Seeing the Forest Through Decision Trees

Episode Notes

Transcript

Dennis Kennedy:  Before we get started, we’d like to thank our sponsors, Embroker, Cleo and Posh Virtual Receptionist’s.

[Music]

Intro:  Intro:  Got the world turning as fast as it can, hear how technology can help legally speaking with two of the top legal technology experts, authors and lawyers, Dennis Kennedy and Tom Mighell. Welcome to the Kennedy-Mile Report here on the Legal Talk Network.

Dennis Kennedy:  And welcome to episode 312 of the Kennedy-Mighell Report, I’m Dennis Kennedy in Ann Arbor.

Tom Mighell:  I’m Tom Mighell in Dallas.

Dennis Kennedy:  In our last episode, we revisited our Second Brain Projects and shared our progress, learnings and challenges as we near the publication of the new work from home edition of our collaboration tools and technologies book. In this episode, we wanted to turn to a foundational technology topic decision trees and decision tree tools. Tom, what’s on our agenda for this episode?  

Tom Mighell:  Well, Dennis in this edition of the Kennedy-Mighell Report, we will indeed be hiking into the forest of decision trees to see how long this metaphor holds up and showing how valuable they can be. In the second segment, we are going to return to our hot or not segment and reconsider– is it really reconsidering the Apple Watch?  We’ll talk about that in a minute. And as usual, we’ll finish up with our parting shots that one tip website or observation you can start to use the second that this podcast is over. 

But first up decision trees, a fundamental technology building block, as Dennis mentioned. To some extent, we have covered decision trees, the technology used to create them in many of our podcasts although probably, not in those terms. So, we thought we’d take a step back and talk about the fundamentals of decision trees and how to think about using them and then maybe kind of what the what the future is looking like for decision trees. So, Dennis, let’s start out with a basic question. What do we mean when we say decision trees? 

Dennis Kennedy:  And I think you’re right, Tom. We want to go really simple here, and so although we’ll kind of show you — or at least talk about some applications, some of the things we’ve been doing. This is meant to be really basic and in a certain sense, these are almost like pen and pencil technology tools to help you get going. But I like to think within terms of two words, if and then and this is decision trees are about — we were looking at something and we’re asking a set of questions and if the answer is the say, “yes,” then something else happens; either in next step, or there’s output and we kind of fork off from that. If the answer is, “no,” we go in a different direction and everything kind of flows from there. So, we’re trying to understand the logic of what’s happening there, but in my feeling, all this comes down to if then and mapping out what that either decision — typically, a decision-making process are moving us through as a framework where decisions lead us to certain results. So, that is how I think about it Tom. I’m guessing you probably have like a more standard definition that than my sort of loosey-goosey one.

Tom Mighell:  I do sort of, I mean my standard, I guess Wikipedia-ish definition of it would be the Decision Tree is a support tool that uses a tree-like model to display decisions and their possible consequences. And so, when I think about it a Decision Tree, I think about a flowchart. On that flowchart, each block, each node of the flow chart represents a test and that that test, the branches off of the test represent all the possible outcomes of that test. So, is this matter a fixed fee or is it time and materials or is it value billing? 

That leads you then to different ways to measure how you’re going to get paid or what the value of that potential matter might be worth. To a certain extent, that’s about as far as I get and my work with and understanding of decision trees is really that elementary. We work on them all the time with clients building out business process. And the way that they are going to do certain information governance processes — or frankly, legal whole processes. That’s why I developed lots of e-discovery workflows using decision trees.

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And I think we’re going to maybe get into this a little bit more, at least when we start talking about some of the tools. A lot of the things I read online start to get into math and calculations and numbers, especially when you’re doing decisions about dollars. And how much the value of a case is and we start looking at percentages and all sorts of stuff. I’ve got to say that makes this poor, liberal arts-educated brain hurt, it’s just painful. So that’s why to me, I really think of a simple way to look at decision tools. So, I’m going to look to you to kind of carry the burden of what more complicated Decision Tree technology looks like.

Dennis Kennedy:  Well, I think you’re right. I consider this really foundational and sort of once you figure out that if something happens then there’s a result then you can kind of bring in the math a little bit by saying, “you know, if we use a numerical thing, you could say, ‘oh, if there’s a 60% chance of this happening then, it goes this way if it’s like a different percent’,” and you can start to build some things in and some probabilities and other things. But we’re not going that direction for this podcast. We are just saying like what is out there that we can use decision trees for to help us understand the technology that we use and the processes that we use and then then maybe once we get that understanding, can we do something with that, that’s valuable to us?  

And typically, that comes in the form of automation so I think that we’re looking for something, where we understand a process, well enough that we can automate it. I think that you’re right, Tom. The key when I think of decision trees, I think of flowcharts and that’s where it starts from say, we have this process and we map it out and in flowcharts, and then we’re able to really automate what we’re doing because it just becomes a simple switching process. Where we say, “okay, this answer leads to these results. This answer leads to these other results.”  

So that’s the flow part of it but I think there’s also this other part that’s also super interesting to me is that to figure out what the flow is going to be in the charts that you need to do. I think in terms of process mapping, so we actually really need to know what the process is and what those questions are because we can’t really create flowcharts out of thin air. So, we kind of need to understand what the actual process is and there’s something a tool called Process Maps that will help you kind of sketch out what’s really happening in that process and we can kind of dive into that. But I think there is that sort of two-directional approach to decision trees and sometime, we just think of the flowchart side.

Tom Mighell:  Well, but let me ask this. So let me kind of give an example about why I think that some of this can get complicated. And I’m not saying that as a criticism but as a means to me not understanding. So, I’ve been meaning to look at this. I just haven’t looked at it for a while, but I know that you included it in our outline for the things we’re going to talk about, and that is our good Law Practice Division friends, Marc Lauritsen’s choice boxer tool and he has been a proponent of a concept called “Choiceboxing,” which is another type of decision-making tool. But to me, if some of the more complicated number and math-based flowchart decision trees are complicated, then this is like ninja guru 3D chess decision-making because I can’t even begin to understand, it’s just way too complicated for me and I feel like there are good uses for this and there are good times for this but I want you to explain to the listeners why somebody like me would look at that and go. Oh, holy crap, I can’t understand it, I go back to my simple flowchart and feel more comforted by something less involved than what I see with Choiceboxing.

Dennis Kennedy:  Yeah, so I think with Choiceboxer, what you’re bringing in is collaboration and you’re saying there are multiple factors that get considered. So, you’d say, I’m looking at — say, I’m considering half-a-dozen case management tools and I decide that certain things, certain features are important to me and I want to rank those things. And maybe I’ll say this is an 8 out of 10, this is a 4 out of 10 and then you say like “whoa.” And so, we can we can flowchart that out easily and you can even do it in a spreadsheet and figure out which one scores the highest and then you can kind of examine how the scoring works and how the ranking works and change that a little bit.

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With something like Choiceboxer, you’re going to 3D level where you’re saying, okay, there are actually four of us who have decision-making input on this and so what if we’re able to kind of line those up in a 3D box and then use that visualization to say. “Oh wait, here’s where there’s agreement on — certain sets of features and here’s where we have agreement on what the final thing is,” but typically we’re not going to have that final grade but we can sort of say, like, “oh wait, I was weighing this one way, but now I see what other people are doing it and the way they do it, I understand that more.”  So, it’s a visual thing and its a — as you say, it’s much more complex, it’s really interesting. Kind of does take Marc to explain it but it’s like all — I think like all Decisions Trees, process mapping, flowcharts, you have this problem that you’re trying to solve. If you’re just theoretical about this, then you’re — just like you said, if you see math you go — and you’re just like it’s theoretical, you’re like, “I don’t really want to do that. I don’t want to learn that.”  But if you say, “I have this specific problem and I want to assess certain weights to different tools, different decisions and I want other things to happen in certain triggers.”  And it is a number that triggers that. Say, if you’re trying to figure out what billing should be or something, then the math just becomes part of the flow and it will start to make sense. So that’s why I keep going, just back to the simple and saying, like, “how can I map this?” and to me, that starts with learning the process really completely.

Tom Mighell:  Well, and just to wrap it up, I’m going to include a link in the show notes to an introduction on Choiceboxing by Mark Lauritsen. So read it, but literally Dennis everything you just said I did not understand about Choiceboxing. It made no sense to me and to me, that’s no shame on me and no slam on Choiceboxing, it’s just not for me.

Dennis Kennedy:  It was a visual tool and I think that if you have a specific problem and you see it visually and it’s a problem that matters to you. You’ll say, “oh, I can see how this might work,” or you’d say, “no, this really doesn’t work for me.”

Tom Mighell:  To me the Decision Tree that we’re talking about, that’s more of the simple workflow is a visual tool that resonates with me. So, let’s stick with that and let’s talk about those here and about how we might use decision trees.

Dennis Kennedy:  Yeah, so I don’t know, I go back to this thing that as I’ve looked at Productizing Legal Services. I think it all starts with decision trees and the one thing I learned, especially from a project that I helped out on a little bit, at least at the early stage of an expungement service, sort of making that easier for people. Is that what I realized is that in order to do these decision trees, you really have to learn the process completely and probably better than anybody else, especially as the processes get more complicated.

And so, I think that that’s one thing so, how do I map out to say what is this process and where these decisions get made?  Because if you miss some of these things, then what you’re going to build off the decision trees won’t work because you’ve missed key points. And so, that’s why I say there’s this sort of process mapping piece and then we kind of reverse that and turned it into a flowchart. So, I don’t know, to me that’s sort of how I think about the time. I don’t know whether that works for you or not, do you have some other thoughts on that?

Tom Mighell:  No, that totally works and frankly not just what you’re talking about but we’ve talked about so many different apps and things on this podcast overtime that our Decision Tree tools because they rely on things like guided interviews or series of questions. I mean, when we did the whole episode on document assembly, document assembly tools to a certain extent are Decision Tree tools because they require you to put some input in, and they give output as part of that. Where I start to — where I start to lose it is what kind of input you need in order to get output like a score. I get it with an expungement or a document assembly where you put input and you get a document back or you get a set of instructions on what to do, that makes sense to me. Those are things that I think you can work through that process very easily, but getting to a point where you’re getting something more complicated like scoring or things like that. That becomes a little bit more outside of my comfort zone.

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Dennis Kennedy:  Right. And I think that you sort of — and I’ll come back to this in a second here but I think that as you map things out and you do these flowcharts and you do decision trees, what I found from the first time I ever did document automation was that it forces you to be really critical of the existing processes or even the logic flow within a document and to simplify. And so, when you’re starting with this stuff, what I think is important is find these extraneous things where you’re going like, “why are we asking this?” or “why are we asking the same question over and over again? Why are we asking for input on whether it’s a he or a she or they and why are we asking that question like five times? When obviously, we only need to ask at once?” 

Abd so, although I do think you have to understand processes really well and really thoroughly, I also think you want to be critical and to simplify where you can. And there is a certain sense, especially when you’re starting out of the 80/20 rule. So, I think you don’t want to say like what I want to do is I want to create turbo techs(ph) with decision trees and that’s going to be my first project. No, like your first project should be — here’s something that requires six questions for me to get answers and six questions and it generates like a simple letter or a simple form, fills out a form. And so, I think there’s this 80/20 rule that comes into play and that — so this kind of process just keeps working to say, “do I understand this? And then can I simplify it? Is there extraneous stuff in my Decision Tree?”

Tom Mighell:  Now, all of that makes perfect sense to me. So, I’m in agreement, in general agreement about all of that. So maybe with that, with those concepts in mind, maybe we talk about some of the tools that you might use to put those processes into play. 

And so, when I think about tools, I am generally going to start with an electronic tool. I know Dennis, you may use something even more simple than that but I usually am going to start with an electronic tool because when I write, it just gets too messy and I’d rather be able to redo things electronically than otherwise. And so, for me, I’ve — like I said at the beginning, I’m a basic kind of person and using a tool like Microsoft Visio to me is one of the easiest simple ways to create a process diagram. 

And it’s infinitely forgivable and it’s got all of the different — it can be as complicated you as you want or as simple as you want. And I create really basic decision trees or process flows on there. The other tool that I would consider using, if I didn’t use something like, Visio would be something like MindMeister. Some of the mind mapping tools, have the same general functionality, it’s not quite the same but it is tree-like in the way that you can organize things. So, you can put thoughts into a tool like MindMeister and in get to the same result. There are some other — what I would call EZTools that that actually offer what they call “decision tree creation.”  I haven’t tried these but I’m just going to offer some — put them in the show notes there. 

There are things, tools like — one is called Venngage, one is called GitMind. I think we may have talked about Lucidchart on this podcast before, Miro. What we’ve talked about I know has its own decision tree maker in there. So, a lot of some of these tools have decision tree makers where you can create things that I think frankly are probably even more simple than Microsoft Visio because they do a lot of the heavy lifting for you and Visio is a little bit more do it yourself. But those are generally the tools that I would think of, if I was going to create some decision tree. Dennis, where did what directions do you go in? 

Dennis Kennedy:  I’m going simple and primitive, almost. To me, this is really mental work and so I want to be thinking about what I’m doing, the process, the decision tree, what the flow is, those sorts of things. And I don’t want to be thinking about how to use the tool and rather things look right? And so, I might start with Mind Maps. No surprise to anybody who’s listened to the show because I start almost everything with Mind Maps, but I sort of played around with different tools. I tried Excel charts in Excel. I tried charts in PowerPoint and tried charts and Word.

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None of them really worked. The problem with Vizio, which I would have liked to try was that I don’t have a version of Microsoft 365 that has that available and I had Adobe Illustrator. So, I had a number of tools and I just realized that I was — instead of working on what I wanted to do. I was trying to learn, how to use these different tools, so I have paper, pencil and I bought this plastic flowchart template thing with like the circles and the diamonds and the rectangles that I use as a template to make those things. And then I just — has a straight edge on it and I connect things together and then I do that and then I may put it into another place. But when I’m trying to get this stuff down and try to understand these things, I want things to go from my brain to where I’m recording it or writing it down without the step of saying “how do I use this tool?” 

That said, if I use a tool — if I do this on a daily basis and I use the tool on a daily basis like Vizio, I would probably be in there. So, I think that’s part of it is like, how often do you really do this?  And do you need a tool? Because for the most part, I think for most of us in most listeners that probably the — pencil and paper if you’re really confident in what you do you can do pen and paper. I’m a pencil and paper person. But that’s sort of how I do it. So, it’s very simple, very primitive and nice paper and a nice mechanical pencil and I’m on my way.

Tom Mighell:  While you’ve been talking, I’ve been searching and I’ve been realizing that actually, I think I believe that these days now, you have access to free online, Vizio with your Microsoft 365 account. I agree, that’s one of the challenges from Vizio is it has previously been a standalone software, but recently Microsoft offered it, the online version for free and I’m able to access it in my account right now. It’s not the app, you can’t use the app, you’re using an online version, which I guess is why it’s free, but it’s there. So those of you who do want to look at that as a possibility you do have it free if you have M365 account, should.

Dennis Kennedy:  Yeah, I think that’s when you’re at the — so there’s a sort of working thing for yourself and if you need to present it to somebody else, then I think you definitely want to convert it to a to a presentation.

Tom Mighell:  I agree, It’s a later phase at that point. So, let’s go step beyond that. So, we’ve got a process flow, I think that there are — if you want to have actual output and do something, that’s when you may look at other more advanced tools and Dennis, do you want to kind of kick that off and talk about this a little?  You’re engaged in them a whole lot more than I am.

Dennis Kennedy:  Yeah, so I think that legal products and legal applications — these are essentially decision tree tools. They’re almost like the perfect example of it. So, you have guided interview tools, you have stuff like TurboTax, great example. You’re asking people to answer a set of questions or to provide data; say, name, whatever, those sorts of things. Make choices, give scores to things, stuff like that, and then you’re using it on the basis of that to create some output and typically, the output is going to be a document. It’s going to be a score, it could be a chart, it could be a form is filled out and ready to move on to somebody to sign, any number of things does. 

That’s the classic world of privatization in the legal world and I think the decision trees get you to that. And then you also want to consider the input side of it, which is also becoming really interesting. So that’s where you start see chatbots and how you format questions and how simple you make things on the screen that people are answering, who answers it, that sort of thing. So, I sort of look at that — that you have your input and interface. That you need to think about, you have the sort of decision tree comes next, it’s the logic of how this works, and then you have the output at the end. And so, it’s sort of like the customer facing or the user facing stuff is the input and the output. 

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But what you’re looking to do it with the Decision Tree is get that core logic correct so that you have the confidence that you do when you’re using stuff like TurboTax that you’re actually getting your tax return done correctly. So, that’s how I think of how we use these tools because they really affect the sort of core logic and flow of your application.

Tom Mighell:  So, you took a step back from my question, which my question was what are the tools that can get you to that application?  Because you’ve described all the output, all of the output of the exercise that you’ve done. But you can’t use Vizio or Miro or any of these other tools that we talked about and that by the end of that, you’ve got an app. And so, there are other tools that are out there. Now that can take that process flow, that can take that decision tree and turn it into an app now, and that was really what my question was is, let’s talk about some of those tools and then we’re going to have to wrap this session up because we’re going a little bit long.

Dennis Kennedy:  Yeah, so I mean, I think if people go back to our productization episode in particular, we talked about this. You’re basically looking at one of the document automation tools and that can be something like Afterpattern, it can be — there’s stuff like Loya(ph). There’s the one that I’ve experimented with, it’s called BRYTER, B-R-Y-T-E-R which is one of the more complex and more expensive ones and I’m using that through Michigan State Law School in the work I do there. 

And those are the tools where you say now that I have these decision trees, I can, put them into these programs and they’ll design — they’ll let me put together this application that allows the user to answer the questions. I put the logic in and it will create this output. So, those are the tools, these days — it used to be called document assembly. Now, it’s almost always called document automation. There are a number of tools out there. There’s been some consolidation in that market, but there are a lot of tools out there. So, they all do similar things and so it’s good to experiment with one and see when it works. 

So, some are definitely geared to producing documents and others give you more options. I like BRYTER because the focus is on the actual logic flow and it gives you more options on what the output can be. Like I said, it’s not what you do probably use in your spare time or anything like that. It’s more — it’s a higher-powered tool but I would look at something like after pattern would probably be the one that I would probably start with if I were doing this, Hot Docs is another — long been a name in this category. 

Tom Mighell:  Okay, we are runways short on time, way long on this segment. So, give your best tips and recommendations on how to get started.

Dennis Kennedy:  Well, I think that this is another case where you can really get yourself jammed up by trying to pick the perfect tool. I think you just need to pick something, you need to pick simple projects, you need to, if you’re doing document automation, you need to think in terms of blocks of text that relate to the questions that get answered and not just like words and to simplify, simplify, simplify your projects. Just start with something easy — when I first did the state planning, I documented automation. I started with durable Powers of attorney because there were very few variables in them and they were very standard. 

Then I moved up to wills and trusts agreements and so I think those are some of the things. And then I think it’s fine to like — I think it’s about five bucks, this helix geometry template I got and like a pencil and paper and you can start rolling. But basically, find that simple problem. It probably has half a dozen steps to it and then you’ll start mapping it. But you’re basically looking like simple forms, that get filled out, things like that and those are the best places to start.

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Tom Mighell:  And now let’s get back to the Kennedy-Mighell Report, I’m Tom Mighell.

Dennis Kennedy:  And I’m Dennis Kennedy. We’re getting back to the hot or not format of this episode. We pick a topic and take its temperature on the hot or not scale. We might agree but we might not and that’s what makes it fun. I’ve been thinking about the Apple Watch lately, just to kind of tweak time a bit and I’ve also been seeing a lot of them on a lot of wrists. So, Tom the Apple watch, hot or not.

Tom Mighell:  Well, Dennis, I’m glad you finally caught up to the rest of the world on this because the Apple Watch has been hot since it debuted in what was it, 2015?  They sold 8 million watches that year, they more than doubled it three years later to 22 million. And now in 2022 — or 2021. They’ve more than doubled that again to 46 million. So, the Apple Watch is definitely hot and so, glad that you’re finally now seeing watches on wrists because frankly, when I see watches now, all I ever see — not just now but it’s been for years no, have been Apple Watch. But frankly, that’s as far as I’m going to be able to take this Dennis because like all Apple products, you can only use the Apple Watch with other Apple products unlike Windows and Android which all play well together. If I wanted to use an Apple Watch, I would need to buy an iPhone, which is not going to happen anytime soon.

So, I despair over the wall garden that Apple has created, but I’ve got to admit it is the best smartwatch out there. There is no question because I do have a Samsung Galaxy Watch4. I’m using it, I like it, it’s great. It still doesn’t have all of the features that the Apple Watch has. I’m looking forward Google is going to be putting out a Pixel watch later this year and I’m looking forward to trying that because it works with the Android phone. But frankly, I think none of them can hold a candle to the Apple watch. Just for its sheer breadth of features and now I think that it’s really trying to make a play for the best health wearable. It measures sleep, it measures O2 levels and measures heart health. It can even track fertility and other related cycles. Every time I start a ride, on my peloton bike, a little message pops up asking me to connect my Apple Watch for a better experience. And of course, I have to say “no,” which makes me a little sad before my ride start. So, I repeat. Dennis the Apple Watch is hot. Yes, do you want to share with us the specific reason you wanted to talk about the Apple Watch this episode?

Dennis Kennedy:  Yeah. It actually feels like it has become hotter, and your numbers kind of bear out what I’m seeing. And the other comment you made was if you go back to when I bought the first gen Apple Watch was, “I said, I’m sort of buying the ecosystem,” and I know the watch will keep improving and that’s why. So, I’m on my second Apple Watch and I love it and it’s like the health things and other things. But I also found that this whole notion of alerts, reminders that we’ve talked about overtime has really become important. It’s really nice to see, like, “oh, here’s a phone call and here’s who it’s from” or “I got a text message” or — and I need to deal with it or I don’t. And even in a pinch, you can answer — I only answer phone calls on my watch. So, I’ve really come to rely on it, I would say, the one thing I noticed for myself — I guess two things. 

(00:35:03)

So, one is I don’t see people using it for payments as much as I thought I would see it because I think that is a truly great customer experience to pay by watch so that’s one thing. The other thing is I find that I use it and think of it less and less of a watch. No, I kind of joke about like I’m not a big fan of the time app, you know?  Because it takes all the screen space on the watch. And so, what I found is I used to go to very simple interface that was more like a watch interface with hands. Now, I’ve gone to digital to sort of like minimize what the amount of space the time takes and I have more information that’s on the watch screen about the health-related things and timers, other things like that and I find it more useful. So, I think it is really hot and it’s because again, the great experience of it and the ecosystem that continues to evolve and I think you’re right. It is going to become a very important health appliance over time.

Tom Mighell:  Well, I would just say when you describe all the reasons why you’re liking your watch, I would say that my Galaxy watch offers all of those exact same features, which I would like it for. And so, it sounds to me that the reason why you’re liking it so much is not necessarily because it’s an Apple Watch, but because we have found something that has become the Dick Tracy Watch that we’ve finally been able to do everything for and talk to people and it does all sorts of magical things. While the Apple Watch has a ton more features than the than the Android watches have, the fact that you can do these things on your watch that once you could only do on your phone and once you could never do anywhere makes all of these hot to some extent. 

Dennis Kennedy:  Yeah, I would say a little bit differently. I would say it’s not the sheer number of features, it’s the fact that the ability to personalize the features to what’s most important to me and that’s the distinction that I would make. But now it’s time for our parting shots. That one tip website or observation you can use the second this podcast end Tom, take it away.

Tom Mighell:  So, my parting shot is a little bit related to our initial topic in this podcast. I became acquainted with a new site called Scribe. Scribe is a tool for documenting know-how and it does it in kind of an interesting way. Is that if you want to show somebody how to use something on their computer, you go in and you will basically just — Scribe is a Chrome extension basically, and you press record and it records all of the things on your screen that you’re doing. So, showing how to do something, like, how to create a Google doc or something on your screen. 

It will record all of that within your browser, but it doesn’t just make a recording, it doesn’t just record that and show that back. It then takes that recording and it turns it into a written set of procedure. So, it will say, move your cursor and click this button. When the next screen comes up, click this button and highlight this. It uses artificial intelligence to really interpret what you’re doing and turn it into a written SOP that also has animated support to go with it to see exactly how it’s done. 

I’m totally intrigued by this and I’m thinking about finding ways to use it so we can train people on how to better use, Microsoft Teams and SharePoint in our work. It is free to use, there is a free tier to use. So, I would recommend go try it out because it’s really, very cool and then you can purchase the better versions for more features than that. It’s called Scribe. I’ll put a link to in the show notes. 

Dennis Kennedy:  So, Tom, this is one of the parting shots when I saw in the script and checked it out. I got an account before we even recorded the show. So, I think it’s super interesting and I can’t wait to play with it. 

So, I decided to go with the topic of automation for my parting shot. So, David Sparks and Rosemary Orchard do a podcast called Automators, and they just celebrated their hundredth episode and they talked about their favorite automation tools in their first 100 episodes. So, it’s a great summary of — it’s Mac and iOS specific. Although some of these tools go on to Windows and other platforms. But it’s a really good overview, especially in the first half hour of what’s out there and some of the things you can do.

(00:40:02)

And if you want to play around with automation in the Macworld, sort of the tools that you would probably want to start with. And so, I found it really useful. I use some of the tools and all ready but it sort of give me a road map to the things that I want to try. They go a lot deeper into the topic in the rest of the podcast. So, I found it really interesting, the whole thing but you may bail out, at some point as they dig deeper, but definitely if you want an introduction to basic automation tools and their uses in the Macworld, this is a great podcast episode to listen to.

Tom Mighell:  Yeah. I really like the concept of the Automator, but it is utterly 1000% useless to me because I’m not in the Macworld. So, I try to listen to it and unfortunately, there are things that I just — I will never use and can’t use because I’m not in that world.

Dennis Kennedy:  So, well TextExpander though is — 

Tom Mighell:  TextExpander is one of the things that I use, that’s right but that is a very small piece of the things that they talk about.  If you’re not living at least some part in the Macworld or in the iOS world and they do, do iOS things. So that’s useful for iPad, and iPhone, then just be aware before you start listening to it. It is definitely better for those of you who have Mac practices. 

Dennis Kennedy:  It will give you reasons to move to Macs and iOS as well if you’re interested in automation.

Tom Mighell:  It will give you reasons that not everyone will follow. Anyway, so that wraps it up for this edition of the Kennedy-Mighell Report, thanks for joining us on the podcast. You can find show notes for this episode on the Legal Talk Network’s page for the show. If you like what you hear, please subscribe to our podcast in iTunes, or on the Legal Talk Network site where you can find archives of all of our previous shows along with transcripts. 

If you would like to get in touch with us, you know where to find us. We are on LinkedIn, we’re on Twitter and we love to get voicemails from you. That number is seven

720-441-6820. So, until the next podcast, I’m Tom Mighell.

Dennis Kennedy:  And I’m Dennis Kennedy and you’ve been listening to the Kennedy-Mighell Report, a podcast on legal technology with an internet focus. 

If you like what you heard today, please rate us an Apple Podcast and we’ll see you next time for another episode of the Kennedy-Mighell Report on the Legal Talk Network. 

[Music]

Outro:  Thanks for listening to The Kennedy-Mighell Report. Check out Dennis and Tom’s book ‘The Lawyer’s Guide to Collaboration Tools and Technologies:  Smart Ways to Work Together’ from ABA Books or Amazon and join us every other week for another edition of The Kennedy-Mighell Report only on the Legal Talk Network.

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