LIBRARIAN FOCUS
Private law librarianship in the new economic climate
By Heather Heen
The impact of today’s economy on librarianship in private law firms has been the focus
of many discussions. At the 2012 AALL annual meeting and the 2012 PLL Summit, it
was the central theme running through many of the programs, and there was consensus
that the current economic climate is calling for innovation and flexibility from private
law librarians.
Economic climate and its effect on librarianship
We all faced significant challenges with the downturn of the legal market in 2008 that
culminated in the credit crisis in 2009. In mid-March and in October 2009, AALL
conducted a survey of law library directors to understand how the economic crisis was
affecting the profession. What they found was that in private law libraries, 30 percent saw
staff reductions, but 72 percent also had a hiring freeze in place.
The impacts of this were many. Library directors were reducing their print collections,
and their staffs were taking on additional new duties, including tracking CLEs and
assisting with client relationship management software. There was more attention spent
on billing research time and increased involvement in research for implementing new
business/strategic initiatives.
In 2010 Thomson Reuters conducted a Large Law Firm Librarians Study to better
understand library directors’ roles in a changing economy. What stood out were the
increased responsibilities in business development research, knowledge management, and
practice area integration or specialization. Additionally, we heard librarian directors were
more involved in product evaluation for solutions traditionally belonging to the IT
department.
We were not only seeing a change in the structure of the work but also in law librarian
reporting structure. The 2011 ALM Law Librarian Survey reviewed reporting
relationships for library directors from 2008 to 2011. It showed that the percentage of law
library directors who reported to a COO, director of administration or executive director
fell 11 percent while their reporting relationship to a CIO or IT director increased 4
percent.
The Hildebrandt Institute anticipates that we are not out of the economic woods yet. They
are advising their clients that growth will remain a challenge and the key to success is
going to be balancing that capacity against the available work. Delivering high quality at
a reasonable price is now table-stakes to be competitive in the business law space.
Librarians are still perfectly positioned to assist in those challenges.
Change as opportunity: future librarian roles
These changes have created challenges for private law librarianship, but by being
innovative and nimble we are poised to create higher visibility for the library and deliver
information in a more timely and efficient manner. The following three roles have been
identified as increasingly needed in private law firm librarianship.
The embedded librarian
The "embedded librarian" is a concept that is quickly gaining footing in private law
libraries. It is a highly customized specialty with a focus on actively developing and
enhancing relationships in specific practice groups.
As reported by the Three Geeks and a Law Blog, a 2012 ARC group survey found there
was almost an even split between the firms that have embedded librarians and those that
don’t have them. This means there is a strong opportunity to create and define this
program as it works best within your specific law firm. We have heard a variety of
business support models, including librarians being housed with the department they
support or in decentralized locations in order to continue supporting the library, as well as
the practice group. The benefits have been the creation of a stronger relationship with the
practice groups and an integral membership in those teams.
Library as a knowledge center
The 2011 ALM Law Librarian Survey highlighted that the library’s role in the field of
knowledge management (KM) was up 42 percent since 2008. This is significant because
the value of knowledge management is to make content—no matter what it is or where it
resides—easier to access. Where best than the library to manage this process? KM can
bring all of those disparate, hard-to-fathom sources under a single user-friendly interface.
But there is a lot of room for improvement in the KM efforts. Librarians’ increased
sophistication with technology can make this process more efficient and seamless. With
tools like wikis, blogs, and Microsoft SharePoint, it is no longer necessary to possess an
engineering degree to build Web portals and practice group pages that bring together farflung content. In open-ended survey questions and follow-up interviews, several library
directors also pointed to enterprise search as a particularly promising new tool. This
technology enables users to use a single query to search a wide range of repositories—
from document management systems to the firm's intranet. As this field expands, the
library brings a natural value-add to this technology.
Competitive intelligence
Competitive intelligence has always been an important asset that librarians have brought
to their firms. When we look again to the 2011 ALM Law Librarian survey, we see that
the department that was most in charge of marketing research was the library (at 52%).
As to which department was primarily responsible for competitive information, the
library (56%) was significantly above marketing.
This indicates that law librarians have a growing and evolving role of value to the firm in
the field of competitive intelligence. Librarians are increasingly collaborating with
business development teams to research and analyze information for attorneys to use in
acquiring and retaining clients. While there has been some tension between the two
departments, law librarians need to continue to highlight that they are key in obtaining
“actionable” information, such as identifying new business opportunities, helping create
strategies, and ascertaining potential threats.
Conclusion
The future of private law librarians in this new economic climate is changing. They face
challenges in the form of reduced staff and budgets, new duties, and different reporting
structures. This new climate calls for innovation and flexibility from private law
librarians to highlight their unique skills and use them in important new ways to help the
firm succeed.
==
Heather Heen is a librarian relations manager for Thomson Reuters, serving law
librarians in California, Washington, Oregon, Arizona, and Nevada. Her e-mail address is
heather.heen@thomsonreuters.com.
==
I’m just a bill (and here’s where to find me)
On Westlaw® Classic, there’s more than one way to retrieve a congressional bill.
Congressional bills and resolutions aren’t simply “extra credit” reading for law
students and scholars. Instead, these documents can assist busy professionals
who need to determine (or argue) the intent of Congress or predict the likely future
of the law.
How do you retrieve a bill with particular subject matter? On Westlaw Classic,
there are several paths to the right bills, including the following:
Search a database
You can search for congressional bills in dozens of databases on Westlaw
Classic. Some databases are topic-specific, some are historical, some are
multibases containing many document types. To identify the databases available,
consult the Westlaw Directory (start by clicking Directory, then browsing the Bill
Tracking contents under U.S. Federal Materials). Among the many databases
available to you are the following:

Arnold & Porter Legislative History: Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002
(SAROXLH)

Legislative History–U.S. Code, 1948 to Present (LH)

Bankruptcy Reform Act Bill Text (BKRABILLTXT)

Bills–All Fifty States and Congress–Summaries and Full Text Combined
(BILLS)

Congressional Bills (CONGBILLTXT)

Congressional Bills–104th Congress to Current (CONGBILLTXTALL)

Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act Bill Text (GLBABILLTXT)

Federal Taxation–Congressional Bills (FTXBILLTXT)

U.S. Code Congressional and Administrative News (USCCAN)
Westlaw Directory (detail)
Tabbed Legislative History–Federal page
If you want bills from a specific stage in the legislative process—e.g., the
introduced bill rather than the engrossed bill—you can narrow your search by
clicking the appropriate step on the diagram on the tabbed Legislative History–
Federal page.
Legislative History–Federal page
Links tab for the USCA section you are viewing
When you are viewing a section of the United States Code Annotated® (USCA®),
you can jump right to bill drafts without running a search.
Just click Bill Drafts under Legislative History on the Links tab. Links to available
bills are displayed in the right frame. To view the full text of a cited document, click
the document’s hypertext link. The document is displayed in the Link Viewer. To
display the document in the right frame, click Maximize on the Link Viewer.
In the alternative, you can click Graphical Statutes for a version-by-version
timeline of the USCA section you are viewing. This feature is especially
convenient when you need drafts related to a particular version of the section.
Bill Drafts link on Links tab
==
Westlaw Classic vs. WestlawNext®: A
head(note) to head(note) comparison
What do all those links around a Westlaw Classic or WestlawNext headnote
do?
As you’re probably aware, a headnote supplied by Thomson Reuters attorney-editors in a
case retrieved on Westlaw Classic or WestlawNext is surrounded by various links.
However, you might have asked yourself the following:


What do all the links do?
How do the links in Westlaw Classic compare to those in WestlawNext?
If so, we’re glad you asked. Here’s a primer:
Westlaw Classic
KeyCite Citing References for this Headnote: This link takes you to an expandable
menu of document types, from which you can link to the case’s KeyCite result limited to
citing references that discuss that point of law. The link is ideal for those situations in
which you find a headnote exactly on point and need to know which court cases,
administrative decisions, or secondary sources have cited the case for the point of law
summarized in this headnote.
Headnote number: This link allows you to jump directly from the headnote to the
corresponding discussion in the opinion.
West topic and key numbers: These links take you to the Custom Digest search page,
from which you can run a search for cases classified under the respective topic or key
number. The jurisdiction is the default jurisdiction selected in your Westlaw preferences,
unless you change jurisdictions on the Custom Digest search page. Cases in your result
are sorted by date.
Most Cited Cases: This link also takes you to the Custom Digest search page, from
which you can run a search for cases classified under the respective topic or key number.
The jurisdiction is the default jurisdiction selected in your Westlaw preferences, unless
you change jurisdictions on the Custom Digest search page. Cases in your result are
sorted in the order of citation frequency, starting with the case cited most often.
Headnote on Westlaw Classic
WestlawNext
[Number] Cases that cite this headnote: This link indicates how many cases cite that
specific case for the point of law summarized in that headnote; it also takes you directly
to the KeyCite citing cases that discuss that point of law. No other document types are
shown. (To see KeyCite citing references other than cases, click the Citing References
tab at the top of the case, then narrow the citing references using filters.)
Headnote number: This link allows you to jump directly from the headnote to the
corresponding discussion in the opinion.
West topic and key numbers: These links take you directly to a list of cases with
headnotes classified under the same point of law, sorted by date. Cases in this list are
from the same jurisdiction as the case you had been viewing. To retrieve headnotes from
another jurisdiction, click Change to display the Jurisdiction selector, and then select a
different jurisdiction.
Headnote on WestlawNext
==
“Stand your ground” laws analyzed in ALR annotation
Once a legal issue hits the headlines, it’s not long before American Law Reports
(ALR®) offers a legal analysis, complete with links to full-text sources.
For example, Florida’s “stand your ground” statute is at the center of George
Zimmerman’s motion to dismiss his second-degree murder charges. Sign on to
Westlaw or WestlawNext® and check out Construction and Application of “Make
My Day” and “Stand Your Ground” Statutes, 76 A.L.R. 6th 1 (2012), which
analyzes state laws that immunize persons who use deadly force in certain
situations.
ALR annotation on WestlawNext (detail)
==
Westlaw Classic thesaurus: Brainstorming tool
Let the Westlaw Classic thesaurus bring you the alternative terms you need for a
thorough Westlaw search.
Suppose you are composing a Westlaw query pertaining to the taxation of S
corporations and you want to find as many synonyms and related terms as you
can for the term S corporation. Where would you look? (Hint: Not Roget’s.)
Instead, try this: Access a database on Westlaw Classic, type “s corporation” in
the Search text box, and click Thesaurus. A list of more than 30 synonyms and
related terms is displayed, ripe for cherry picking.
The Westlaw Classic thesaurus provides synonyms and terms related to those
you use in a Terms and Connectors query or Natural Language description. This
includes a collection of thousands of tax-specific and insurance-specific words,
phrases, and citations you can use as search terms. For the term depreciation, for
instance, the thesaurus instantly identifies more than 80 related tax terms,
including depletion, IRC 173, straightline recovery of intangibles, and Form 4562.
To add related terms to your query or description, type your query or description at
the Search page (place phrases in quotation marks) and click Thesaurus. Select
a term in the Terms in Search list box, then select a term on the Related Terms list
box, and click Add. The related term is added to your query or description, which
is displayed in the Current Search box.
After all, you don’t want to miss an important document just because one little
term didn’t occur to you.
Westlaw Classic thesaurus
==
Public records content on Westlaw PeopleMap
Westlaw PeopleMap—the public records tool whose deep crossreferencing and smart technology gives you the highest degree of
confidence—has enjoyed increased coverage in several areas, including
the following:
 Expanded Nevada coverage: Now includes Nevada Experian





credit header data, with over 3 million records
Real Property expansion: Includes new data in pre-foreclosure
and deeds within the top 50 metropolitan statistical areas
Pre-foreclosure: Added 236 new counties and more than
200,000 new records
Deeds: Added 163 new counties and more than 2 million new
records
Expanded criminal records include 250 new jurisdictions
(records are combined so all charges for a defendant in each
jurisdiction are in a single record)
New warrants data includes 1.2 million total records, with arrest
and bench warrants
 New criminal and arrest images, when available
==
WestlawNext: Law clerk starter kit
Here are some ways WestlawNext can get your research started quickly
and painlessly.
If you’re a new clerk—or just someone who’s not yet comfortable doing legal research—
WestlawNext is your friend. Here are a few ways you can jump-start a legal research
project and get right to the documents that are most important.
Global search, narrowing results with Am Jur® 2d and CJS® filters
If you are unsure where to start, here’s a suggestion: Run a plain language search from
the search box. (Don’t worry about jurisdictions, databases, or anything else yet.) You
will retrieve a result page with links to probably thousands of primary and secondary
sources. Then you can use the filters in the left column to focus on content from
American Jurisdiction, Second Edition, and the Corpus Juris Secundum filters. Click
Secondary Sources, select the American Jurisprudence, Second Edition and Corpus
Juris Secundum check boxes under Other Publications, and click Apply Filters.
Each of these resources summarizes the major concepts and holdings within an aspect of
the law and provides citations to leading authorities and research references. In addition,
when you search these materials on Westlaw, you can jump directly to-and from-a wide
variety of primary and secondary sources via hypertext links.
ALR analysis of a relevant case or statute
Once you identify a case or statute that pertains to your issue (whether you retrieved it in
a global search or saw it cited in a secondary source), see if American Law Reports
(ALR) has done an annotation on it. ALR contains thousands of annotations that analyze
federal cases and statutes. In addition, the annotation contains many citations to related
cases, statutes, treatises, and other sources. Like many databases on Westlaw Classic and
WestlawNext, ALR provides links for easy viewing of cited documents.
To retrieve ALR analysis for case or statute, click the Citing References tab; then click
Secondary Sources in the left column and use an ALR filter to narrow the secondary
sources result. For a statute, you also have the option of hovering your pointer over the
Context & Analysis tab and clicking ALR Library.
Link to ALR annotations on Context & Analysis tab
Browsing by topic
To browse primary and secondary sources on a topic, you might not even need to run a
search at all. Click the Topics tab on the home page, then click the topic that most closely
applies to your issue. A topical content page is displayed, from which you can follow
links to a variety of publications and content types. You can browse many of these
publications (e.g., statutory codes and treatises) by clicking their titles and then their
headings in their respective tables of contents.
Using Favorites
Are there practice areas, publications, statute titles, regulatory chapters, West topic and
key numbers, courts, or other items you tend to search often? Then add them to the
Favorites section on your home page. Once items are added to the Favorites section, you
can use check boxes and the Favorites search box to search them directly.
To add one of these items as a favorite, browse to the applicable content page,
publication, publication portion (e.g., chapter or subchapter), portion of the West Key
Number System, or content category (e.g., Environmental Law Cases). Click the star or
Add to Favorites at the top of the page. You are then given the option of saving it to a
Favorites group or creating a new Favorites group to help organize your Favorites
section.
Free help is available!
If you need ...
Then
a password
contact your organization’s Westlaw
administrator.
access to Westlaw Classic or WestlawNext
contact your organization’s Westlaw
administrator if you can’t access Westlaw
Classic or WestlawNext from the computer
you use.
answers to general questions about
Westlaw Classic or WestlawNext
call West Customer Technical Support at
1-800-WESTLAW (1-800-937-8529).
assistance with Westlaw Classic or
WestlawNext research
call the West Reference Attorneys at
1-800-REF-ATTY (1-800-733-2889).
==
KeyCite® on WestlawNext: It’s easy here, too!
You'd expect KeyCite to have a prominent place in WestlawNext. And you'd be
right.
Among the first things you'll notice when you try out WestlawNext are some timesaving enhancements to KeyCite, including the following:
Quick access to KeyCite history from case or statute
When you’re viewing a case, statute, regulation, or law review article on
WestlawNext, current KeyCite history is available on the History tab. (For a statute
or regulation, hover your pointer over the History tab and click Validity; for a case,
click the History or Negative Treatment tab.) For a current display of citing
references you can filter as you see fit, click the Citing References tab.
History tab on displayed USCA section
Citing References display
Quick access to KeyCite history from search box
If you know a document’s citation, you can quickly display the KeyCite negative
direct history or negative citing references for it: Simply type kc or keycite
followed by the citation in the text box at the top of any WestlawNext page, e.g.,
you can type kc 378 fsupp2d 1249. Then click Search.
To view the full-text document, related court filings, and additional history and
citing references, click the appropriate tab at the top of the KeyCite result.
==
WestlawNext: Your source for expert witness profiles
Q: Can I use WestlawNext to identify accident reconstruction experts in my
home state of Florida?
A: Yes. WestlawNext gives you several ways to retrieve expert witness
profiles from a specific subject area in any jurisdiction, including the
following:
 Run a search from the search box: Select a jurisdiction and type a
description of the subject matter in the search box, e.g., accident
reconstruction. Then use the Expert Profiles (under Expert Materials)
and Jurisdiction filters to narrow your results.
 Run an advanced search from the Expert Profiles category page:
Click Expert Materials on the All Content tab, then click Profiles on
the next page that is displayed. Use the Advanced Search template
to specify the state and area of expertise (there are several options
within the Accident & Injury category).
 Retrieve a deposition, jury verdict, court filing or other document
related to the subject matter within the jurisdiction and click expert
names when you see them.
Expert witness profiles have long been available in WestlawNext. Now,
these documents are native to WestlawNext, e.g., document views and
searches now appear in your WestlawNext history.
To retrieve references for an expert, click the References tab above his or
her expert witness profile.
Expert witness profile on WestlawNext
==
WestlawNext: Legislative history in one fell swoop
Q: I’m doing legislative history research on sec. 1001.055 of the Texas
Education Code, and I want to retrieve all versions of this statute that have
been in effect since 2005. I browsed to the Texas Statutes & Court Rules
page, where I clicked Texas Statutes Annotated–Historical. A page of
links to individual years was displayed, but it didn’t look like I could search
more than one year at a time. How many searches do I need to run?
A: Just one: Type fi: tx educ 1001.055 in the search box and click Search
to find the section. From the displayed statute, hover over the History tab
and click Versions on the menu. The versions of the statute are listed in
reverse chronological order.
If you also want bill drafts, committee reports, and other legislative history
materials for each version, hover over the History tab and click Graphical
Statute on the menu. Select the check box for each version for which you
want legislative history material; a list of available documents is displayed
for each section you selected.
The historical versions feature was recently expanded. Jurisdictions with
this feature now include USCA and CFR, as well as AR, CA, CT, DE, FL,
IL, MA, NV, NJ, NY, OH, PA, and TX statutes. Watch for additional
jurisdictions to be added through 2013.
Historical versions feature on WestlawNext
==
OUR NEWEST USER GUIDES
Cost-Effective Research Tips on WestlawNext (published September 2012)
This quick reference guide provides 12 cost-effective research tips to help make your WestlawNext
research session more efficient.
Managing and Deleting Court Feeds and Newsletters on Westlaw Court Wire (published September
2012)
This quick reference guide shows you how to manage and delete court feeds and newsletters on
Westlaw Court Wire.
West Key Number System (published August 2012)
This quick reference piece lists West digest topics and their numerical designations and shows how to
search using topic and key numbers.
WestlawNext: Searching with Topic and Key Numbers (published August 2012)
This quick reference piece explains how to use topic and key numbers to retrieve cases and also how
to use the West Key Number Digest to find topic and key numbers related to an issue.
Using Westlaw Court Wire (published September 2012)
This quick reference guide shows you how to track issues or parties, monitor industries, or find and
distribute information about new court filings with Westlaw Court Wire, including how to create daily email newsletters that report your court feeds to designated recipients in your office.