Using technology to improve efficiency and to reduce overhead is key in any business. Right now, I am testing, along with another one of my partners (you might know Dan Best, this was his idea), voice recognition software for our firm. I would submit to you, that credit unions could also benefit from such technology.
I had tried using this technology years ago. At that point the voice-recognition technology was maybe 90%. This is, as you can imagine, insufficient. I’m extremely impressed with the voice-recognition technology being offered by the product that I’m using.
So long as I stick to my dictation skills, and dictate the punctuation and whatnot, the software functions extremely well. I’ve done some reading on typing speed versus dictation speed. Some sources say that we can speak as quickly as 300 words per minute. I doubt very much, however, that it could keep up with someone speaking that quickly. You would need a supercomputer. However speaking at 150 words a minute or even 110 words a minute is not that difficult. Typing at that speed is difficult.
One thing that attorneys can do with respect to using a secretary for dictation, is to juggle many different projects at the same time. I’m not sure how that part translates to computer dictation. Ideally, you would be so efficient that you could complete tasks, in a linear fashion, much more quickly than juggling multiple tasks with the help of a secretary. Either that or it just doesn’t translate. The jury is still out.
In any event, I have dictated this entire blog post using voice recognition. I have to say that the speed at which I completed this writing is somewhat overwhelming. I suspect that as I become more comfortable using the software, I will wonder how I ever functioned without it.
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