Sync Your Google Calendar with Outlook - For Free

We firmly believe that lawyers benefit greatly from practice management software designed expressly for law firms.  Ordinary personal information managers (PIM's) such as the Palm Desktop or Microsoft Outlook, even when they share info over a network or the Web (which may be difficult or require additional hardware, software, or services), come up short primarily for one reason:  They have no ability to organized information based on a case or matter.  Instead, they organize information based on contacts.  That is not how firms organize their files.  Look in your file cabinet.  Your files are likely organized by case or matter, not by contact.

Because of this organizational shortcoming (and for other reasons as well), programs like Amicus Attorney and Time Matters (Lexis-Nexis Front Office) are much more useful.  However, if you decide for cost or other reasons to stick with Outlook as your PIM, you can still share a calendar over the Web with your partner, associate, legal assistant, and/or secretary even if you don't have an Exchange Server.  All you need is a free Google account.  A Google account includes nice features such as Gmail, Google Docs, and Google Calendar.  Your Google Calendar can be shared with others.  Those with whom you share your Calendar, such as others in your office, can be given viewing rights only, or you can grant them the right to change, add, or delete appointments. 

Although the Google Calendar is Web-based, requiring a live Internet connection to access it, you can automatically sync your Google Calendar with the Calendar module in Microsoft Outlook 2003 or 2007.  All you need is the free Google Calendar Sync utility.  It is easy to download, install, and configure.  You can set sync intervals after you install the utility.  You can also choose between full 2-way synchronization or a 1-way sync in either direction.

Google Calendar and Google Calendar Sync will let your assistant view and manage your Calendar from the Google Calendar web interface.  When events are added, deleted, or changed by your assistant, they will automatically by synchronized with your copy of Outlook.  If you don't have your computer with you, you can log into your Google account from any computer with Internet access and instantly see those changes.  Once you are back at your computer, the Google Calendar Sync utility will make sure the changes in your Google Calendar also appear in your Outlook Calendar.  If you sync a Palm or other device with Outlook on your PC, the changes in your Outlook Calendar will then be transferred to that device at your next hotsync. 

If you opted for 2-way synchronization in your Google Calendar Sync options, changes you made in Outlook will automatically appear (once you reach your next sync interval) on your shared Google Calendar for your assistant to see.  If you make changes or additions to your Calendar on your Palm or other handheld device that syncs with Outlook, then perform a hotsync, those changes will go into Outlook and then to your Google Calendar at the next sync interval. 

Note that the default Google Calendar Sync interval is 120 minutes.  If you want more frequent synchronization, shorten the interval.

Although practice management software offers many advantages over traditional PIMS, it is possible to combine free software and services with Outlook to make it a more useful PIM for your law practice.