Access to Justice

What’s Your Procedural Pet Peeve?

~ Noel Semple

Slaw.ca Legal Ethics Column, August 13, 2021

Found online at: http://www.slaw.ca/2021/08/13/whats-your-procedural-pet-peeve/

Our justice system isn’t all bad, and in some ways it’s getting better. Some things in the system might have to be difficult and complicated, because life is complicated and so is the law. But there are also plenty of things that seem unnecessarily difficult and complicated. I’m talking about things that could be fixed without a lot of controversy or money, just by thinking carefully about how they affect the system’s users.

One that has always irritated me is Rule 4 (“Court Documents”) in Ontario’s Rules of Civil Procedure. It lays out all of the technical requirements for documents used in Ontario actions and applications. (I dare you to read it through.)

One highlight of Rule 4 for me is the seven different colors of paper that must be used for different kinds of document if filed in paper. For example, “An appeal book and compendium shall be bound front and back in buff covers.” (R. 4.07(3)). (This one always makes me think of “in the buff” — an expression my grandmother used, meaning “naked.”)

Subrule 4.07(6) adds that “backsheets and covers shall be of 176g/m2 cover stock.” Am I the only one who would not know what 176g/m2 card stock is even if I were slapped in the face by it?

Of course, system insiders and repeat-players know exactly what it is and have no difficulty complying. But if you believe that the interests of those who are not insiders and repeat-players matter, then the problems created by rules like 4 quickly become apparent. Making this extremely detailed, picky requirement part of our law has the following consequences:

— civil litigation firms must pay to keep a room stocked with all sorts of different kinds of paper. They must pay someone to keep track of all the paper. Clients ultimately foot the bill.

— more generalist law firms, which don’t practice under the Rules of Civil Procedure often enough to justify the expense and headache, will outsource the task of complying with Rule 4, and pass the cost along to clients.

— self-represented litigants are confronted with a highly technical, almost impenetrable set of requirements that cause them significant stress and expense.

— Assistants and law clerks spend lots of time — adding to law firms’ overhead — trying to comply with Rule 4. Lawyers spend time — billed to their clients — checking the work of clerks to see whether they got the paper colours and weights right.

— the court can legally refuse your filing because you used the wrong kind of paper (for example Grand & Toy’s card stock which is only 147 g/m2). Real world legal rights can be lost, or at least delayed, because, to take another example, “the text [is not] typed on thirty-two lines numbered in the margin at every fifth line,” as required by Rule 4.09(3).

— The realistic fear of not successfully complying with Rule 4, and other requirements like it, scares some generalist lawyers away from helping clients with litigation matters entirely. Instead, clients are referred out to more expensive firms downtown.

And all for what? Unless I’m missing something, the purpose of much of Rule 4 is to minimize the work that court staff and judges must do in order to organize and understand parties’ submissions. If everyone complies with Rule 4 then everything will arrive at the court pre-organized.

But is offloading this work on parties really fair or just? Is it efficient, given what a source of expense and inconvenience it is for the rest of us? Given that court staff are experts with court documents, maybe they should be the ones organizing them? For a start, parties could just be allowed to submit everything on normal paper (when we can’t do it online. During COVID parts of Rule 4 are in abeyance, as parties are allowed to file electronically. But it is still law, and may come roaring back into full force when the pandemic ends. Or it might be replaced by something similarly abstruse.)

Courts are not retail businesses. But maybe they should ask themselves what retail businesses would do. Your grocery store could save its own staff a lot of time if all customers were required to submit all food orders on preprinted forms, categorized by colour based on the type of order. Anyone who wants any frozen items would have to use 176g/m2 card stock.

They don’t do this because, in a competitive market, they have to care about the experience their procedures create for their customers. So long as courts have a monopoly on justice, those who create and administer court procedures will not feel the hungry wolves of competition nipping at their heels. But maybe access to justice would take a leap forward if they were act as if they do.

Rule 4 is a picayune example. Hopefully it will become less of a headache if the pandemic drags our profession and courts into online practice. But it is definitely not the only part of our justice system that would profit from some serious user-oriented scrutiny.

Justice in Your Neighbourhood?

~ Noel Semple

Slaw.ca Legal Ethics Column, December 22, 2021

Found online at: http://www.slaw.ca/2021/12/22/justice-in-your-neighbourhood/

I live in Etobicoke, Toronto’s western suburb. We used to have our own courts, right here in the west end. There were family and criminal courts at 40 East Mall, and a Landlord Tenant Board outpost on Dundas Street West. Just over the Humber River, in the original City of Toronto, there was a Small Claims Court on Keele Street (pictured above). People asserting civil rights, or facing criminal charges, could visit a courthouse in their own community.

Nowadays, there isn’t a single physical court or tribunal of any kind in Etobicoke. To get to a family court or small claims court, you have to go downtown to University Ave or Yonge Street. On the criminal side, next year, all six Toronto Ontario Court of Justice locations will be closed and consolidated into one 17-story mega-court on Centre Street. It will be part of a cluster of buildings around Queen and University that will now house almost all of the GTA’s courts — the Court of Appeal, all four Superior Court of Justice locations, as well as the Law Society, and (just a couple of blocks away) the Ministry of the Attorney General.

There is nothing local about the justice system in Toronto anymore. Everything is consolidated and centralized. The various systems supposed to serve the whole city, if not the whole province. Online justice is a big part of this trend.

Legal disputes involving Etobicoke neighbours, Etobicoke community institutions, or Etobicoke families would probably have been heard in Etobicoke thirty years ago. Now they go downtown, or else they go online.

The March of Progress?

So what? This column isn’t a nostalgic tribute to the good old days of local justice. Consolidation and centralization offer advantages in the field of justice, just as they do for hospitals or schools or supermarkets.

The government says that the new downtown mega-court will broaden access to specialized facilities — such as mental health courts – that cannot be maintained in smaller venues. It will also allow more efficient allocation of the many necessary professionals to cases, reducing delay. Anything that addresses the atrociously long waiting periods in our justice system is to be welcomed. Looking at the picture above, it is easy to imagine the inconveniences of the old neighbourhood courts.

Still, local institutions offer forms of convenience and embeddedness that don’t come naturally to centralized behemoths. Most obviously, it’s easier to travel to a court that is in your neighbourhood as opposed to one that’s 20 km away downtown. This may be especially true for public transit users who will face longer journeys. People who have a choice about whether to appear in court —including not only applicants in civil and administrative matters but also family members offering support for accused individuals— may simply decide not to do so.

Psychological Access to Justice

Too often, people allow their rights to be sacrificed because the formal justice mechanisms that would uphold them are inaccessible. They go without child support instead of using family court, they put up with substandard housing instead of using the landlord-tenant board, or they let themselves be defrauded instead of using small claims court.

Sometimes the barriers to justice are psychological, more than they are financial or geographical. People don’t use courts that they don’t know about, or that seem inaccessible or inappropriate for their needs.

The advantage in psychological accessibility goes not to the 17-story super court downtown, but rather to the neighbourhood institution that you see on a daily or weekly basis, and which your neighbours or family members have dealt with in the past.

Tradition and Change

If justice institutions must be centralized and consolidated, they should do what they can to make up for these shortcomings. Online justice can be well-designed, user-friendly and properly advertised — British Columbia’s Civil Resolution Tribunal has blazed the path. If so, it might outperform the old neighbourhood courts in every way, for those matters that truly require no in-person hearings.

Courts are for the people. They are not for the judges or lawyers or other people who work in them. I worry that clustering all of the remaining physical courts in a two block radius at the centre of elite downtown power might make them more insular, more lawyer-centric, and less accountable to court users.

As Edmund Burke said, our leaders must have both “a disposition to preserve and an ability to improve.” The old neighbourhood courts need not necessarily be revived. However, reformers should understand the merits along with the flaws of the old ways, and look for opportunities to preserve those merits in the new systems they create.

Justice at Tribunals: At the Government’s Whim

~ Noel Semple

Slaw.ca Legal Ethics Column, April 7, 2022

Found online at: https://www.slaw.ca/2022/04/07/justice-in-tribunals-at-the-governments-whim/

Suppose that “JM” is a Canadian person, who believes that their legal rights have been infringed. The problem might have arisen at work, at home, with a corporation, or with some part of the government. JM has tried to resolve the matter privately with the other side, but got nowhere. Next, JM did some online research and perhaps spoke to a lawyer. It turns out there is a public body that’s supposed to make decisions, and uphold rights, in disputes like JM’s.

JM brings their dispute to that body. JM wants to be heard, by someone who is competent and neutral. JM expects a fair and legal resolution within a reasonable time frame, even if JM is unsuccessful or the outcome is some sort of compromise.

Now pan the camera back from JM, and ask some questions about the body to which JM’s dispute is brought.

  • Are the decision-makers in this body competent to resolve the disputes fairly according to the law? Or have they only been appointed because they are ideologically aligned or personally friendly with the government?
  • Do they have enough job security to make neutral decisions, without fear of losing their jobs if those decisions upset government Ministers?
  • Can the government simply neglect to appoint members to the body, causing delays that last months if not years?
  • Can the government abolish the body, if it so chooses, at any time for any reason?

The answer to all of these questions hinges on whether the dispute-resolution body happens to be a court or a tribunal. If it is labelled “court,” then each of these questions will have an answer that reassures JM. However, it is just as likely that the body will be labelled “tribunal.” If so, its ability to do justice in JM’s case is completely dependent on the attitude of the government toward the tribunal and the laws that the tribunal is meant to apply.

Three recent examples from Ontario illustrate the government’s total power over adjudicative tribunals, and the serious consequences of this power for access to justice and the rule of law.

  1. Ontario’s License Appeal Tribunal is charged with hearing disputes about motor vehicle accident benefits, typically involving an insurer and an accident victim. However the government has not appointed enough adjudicators to provide anything close to prompt resolutions. The Ontario Bar Association recently flagged delays of a year or more between filing and hearing. After hearings – even on very simple issues – another year or more can pass before a decision is rendered. Tribunal Watch Ontario recently surveyed LAT users and found that “overall processing times, for cases that go to a hearing and final decision, appear to have gone from 6 – 9 months to 1.5 – 2 years.” During these extended waiting periods, accident victims may go without any of the benefits that they are claiming.
  2. Appointments of Ontario tribunal members are often for very short periods. Renewals are at the exclusive discretion of the government. For judges, we have formalized appointment processes and security of tenure after appointment. This system was developed to ensure that judges would feel free to rule against the government or its friends, without fear of losing their jobs. The same risks arise from the insecurity of tenure which still characterizes most tribunals.
  3. In March 2022, The Government of Ontario introduced legislation that would have completely abolished the College of Traditional Chinese Medicine Practitioners of Ontario (CTCMPAO). The CTCMPAO is an administrative body that regulates practitioners of traditional Chinese medicine and acupuncture. No consultation, and no serious policy rationale accompanied this proposed move. One week later, the Government reversed course. The episode indicates the complete power of life or death that the government possesses over tribunals, and the capricious way in which that power can be exercised without recourse.

So long as administrative tribunals are the creatures and playthings of the government, access to justice for people like JM will depend on the whims of the government. If we cannot guarantee reasonably fair, prompt, and competent dispute-resolution for people like JM, our constitution’s claim that Canada is “founded upon principles that recognize … the rule of law” is highly questionable.

Although some have policy-making roles, many Canadian tribunals have effectively the same function that courts do: resolving legal disputes. Resolution comes through adjudication if necessary (although, in both courts and tribunals, mediation of some kind is typically tried first). Giving litigants whose matters are assigned to tribunals better guarantees of procedural justice is a way to help tribunals discharge their adjudicative functions.

Constitutional litigation is one possible path toward this destination. The Supreme Court of Canada extended constitutional protection of independence first to section 96 courts, then to provincial courts, and then to tribunals dealing with constitutional and then quasi-constitutional matters. However, in the 2001 Ocean Port decision, the SCC refused to do the same for adjudicative bodies (and the people who use them) that are not in these favoured categories. Twenty years later it may be time to sail away from Ocean Port, while keeping on board that decision’s message of respect for legitimate policy-making by democratic governments.

A second possible path is legislative. Ron Ellis — who has done as much as anyone to fight for tribunal justice in Canada— has recently proposed some interesting model legislation. It would establish an expert, non-partisan Administrative Justice Council to oversee appointments and promote continuous improvements in Ontario’s tribunals. Another possible model is found in England & Wales. The government there entrenched administrative tribunals within the judicial branch, with the same guarantees of independence that apply to judges.

The independence of tribunals is not an end in itself, but it is a way to secure access to justice and the rule of law for Canadians like JM. We should not think about the division of powers between our public sector institutions (executive, legislative, judicial, administrative) in terms of the prerogatives or legitimate spheres of power of those institutions. We should think in terms of the functions these institutions can perform for the many Canadians who rely upon them. We should reform them with the same spirit.

Online and In-Person Hearings: The Best of Both Worlds

~ Noel Semple

Slaw.ca Legal Ethics Column, June 9, 2022

Found online at: https://www.slaw.ca/2022/06/09/online-and-in-person-hearings-the-best-of-both-worlds/

For a while during the pandemic, online hearings were the only option for courts and tribunals. Justice was done on Zoom, or else it wasn’t done at all.

Now, as we emerge from the age of Covid (knock on wood!), online vs. in-person is a recurring controversy across Ontario’s justice sector. After the Superior Court of Justice ordered most contested family law matters to return to court, a group of family bar lawyers organized in defence of the online option. By contrast, the Landlord and Tenant Board is insisting on fully online practice, while the Advocacy Centre for Tenants Ontario states that “going digital has been a failure” and calls for a return to in-person hearings. The online vs in-person controversy is also litigated on a case-by-case basis. For many civil trials, in the absence of party consent an expensive procedural motion may be necessary to resolve the question of online vs. in-person.

Technologies of Justice

The online hearing, and the in-person hearing, are both technologies, in the sense of “manner[s] of accomplishing a task… using technical processes, methods, or knowledge.” The task which hearings of either type should accomplish is the resolution of legal disputes in a just, expeditious, and affordable way.

Here are three ideas that might be helpful as the justice system engages with online vs in-person controversies.

1. Client-Centred

The justice system does not exist for the benefit or convenience of lawyers, court staff or judges, but rather for clients and the broader public. The diversity of clients and their needs must be clearly understood by those who make these decisions. For example, some Landlord and Tenant Board litigants live far away from the place where an in-person hearing would be held. They enjoy much greater access to justice if it is online. However others have little or no access to the devices and data needed for a video hearing. The LTB must find a way to give them access to justice too.

2. Internationally and Inter-provincially informed

Too often, discussion about justice reform in Ontario seems to proceed as if Ontario has the only justice system in the world. We Ontario lawyers talk to each other, and on a good day we might also consult with clients and other professionals working in the field. Far too seldom do we search the globe (or even the continent) for best practices and successful models that we can apply (with appropriate modifications) here. Every jurisdiction in the world has divorces and tenants, and many of these places are quite similar to Ontario. Our ignoring the progress they have made in justice system design is no more sensible than doctors ignoring breakthroughs in cancer treatment from abroad.

3. Remember It’s adversarial

One major difference between treating cancer and designing justice systems is that in the latter case everyone is not pulling in the same direction. In a motion about whether a civil trial should be in-person or online, the parties are not typically putting their heads together to figure out which approach will produce better access to better justice. Instead, each is advocating for the option that favours its own side. Likewise the Advocacy Centre for Tenants Ontario is exactly what its name suggests – an advocate for tenants, not landlords.

Neutrals (judges, tribunal chairs, the Attorney General, etc) are ultimately responsible for resolving online vs in-person controversies, and all other procedural controversies. They must listen closely to stakeholders and litigants, but they must also draw on research, and intelligent leadership, to make just decisions in the public interest. When people who are unorganized and lack powerful insiders to speak up for them- such as self represented litigants- have distinct interests at stake, it is especially important that the neutrals actively inquire into these interests.

Should hearings be online? Should hearings be in-person? The answer is yes. We need the best of both worlds, and we need intelligent and evidence-based justice system leadership to deliver it.

Better Access to Better Justice: The Potential of Procedural Reform

~ Noel Semple

Canadian Bar Review, Vol 100, No. 2

Improving access to justice is often identified as a goal of reforms to legal procedure. What does access to justice mean in this context? This article proposes that “better access” and “better justice” should be understood as distinct but overlapping goals. Access improves when procedural costs confronting litigants are reduced. Justice has three qualities—substantive justice, procedural justice, and public justice—which legal procedure can produce to a greater or lesser degree. Although access and justice are sometimes in tension as goals for procedural reform, they are also harmonious. Better access to better justice is a worthy goal for procedural reformers. Welfarism is introduced in the final part of the article, as a way to focus access to justice reforms and make the necessary tradeoffs. This article’s argument is illustrated by three procedural reform trends—mandatory mediation, smaller-dollar procedure, and inquisitoriality.

Full text: https://cbr.cba.org/index.php/cbr/article/view/4772

Civil Procedure and Practice in Ontario, Vol. 2

~ Noel Semple

I’m delighted to announce that the updated 2022 edition of Civil Procedure & Practice in Ontario is now live at https://www.canlii.org/en/commentary/81787.

We are also grateful to our publishers CanLII, and in particular the team of Sarah Sutherland, Alex Tsang, and Alicia Lazear.  Assistant Editor Sheldon Leung and our Windsor Law editorial team (introduced below) were essential to the success of this project. 

The British Invasion: Legal Services Regulation Edition

~ Noel Semple

Slaw.ca Legal Ethics Column, April 10, 2020.

Found online at: http://www.slaw.ca/2020/04/10/the-british-invasion-legal-services-regulation-edition/

Bringing British things across the pond is a hot Canadian trend. Prince Harry and Megan Markle are now our most famous immigrants. A Canada-U.K. free trade deal has apparently become a post-Brexit priority. And the Downton Abbey movie has raked in hundreds of millions of dollars from my parents and their friends.

While we’re at it, we should copy at least three aspects of legal services regulation as practiced in our erstwhile mother country. The U.K. has swept away many of the outdated and unnecessary restrictions on legal services that we still cling to. The payoff is better access to justice, without any apparent diminution in quality or ethics. Continue reading →

Dispatches From the Front Lines of Canadian Legal Ethics

~ Noel Semple

Slaw.ca Legal Ethics Column, December 16, 2019.

Found online at: http://www.slaw.ca/2019/12/16/dispatches-from-the-front-lines-of-canadian-legal-ethics/

On October 25 & 26, Windsor Law proudly hosted the 2019 conference of the Canadian Association for Legal Ethics. The presentations touched on many of the most important issues confronting the legal profession today. Check out the brief summaries below to stay up to date. Continue reading →

Collegial Reputation and Peer Rankings: An Invisible Hand?

~ Noel Semple

Slaw.ca Legal Ethics Column, January 31, 2019.

Found online at: http://www.slaw.ca/2019/01/31/collegial-reputation-and-peer-rankings-an-invisible-hand/

Suppose you have practiced law for many years in the same community. You are shown a list of other lawyers who do the same sort of work as you, in the same area. You probably have an opinion about most of the names on the list. Favourable or unfavourable impressions will have accumulated from your interactions with them on files, your observations of their work, and other colleagues’ comments to you about them.

Of course, they also have opinions about you. Your collegial reputation is the sum of the opinions about you held by others in your community of practice.

Collegial reputations are not necessarily fair or well- deserved. They may reflect prejudice or irrelevant factors, rather than the real qualities of someone’s work. Nevertheless, within professions like law, colleagues are relatively well placed to evaluate the many aspects of value that are invisible to clients. Continue reading →

Why We Can’t Ban Legal Advertising

~ Noel Semple

Slaw.ca Legal Ethics Column, December 14, 2018.

Found online at: http://www.slaw.ca/2018/12/14/why-we-cant-ban-legal-advertising/

Whenever I see billboard or TV advertising for law firms, I worry. I don’t worry about the “dignity” of the legal profession; I worry about the people at whom these ads are targeted. Choosing the best possible firm can make a major difference in the long-term happiness and financial security of a person with a serious personal plight legal need (e.g. a personal injury, a divorce, or a criminal charge). Mass media ads almost never provide any useful information that would help someone in this position make an intelligent choice. The airbrushed photos, empty boasts, and gleaming boardrooms in these ads are meant to promote emotional resonance and brand recognition, not reasoned decision-making.

Advertising for normal goods and services — which most consumers can understand and evaluate — may foster healthy competition, which in turn improves quality and reduces price. By contrast, mass market advertising for opaque professional services such as law is more likely to promote unhealthy and consumer-hostile competition. It encourages a struggle between firms to achieve name recognition by deploying expensive campaigns, which are ultimately paid for by clients through higher fees. Clients are better off when they choose law firms by relying on knowledgeable and unbiased referrals, or comparing objective information about the available options. In such a market, financial incentives are aligned with professionalism: firms’ profits will depend on the real value that they offer to clients, not on their marketing budgets.

With these thoughts in mind, I started writing this column to argue that most or all mass-market law firm advertising should simply be banned — as it was before roughly 1980. However in researching this piece, I’ve come across some compelling reasons to think otherwise. Continue reading →

Bridges over the Chasm: Licensing Design and the Abolition of Articling

~ Noel Semple

Slaw.ca Legal Ethics Column, July 27, 2018.

Found online at: http://www.slaw.ca/2018/07/27/bridges-over-the-chasm-licensing-design-and-the-abolition-of-articling/

What should people who want to practice law have to do before they are licensed? This perennial debate has bloomed once again. The Law Society of Ontario (LSO) is seeking feedback on its Options for Lawyer Licensing consultation paper (Slaw summary here). Two of the LSO’s four options would abolish articling. Candidates would instead have to pass exams covering both legal skills and substantive knowledge. There would also be a law practice program, either required for all candidates (LSO’s Option 4) or only for those practicing in smaller firms (Option 3).

Thinking of licensing in terms of footbridges over a chasm may help clarify what is at stake, and why the LSO should in fact abolish the articling requirement. Continue reading →

Measuring Legal Service Value

~ Noel Semple

(2019) University of British Columbia Law Review, Vol. 52, No. 3.

This article proposes a theoretical foundation for measuring legal service value. It aims to support efforts to compare the value of offerings from different law firms, as well as alternative legal service providers.

The value of any legal service depends on (i) its effectiveness, (ii) its affordability, (iii) the experience it creates for its clients, and (iv) third party effects (the impact the service-provider has on people other than the client).

These four elements of value can be quantified through various metrics applied to firms or entities that provide a given service. Output metrics evaluate either the actual real-world impact of a legal service, or the written and oral work products of the firm. Internal metrics check for processes or structures within a firm that demonstrably support high value outputs. Input metrics focus on the attributes and credentials of the individuals who provide the service.

This article concludes that measuring legal service value is challenging, and may be dangerous if done poorly. Nevertheless, the rewards justify the challenge. Higher quality legal professionalism, more effective and less burdensome regulation, and consumer empowerment are among the payoffs if we can find better ways to measure legal service value.

Full text: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3144771

Mystery Shopping: Demand-Side Phenomena in Markets for Personal Plight Legal Services

~ Noel Semple

International Journal of the Legal Profession, Vol. 25.

“Personal plight” is the sector of the legal services industry in which the clients are individuals, and the legal needs arise from disputes. This article proposes that competition among personal plight law firms is suppressed by three demand-side phenomena. First, consumers confront high search costs. Identifying competing law firms willing and able to provide the needed services often requires significant expenditure of temporal and psychological resources. Second, comparable price and quality information about firms is scarce for consumers. Both of these factors impede comparison shopping and reduce competitive pressure on firms. A third competition-suppressing factor is observed in tort legal service markets, where offerings are typically priced on a contingency basis. Contingency fees have relatively low salience to consumers, and this reduces consumers’ willingness to negotiate and comparison-shop on the basis of price. This analysis is supported by the author’s empirical research with Ontario personal plight lawyers as well as the existing literature. The article concludes by suggesting possible consequences of this analysis for regulatory policy.

Full text: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/09695958.2018.1490292?journalCode=cijl20

Measuring Legal Service Value, Part 2

~ Noel Semple

Slaw.ca Legal Ethics Column, Tuesday June 1, 2018.

Online: http://www.slaw.ca/2018/06/01/measuring-legal-service-value-part-2/.

What makes a great law firm? How can one quantify just how great a firm is, and compare it to its competitors? Last time in this space I suggested that legal service value has four elements (full paper here):

  • To the extent that a firm gets good legal results for its clients, it has effectiveness value.
  • To the extent that the firm’s fees are low and easy to pay, it has affordability value.
  • The more the firm’s practices minimize clients’ time and stress costs, the more client experience value it has.
  • Finally, if the firm’s work has many benefits and few costs for people other than its clients, it has high third party value.

In principle, a firm’s performance on these four elements of value can be quantified. If we could actually create accurate charts like these for legal services providers, we would have more empowered consumers, better self-awareness of strengths and weaknesses within law firms, and more evidence-based regulation. This project can also move us toward a more meritocratic legal profession, in which individual success is less dependent on racial and socioeconomic privilege.

An accurate quantification of value will require multiple metrics, and the array of metrics will depend on the legal niche in question. This column outlines three basic types of metric for quantifying legal service value: output metrics, internal metrics, and input metrics. Output metrics measure what comes out of the legal service provider. Internal metrics examine what happens inside the firm. Finally, input metrics analyze the people who walk in (or log in) to the firm each morning. Continue reading →