Toronto’s Aird & Berlis is a full-service law firm, with 120 lawyers and 200 support staff. As with any law firm today, the need to maintain constant communications is an ongoing concern — especially because a number of our legal professionals frequently travel to destinations outside North America.
Traveling internationally can be problematic for heavy users of BlackBerrys, Treos and cell phones. Often North America-based professionals find that travel overseas can create havoc on connectivity. But the cost of replacing all devices to ensure global coverage for a handful of lawyers is far from practical, for a number of reasons. For one, most firms have already invested significantly in PDAs and cell phones, so a wholesale replacement of units to cover occasional needs is impractical. In the fall of 2004, we invested $23,000 to provide all of our lawyers with new BlackBerrys, from Research In Motion Ltd.
