Law firms are beginning to incorporate technology-based training to enhance or sometimes replace classroom instruction. Several quality content providers offer a full range of online courseware on most any application or procedure in the legal environment. Whether it's training on legal specific software packages including the Microsoft XP content, or ethics and office procedures for support staff, legal trainers now have an array of effective online training tools. Online courses and other e-learning tools are, by and large, used to reduce the costs of instructor-led training and deliver more consistent training firm-wide, even over different geographic locations.

Another trend worth watching over the next 12 to 24 months is "Mobile Learning". M-learning is knowledge or training delivered via a wireless apparatus such as a PDA or web-enabled phone. The increase in use of this technology is expected to rise rapidly. A few statistics (courtesy of EmpoweringTechnologies.com) are:

• Over 75% of Internet viewing will be delivered via wireless appliances by the end of 2002.
• By 2003, there will be over 1 billion wireless devices (outnumbering land- based PCs).
• Worldwide mobile commerce will exceed $200 billion by 2004.

Leading the m-Learning trend is "chunkier" content, or content broken down into much smaller subtopics to allow for just this sort of remote and self-paced learning.

For instance, until now, if you needed to learn how to use something like Style Sheets, you might have to wade through an advanced Word course. Today courseware is being designed so that you can search through an on-line course and get just the "chunk" of information you need. As users grow more accustomed to this sort of learning, obvious benefits to firms will include reduced training costs, easier migrations, and less demand for support desk assistance.

With chunks of knowledge available through a firm's web-based training system, users can download resources at their desk or on-the-fly that can function as a traveling reference source to software, procedural issues or workplace compliance matters. For instance, how nice would it be to have a step-by-step list of instructions for a litigation support software package on a PDA that could be accessed in an instant during a trial? Or how about the ability for an employment law practice to actually create training for hiring/firing procedures that a client's managers could use and have on their PDA at all times? The possibilities are endless and will have a large effect on how firms work in the very near future.

Also, with an eye on m-Learning, new generation learning management systems -- the mechanism that delivers and tracks on-line training -- are being designed with greater flexibility. Users can download and run content on their laptops or PDAs as opposed to running from a remote server. The training can be taken, tested, tracked and synchronized with the LMS so that a firm's trainer or administrator can maintain a record of the training for all users, regardless of where or how it was delivered.

In a limited way, this kind of technology is already in use. Several CLE courses have been optimized for the various PDA platforms and are in the early adoption phase. As CLE is not typically assessed or scored, this makes for a good application in the short term. There is also some niche e-Learning software training available via PDA, but that content has not filtered down to widespread use in the legal community yet.

What does all of this mean to the law firm? It is time to start looking at how much delivery of training costs in terms of both hard dollars spent on training and lost productivity for law firms as a result of spending what would be billable time in a training classroom. Though continuing to evolve, on-line learning is here to stay. It offers positive financial and operational benefits for firms who employ it successfully. m-Learning is on the horizon and clearly in view. The savvy firm will select e-learning programs today with the flexibility to incorporate evolving technology.