Legal innovation is often associated with cutting-edge AI tools showcased at tech events. However, Microsoft Office remains the primary software package used by lawyers worldwide. Indeed, this familiar toolset represents the most accessible form of legal innovation for most practitioners.
Once you explore beneath the surface, you’ll discover an impressive array of useful tools within Microsoft Office. Moreover, these features can transform your legal practice and daily workflow in meaningful ways.
[Related Content: Microsoft Office hacks for lawyers]
After countless pandemic chats, tweets, and LinkedIn messages, Crafty Counsel joined forces with a group of lawyers to share Microsoft tips. Together, they shared their Microsoft skills with fellow legal practitioners. The result? Crafty’s ‘How To’ series on Microsoft Office — and it was a real pleasure to help kick it off. At the time of writing, there are 18 videos — and counting. They cover everything from switching case with a click in Word to using mail merge for contract templates.
Some of these Crafty tips can be complete game-changers that will transform daily life and save hours of wasted time. Some tips are just handy “nice-to-knows,” perfect for impressing at webinars, Zoom calls, or even virtual family gatherings (!).
The Crafty Counsel ‘How To’ box set on “Microsoft Office hacks” is always evolving.
It’s a lawyer-generated treasure trove of tools and ideas that make a real difference to daily legal practice.
Some personal favourites include tips around formatting documents, using Excel formulae and making Excel look nice with conditional formatting.
And that brings me to Excel, one of the most important yet often underrated programs in the Office suite. Many lawyers fear Excel because it lacks the familiar functions of Word, it actually offers powerful time-saving features. Excel allows for quick data analysis and is invaluable when providing fee quotes or analysing costs.
Common problems solved!
- Have you ever opened a document only to find a large random gap in the middle of the second page? Someone may have hit “Enter” repeatedly to move a heading, but later edits shifted it, leaving an unexplained gap.
- Ever received a document with broken cross-references? Or worse, a list of numbers that seem fine until you try to make changes, only to realise there’s no automatic numbering. Document formatting can be a bane for lawyers, but it doesn’t have to be.
One of the main aims of this boxset is to pass on this valuable knowledge to other generations of legal practitioners. It’s never too early (or late!) to learn these handy tricks that save time and even bring a smile to the face of a particularly pedantic partner or supervisor.
What makes this series even more exciting is that it will continue to grow as new tips are shared by the Crafty community. Therefore, we encourage you to use this as an opportunity not only to learn but also to share, so we can all benefit from these hard-won discoveries.
Written by Rosie Burbidge, Partner, gunnercooke
Are you an in-house lawyer looking to continue learning from others? Join the Crafty Counsel Community and discover a peer group of in-house lawyers that you can connect, share, and learn from.