How AI Helps Law Firms Handle More Cases With Timothy Hiller

[00:00] Welcome to the Grow Your Law Firm Podcast, brought to you by Pilmah.
[00:08] This podcast helps lead lawyers to more growth, profit and freedom.
[00:13] Here is your legal marketing expert and host, Candahartis.
[00:17] Well, hello everyone and welcome to another episode of RyoLol from the Hollywood
[00:26] Happen, Aron, do you have a 10-minute?
[00:28] There's one of the shares, what he is doing to use a, and his law firm dim welcome to the
[00:35] show.
[00:36] Well, thanks for having me, Ken.
[00:37] Excited to be here.
[00:39] Yeah.
[00:40] So tell our viewers in our listeners a little bit about you, your journey and they will get
[00:45] into the amount of the car you're doing yourself.
[00:47] And I give us a grant.
[00:49] Yeah, sure.
[00:50] Well, I'm a partner at Hiller Commonford,
[00:52] Adrian Disability.
[00:54] We're based at a Buffalo, New York.
[00:56] And we've got over 240 employees.
[00:59] So we're pretty big operation.
[01:03] Mainly a disability practice.
[01:05] We've got over 18,000 social security clients
[01:10] and over 2,000 VA clients.
[01:13] So we do do a significant amount of volume there.
[01:16] And we've got a small but growing PI practice
[01:19] that we're trying to add to that.
[01:21] Absolutely, good deal, man.
[01:23] How are you going to do with volume and doing this?
[01:26] I've been doing this ability since 2012.
[01:29] When I got out of law school,
[01:32] this firm, Hillary Cumberford,
[01:35] it's formally known as a law office.
[01:36] It kind of held her, which my father
[01:38] restarted the firm back in 1999.
[01:40] So disability laws kind of been in my blood.
[01:43] I remember being like a 10 year old kid driving in the car.
[01:46] And you would have the tapes from the hearing.
[01:49] He'd be listening to them, the disability hearings.
[01:52] And we would be talking about the cases and stuff.
[01:55] So I wanted, we were talking at the National Mod,
[01:59] I can't remember somewhere about what you're doing with AI.
[02:04] And I think the law lawyers are there really
[02:07] or scared of it, the Lord of the Storke.
[02:10] and on how to use it or what the user will ever.
[02:13] So you graciously has the second manifestation
[02:17] to talk about what you're doing with AI,
[02:20] you're all from it.
[02:21] How's it the opening and water?
[02:23] So things people need to be thinking.
[02:24] But what are you doing?
[02:26] How are you using it now?
[02:27] Yeah, I mean, I think the last six months or so
[02:31] have just been the final nail on the coffin
[02:34] for anyone who thinks this is just hype,
[02:35] and it's not going to really impact things.
[02:38] It's been a wild six months.
[02:41] Really starting with, I think for us with us
[02:45] becoming aware of Cloud Code and the stability now
[02:48] for people who, like myself, who don't know how to code,
[02:52] I can basically code somewhat sophisticated apps and projects
[03:00] just by talking with Cloud.
[03:02] And that's a game changer if you're looking for things
[03:05] like deploying your own Facebook lead generation campaigns.
[03:09] We don't have to pay someone to do that anymore.
[03:11] It's a few hours, we can set it up ourselves.
[03:15] So we've got a VA, for VA, we've got a disability calculator out there
[03:20] on Facebook that people, it says, you know, find a how much money you could be making
[03:25] and that the people click on it.
[03:28] And then at the end, you know, it asks for the contact information.
[03:32] We've been getting a really good cost per case on that and that's something that we made in-house
[03:37] and you didn't have to hire anybody and it looks great, the disability calculator looks great.
[03:44] And so that's just one thing, you know, custom dashboards.
[03:48] We've got our own CRM smart advocate and it comes with a lot of reports, but you know, like I said, we're a disability firm.
[03:55] So a lot of the reports and a lot of these CRMs are geared towards a PI.
[04:00] So we don't have to go out and pay somebody to create dashboard for us.
[04:06] It's, you know, again, a couple of hours.
[04:08] We can have any dashboard we want.
[04:10] We've also got a tool to analyze our medmail cases.
[04:13] You know, that's been a big pain point for us because it's kind of hard to come up with hard and fast rules about medmail.
[04:21] So it kind of requires an attorney to review it.
[04:24] But, you know, we're still not going to take 99% of the cases.
[04:27] So we've got a, we're training a metmail analyzer and over time.
[04:33] I think it's going to get better for us.
[04:36] So how are you, with Klo, can you, uh, it would,
[04:40] with Jim and I, you can sign in the prize agreement, keep it private,
[04:44] because a lot of lawyers are worried about, uh,
[04:47] but because they're class stuff, they can get out into the,
[04:51] upper world.
[04:52] Yeah.
[04:53] So I mean, for all the things that I talked about,
[04:56] we're not putting client data into it.
[04:58] But yeah, we do have an enterprise agreement.
[05:00] So if we did want to put client data into it, I think we could.
[05:05] Yeah. I think that's the key.
[05:07] I know we would Jim and I understand Jim and I thought they experiment.
[05:12] I understand this can't GPT. We would not sign in a browser.
[05:16] We could say, you know, we could pick a private file agreement
[05:20] where you, that they're probably sure. Right. I will go ahead.
[05:23] and I tell you all of them here.
[05:26] That's right. That's right.
[05:28] So that's the employers that I was, because I was just
[05:31] on a, when we were a mastermind, just again, how are going?
[05:36] That seems to be the big, you know, that's the big deal everybody's
[05:40] who were worried about that and anything else.
[05:42] And then you're so many companies out there,
[05:45] about this, this, this, this, and a lot of them started
[05:49] what you're doing, or doing it themselves, and that way that you know they can broadcast it.
[05:55] Right.
[05:56] You know, in one of the things we're actually considering doing is we've got work in a
[05:59] center and hire our own internal software engineer because I mean, I'm able to create
[06:04] these, what I describe, which are, you know, for me, they're incredible that I'm able
[06:10] to create these projects and you know, it's like kind of cool, but you know, they're pretty
[06:14] simple, but you know, if you get somebody who actually knows how to code and now you get
[06:18] with Claude, you know, they're able to do things, you know, in six months that previously
[06:23] would have taken a lot longer. So we're kind of exploring that. I'm seeing if we can recreate
[06:29] some of this software that we pay for, you know, if you pay, if you have an in-house employee
[06:34] and it takes some three months to recreate it for you, that could be a win.
[06:39] Well, I know in the... as you grow better, I mean, I know, much for disability, but there's
[06:46] So, the women's records, I've never provided them.
[06:51] And there's a lot of stuff through, or you're using AI to sift through this stuff
[06:56] and get some of your jail on it, or you work it or not.
[06:59] Yeah, so for Social Security actually it's really helpful because we've got one of the things that we do.
[07:06] We have a very active federal court practice, and so what happens in federal court when you file a Social Security
[07:13] of healing federal court, they submit a transcript of everything that happened at the agency.
[07:19] And this transcript nowadays, these transcripts are 1,000 to 3,000. We were working on a 12,000
[07:25] page transcript the other day. You got to take that and put that into a statement of facts as part of your
[07:30] brief in federal court. So that is a huge pain point for our attorneys to say at least. So yeah,
[07:39] Yeah, we've signed on with the Eve and we're really happy with the facts
[07:43] actions that we're getting so far.
[07:45] I mean, we haven't been doing it too long, but I've been going through them and
[07:48] everything is accurate.
[07:50] And I'm just amazed that you're able to get like a 15, you know, we're
[07:54] talking about like a one or two page demand letter here.
[07:57] We're talking about a 15, 16, 20 page statement of facts that's written at a
[08:03] level that you could submit to a federal court.
[08:07] That's what it's producing.
[08:08] I mean, it really blows me away.
[08:11] I'll show you over what you spit at them.
[08:14] Of course, yeah.
[08:16] And we have a policy here about that.
[08:19] We promulgated a policy that you're never allowed to submit anything
[08:24] that's been generated by AI unless you've independently
[08:27] verified the accuracy of it.
[08:30] And so, that's something we talk about a lot.
[08:32] And frankly, our attorneys, we don't really have to remind them too much
[08:35] because they're nervous about it anyways.
[08:38] So, and it seems like, you know,
[08:40] there's plenty of attorneys in the news
[08:42] who are abusing AI that kind of keeps it fresh in our mind
[08:45] that, hey, you know, we gotta check this stuff.
[08:48] Yeah, sanctions have some big tightness
[08:50] and they haven't been the last month.
[08:53] Yeah, a lot of the people who are being sanctioned,
[08:55] those not only did they use AI kind of a reckless way,
[08:57] but then when they get caught with it,
[08:59] they don't just fall in their sword and say, sorry,
[09:02] you know, it's like they fight back or something.
[09:04] and maybe not the wise, this litigation strategy.
[09:08] Yeah.
[09:08] So what do you see the future?
[09:10] What's on your plans?
[09:11] I mean, you've done what's already done.
[09:13] What do you promise for, for, as you said?
[09:17] Yeah.
[09:18] So the way that I see things going is I'm kind of wondering if,
[09:22] in the case that the CRM companies
[09:24] probably won't like to hear this,
[09:25] but I'm sort of wondering if AI is really going to totally
[09:30] displays the way we think about case management, where all of your information could just be
[09:36] in the AI system and then you're interfacing with the chatbot to get any information you need
[09:42] out of the system about the case, about whatever you're working on. And instead of having
[09:48] kind of a rigid interface, you could see that there could be some benefits to that. And I know some of
[09:54] of the AI companies themselves want to move in that direction as well.
[10:00] Oh, it will be interesting. I think it's, you know, for us, I think it's, it's really important.
[10:04] We're trying not to sign any long-term agreements for anything these days because
[10:10] everything is changing so fast and so anything with technology, we want to keep our agreements
[10:16] to certainly under a year. But preferable is just month and month because, you know, who knows
[10:21] something could come out next month that's just totally changes the game.
[10:25] We were just discussing that again and I'm guessing I'm on the earlier day and that's the big
[10:31] concept.
[10:32] And so fast.
[10:33] Because most of the acts, people are really hungry or at least have a bell out
[10:39] cloth if you sign a year, have a 90 day bill out of those.
[10:42] That's something we learned early on.
[10:44] We signed right at the beginning of this whole AI trend.
[10:50] We signed on with the company and we did get locked in on a longer term deal and we really
[10:54] regret it and so we don't use that tool anymore and it was a hard lesson.
[10:59] It's certainly a mistake we won't repeat again for sure.
[11:02] Absolutely.
[11:04] Good deal.
[11:05] Good deal.
[11:06] Or you see this is something that's always talking about this morning and all what I do
[11:10] to do is show you about the child that's making a difference and you tell you how
[11:16] there's many people or how having the user or the people that you are using or being
[11:20] more productive or anything like that,
[11:22] where you see me in the enters the hole,
[11:25] it's not been left to tell.
[11:27] Well, we certainly haven't, like,
[11:30] it's hard to tell because we're trying to grow.
[11:31] And so we are growing.
[11:33] This is what I tell my employees, it's like,
[11:34] I'm not looking here to like improve productivity
[11:39] and get rid of employees and just kind of
[11:41] rest on my laurels here.
[11:42] You know, we're looking to grow.
[11:43] And so we, I think the way we're using
[11:47] and the way we're thinking and talking about it is,
[11:49] like we want to grow, we want to compete with these huge mega firms.
[11:53] So this is going to help us do that in a cost effective manner.
[11:56] We may be hiring slower than we normally would as we grow.
[12:01] But we really haven't sat down and said,
[12:05] geez, now we can do this so much faster.
[12:07] We can get rid of X, Y, and Z.
[12:10] If anything, something that has happened is
[12:13] we've applied, let's take foundation AI,
[12:17] an AI which is a helps you sort your incoming documents
[12:22] and get them filed in your CRM.
[12:24] Well, that's really lowered the demands on our mail room.
[12:29] We don't, we're not getting rid of those people,
[12:32] we're just finding something else for them to do.
[12:34] And so, yeah, I think that's a really important part
[12:37] for law for homeowners.
[12:38] Because if you don't even have to portray it this way
[12:42] for people to be nervous about the AI taking their job.
[12:47] So anytime we talk about it, we like to talk about it and kind of like in a abundance kind of mindset like this is going to help us do more.
[12:55] I gave the example of the federal court brief.
[12:59] It's helping us do the statement of facts.
[13:01] Well, we get in federal court, you get paid for your time.
[13:05] Okay.
[13:05] So we don't actually want them to take less time on their cases because you know, we would make less money.
[13:13] And so what work has presented it to them is look, this is a way to really eliminate a
[13:21] pain point for yourself and produce top quality work that's going to really increase your
[13:26] win rate and in that sense, you know, make more money for the firm.
[13:31] I guess what we really try to talk about it as this is just going to help us do more work.
[13:37] When you think about the legal industry as a whole, I'm kind of thinking lately that, you
[13:43] I think it will be disruptive, there's no doubt.
[13:45] But when you talk about these predictions of mass layoffs and stuff,
[13:51] I mean, that assumes that there's a cap on the amount of legal work that can be done.
[13:55] You know what I mean?
[13:56] We can always do more legal work.
[13:57] I just think it's premature to assume that there's going to be
[14:02] all these people out of a job because we can always do more.
[14:05] There's more clients we can serve.
[14:06] There's more cases we can take on.
[14:10] So how do you go about communicating what you just said about how you explain this to you?
[14:15] You're saying.
[14:16] You could call them.
[14:17] And on nominating, he talked to a manager, he could have something on the email or maybe
[14:22] how do you do that?
[14:23] I think if I was running a firm, I would be wondering how, that's the best way to make it.
[14:28] We could communicate that.
[14:29] Did that statement?
[14:30] And your big, should be hard to do it well.
[14:33] Yeah.
[14:34] I guess all of the above we do it.
[14:36] try to just constantly communicate about these tools and that they're important to us and that
[14:42] they're not here to replace people and we have I like it when we can have an ambassador,
[14:49] you know an employee who understands what the message we're trying to get across and they can deliver
[14:55] the message because they understand what the employees are going through more than I do.
[14:59] And so for example, we had one of our top trial attorneys talk about Eve to the PI staff before we rolled it out.
[15:09] And I think he gave a better presentation than I could.
[15:13] Simply because he was more in tune with how the employees are thinking about it.
[15:18] And one of the things he mentioned was, look, in personal injury, especially there's a personal touch here that can never be replaced.
[15:26] And I thought that was a very effective message to the staff.
[15:29] I saw a lot of people nodding.
[15:31] But so we do small groups.
[15:32] We do a larger, like when we roll out,
[15:35] when we roll out Eve, it was a large group.
[15:38] But then we follow that up with smaller groups.
[15:41] And then we try to meet individually with people
[15:43] who are resistant and see if we can't
[15:47] do a one-on-one get them on board.
[15:49] Yeah, we had to find anybody because it wouldn't use.
[15:52] Yeah, we haven't gotten there yet.
[15:54] We haven't gotten there yet.
[15:55] Yeah.
[15:56] I've ordered an app in the quarter to allow for a regular regular business.
[16:00] You know, I just don't mean they got to get it for a reason.
[16:03] Gotta go.
[16:04] Yeah, I mean, I've heard stories of that too.
[16:07] I think that the way that the way that I prefer to do it is to say,
[16:11] look, this is, you know, if now because of the AI, the productivity is increased to a certain level,
[16:17] we expect you to meet that level regardless of what you don't want to use the AI as fine.
[16:22] You got to meet that level that everyone else is performing.
[16:25] You know what I mean?
[16:26] So that's kind of the way that I like to.
[16:28] And we haven't so far we haven't had to get rid.
[16:32] But like I said, we've really just exploded in our adoption of AI
[16:37] in the over the last six months.
[16:38] So that they could be coming.
[16:41] You do anything that I have not asked you
[16:44] that you think is important.
[16:45] But all you're there, you're there.
[16:46] You're struggling or trying to figure out what it's for.
[16:49] Yeah.
[16:50] I just think you need to start using it being a consumer up at.
[16:53] You just gotta start playing around with, like, um,
[16:55] I really think every law firm owner should just play around with cloud code.
[17:00] Just so you can understand what it can do.
[17:02] You know, regardless of whether you want to do this yourself or not,
[17:05] I personally like doing it, but, you know, regardless of whether you want to do that,
[17:09] I think it's important to play around with, and it's important that you have an understanding
[17:14] of these systems how they work, what their limitations are.
[17:17] If you don't have it, you're not going to be able to really explain it to people, but that you want to use it.
[17:23] I agree with S.S. the way I started out, it started playing with it.
[17:27] Like, I had my trips trying to figure out certain things about stuff about,
[17:32] where's the misplacing of the, you know, right?
[17:36] It's a piece of, I mean, it's something like that, or it's not thinking about going nearly,
[17:41] or like the 10 things, you know,
[17:42] But me out of the trip, I can do further 30 albums.
[17:47] You don't understand.
[17:49] Yeah, I mean, it's great for planning.
[17:51] I mean, if you need to plan a project, it's great for that as well.
[17:56] But yeah, by playing around with it, you get to know its limitations,
[18:00] what it can do, what it can't do, and how to get it to kind of give it what you want.
[18:06] Because there definitely is a skill to that.
[18:08] and you'll never get it until you start doing it yourself.
[18:13] Yeah, I read a book called A.I. Leadership. I don't know if you read it.
[18:17] I have not.
[18:18] But so, the deal he was talking about, he was carrying up earlier,
[18:22] probably adopt for the way you would think about it.
[18:25] He uses it to solve problems of businesses,
[18:28] and like his digdill is you throw in the context,
[18:32] but tell the story of what's going on and what the problem is.
[18:37] And then what he would tell, he would tell,
[18:39] to get a GP take close, whatever he says.
[18:42] Now ask me one question at a time,
[18:44] if you need anything, I think three to four.
[18:46] And then just do it and ask you question, you can answer them.
[18:51] And it says, I've got enough information.
[18:53] This is one way to handle it.
[18:55] This is another way.
[18:56] And then you can talk to, you know, what I'm not about.
[18:58] I'll talk to that for people.
[19:00] What if this wasn't there?
[19:02] Yeah.
[19:03] And I've used it before.
[19:04] And I can tell you that I want it five different ways to prove something.
[19:08] And three of them are good to themselves.
[19:09] Because I'm a sweety, three of them are really two of them are great.
[19:13] One of my head never thought what I'm saying, thought if it was confirming to me.
[19:18] I didn't even know I just never owned it.
[19:20] But I just never read it.
[19:23] It doesn't.
[19:24] I don't know, it's like I forget.
[19:26] All that was in a rich.
[19:27] Yeah, great for brainstorming.
[19:29] And we use it for something kind of similar.
[19:31] Like we've used it to kind of help us do some advanced,
[19:35] financial forecasts, and that, you know,
[19:38] maybe I can understand, but that I wouldn't be able to do
[19:41] myself.
[19:42] So like, you know, you can give some of your KPIs,
[19:46] and then you can have it run, you know,
[19:47] pretty sophisticated statistical analyses.
[19:51] Like so for example, one of the things that I would never be able to run myself or figure
[19:56] out how to run myself.
[19:57] It can project my cash flow like based.
[20:00] a certain number of KPIs and I didn't even determine what the KPIs were. I asked it what the
[20:05] KPIs should be. So we built this kind of from the ground up and then you know you put it in
[20:10] and then it runs like an endless number of simulations and then it gives you kind of like here's your worst case scenario
[20:19] bottom 25% scenario for cash flow over the next couple months. Here's your top quarter picture and here's you know the middle.
[20:27] I mean that's a useful tool for me for sure and I would never be able to do that myself
[20:32] I would never be able to do that myself for or even know how to set it up
[20:37] But just through talking with Claude Cody is not hard anybody could do it
[20:42] Yeah, I can do it. I mean I just talk to
[20:47] I say
[20:49] I say you know I'm out of the world for the cast take my all do anybody in the world
[20:53] But I still use the AI everyday in my life now and it makes my life easier.
[21:00] I'm worried about some things down the road, it's getting out of hand, but I think
[21:04] Congress and I have to deal with that.
[21:06] You're trying to avoid that, but I'm just playing some things.
[21:09] But I don't have for me right now, I personally, personally.
[21:13] It's kind of big, perhaps so.
[21:16] I ain't big if you're there.
[21:18] I'm there listening to this, yeah.
[21:19] at least, I thought, oh my, seven years old,
[21:23] doesn't have a lot of time getting there and using it
[21:27] and getting some money, I don't know,
[21:28] but anybody can get it.
[21:29] That's not pretty into it, I don't know what you think,
[21:32] but I think really.
[21:33] I think it's very user-friendly.
[21:35] I mean, if you know I ask a question,
[21:37] you know how to use AI, you know?
[21:40] Yeah, and we're all here, who's supposed to know that
[21:42] that's where it's from.
[21:43] That's right.
[21:44] That's right.
[21:45] That's what they try to throw yours for a little bit.
[21:47] Now that I think about it is sort of like a deposition, you know, your hair
[21:51] helps.
[21:51] Yes.
[21:52] Grats me a question and that it gives you something or like,
[21:54] I don't know, that's not really what I mean.
[21:55] Like how about this, you know, so it is similar.
[21:58] It is.
[21:59] It is.
[22:00] So it was great.
[22:02] And then I'm actually very proud of what you're doing in press.
[22:06] I don't know.
[22:07] But people don't realize how the phantoms or the 18,000.
[22:13] I've been, I've been 3,000 and I told I was.
[22:17] So I can imagine six times I don't know what you would.
[22:22] Yeah, I feel like you'll have it.
[22:24] And because it is heavy, it's very representative.
[22:26] This is really an help you would.
[22:27] I think, but more labor resistant, I'm not,
[22:31] and I don't know what to do about.
[22:32] I can't remember that.
[22:34] Yeah, I mean, I think it's just Taylor made
[22:36] for our practice groups, and that's why we're leaning into it so hard.
[22:41] And especially if we want to compete with, you know,
[22:43] now the private equity money is moving into the disability world as well.
[22:47] We gotta be able to compete with them, so.
[22:49] Yeah, absolutely.
[22:51] That's a good deal.
[22:53] So, what are you going to do to some of this year?
[22:55] I'm sending my marketing director.
[22:57] I did so much traveling.
[23:00] This is actually, I don't know what time's on.
[23:02] I'm in at the moment, but I'm so, but I am sending my marketing during that.
[23:06] I'll be his first film a summer, so I'm excited for that.
[23:09] You'll have to, you'll probably come back over with.
[23:13] Yeah, drinking from a fire hose for sure.
[23:16] Absolutely.
[23:17] Okay, my friend.
[23:19] Any party boards before we take a holiday?
[23:22] No, this is great.
[23:23] Thanks for having me on.
[23:24] Thank you.
[23:25] I appreciate it.
[23:26] Because I know in that committee case,
[23:28] you got to be a big.
[23:29] Yeah, that's right.
[23:30] That's right.
[23:31] Until next time, this is Kit Harder's dedicated to users.
[23:34] You've been listening to the Grow Your Law Firm podcast, the podcast that leads lawyers
[23:49] to more growth, profit and freedom.
[23:52] Go to GrowYourLawFirm.com to find more ways to market and manage your law firm.
[23:58] Please leave us a rating and review wherever you listen to your podcast.