Working with the District of Columbia Bar Association
Founded in 1972, the District of Columbia Bar (DC Bar), is currently the 2nd largest unified bar association in the United States. Comprised of thousands of attorney members, DC Bar’s main functions consist of registering certified lawyers, maintaining a lawyer disciplinary system, and holding various educational and public service events. In addition to this, the society maintains high standards of integrity and conduct throughout every level of its organization by promoting the professional interest of its members and creating public programs for legal research, practice, and procedure.
With a mission of providing service to the profession, the courts, and the community, DC Bar actively assists in strengthening the administration of justice in the legal system. It also encourages the formation of voluntary bar associations in order to unify professionals in the industry and further the discussion of subjects related to the practice of law.
After realizing a decrease in staff efficiency due to a scattered structure of data flow, DC Bar desired a new method of enterprise resource management that would replace its old system of relying on multiple databases. The new solution that the organization desired not only had to provide complete integration of all information into one source but also had to be much more efficient in order to handle the bar’s growing membership base. Powerful electronic commerce capabilities were also a must as its members demanded easy, online access to publications, event registrations, professional networking opportunities and the like.
After looking at multiple AMS vendors, DC Bar decided to partner with Euclid and implement its ClearVantage software solution. “We were very happy with Euclid’s ability to meet every one of our organization’s needs for a system conversion of this magnitude—we literally had a checklist of 229 separate items that the AMS had to meet before we even considered a software solution. Euclid’s ClearVantage easily came out on top,” explains John Kinas, DC Bar’s Director of Information Technology. “In addition, one of the biggest challenges in selecting a new AMS solution was picking one that could easily provide access to all of our member services online. Euclid’s ClearVantage was the right answer to that challenge.”
Successfully implemented, ClearVantage now allows DC Bar’s members to easily stay in touch with one another by using the software’s community building functions. In addition, the organization’s staff is now able to perform controlled marketing for events and publications through the software’s ability to provide detailed demographic searches to target specific members.
“The ease of generating mass email campaigns and the ability for us to now zero in on customer preferences through one system cuts the time needed to pull up members,” continued Kinas. “In addition to all this, we now have an efficient, centralized and fixed process to manage our members’ dues. Before the switch, we were forced to coordinate with programmers to get our members’ invoices—a process that became increasingly frustrating and time consuming. Now, everything from customer invoices and accounts receivable to real-time updates of our members’ profiles is no more than a few clicks away,” says Kinas.
ClearVantage’s e-commerce and enhanced marketing mechanisms are not the only tools that allow DC Bar to better serve its members and further penetrate its market space. The software’s “products” module will allow the organization to start a bookstore that permits the association’s members to purchase courseware as well as literature published by distinguished authors and event guests—content that, according to Kinas, is waiting for a market place.
“Functionality aside, Euclid’s method of implementation also left us very pleased,” notes Kinas. “Euclid has the best team of specialists that I’ve ever worked with on a project of this scope. They listened carefully to what we had to say and were very technically competent. Every member on the project team constantly communicated with us by following up on any and all questions that we had. Overall, the implementation process was very smooth and well managed. Euclid’s team of experts was dedicated to getting the job done right, and they did just that,” concludes Kinas.