Data Sharing to Show Experience - Follow Up

In my prior post, I pointed out that the biggest difficulty with implementing a system to display a law firm's experience is extracting the information from the attorneys.

Over the weekend I thought of two areas that law firm can display their experience without relying on the attorneys: litigation and securities.

For a litigation practice, you can pull the published cases in which the law firm represented a party. Lexis and Westlaw can both do this. Then you can categorize them based on the jurisdiction. Sidley Austin LLP did something like this. They show their state court experience for their Products Liability and Mass Torts Experience. The map is short on the details of what they did in each jurisdiction, but it does show that they have handled some sort of case in every state. I could also see this tool providing a detailed list of the decided cases and appeals in each jurisdiction.

For a securities practice, you can pull the filings in which the law firm represented the underwriter or issuer. You will find this capability in Securities Mosaic and LiveEdgar. Then you can categorize the issuance by industry, since that will be listed in the filing. You can also categorize the issuance by whether the firm represented the issuer or underwriter.

These are two ways to provide a rich source of data for an experience system, without relying on the attorneys to provide it.

Update: Can You Share Too Much?