues with identical claims, there is an improper extension of the monopoly.” Many of the decisions on double patenting, including this statement from the Supreme Court arise from disputes over “old Act” patents where the . . . [more]

My Dad, who passed away in 2006, had a collection of favorite sayings. At one point we packaged them up and listed the top 10 ala David Letterman. At the top of the list was the phrase “listen you might learn something”. Over the years I have begun to understand more deeply the wisdom of his words. Listening well is a key competency for being a good human. It is especially important for those in leadership and in the conflict management disciplines, such as law, mediation, arbitration. There are probably thousands of books and articles written on what effective listening . . . [more]

Dear Tri-Agency, I was delighted to see your announcement last summer that the Tri-Agency, representing Canada’s major research funders (CHIR, NSERC, SSHRC), have decided to review your Open Access Policy on Publications. Your continuing efforts to increase the public’s ability to consult research and scholarship through this policy are admirable. Having seen your invitation for public input on the review process, I wanted to make a small contribution, as a professor of education who started a Public Knowledge Project 25 years ago to support public access to research, and as a school teacher before that . . . [more]