Early in my career, I handled a complex Fair Labor Standards Act claim involving federal rules and the maximum drive time hours of school bus drivers, who at times also drove on select charter trips. I had to mesh, and ultimately argue against, the application of federal Department of Transportation rules with a specific ‘motor carrier’ exemption in the FLSA. Even describing it now probably makes you grab your mouse to head somewhere else. But wait. There’s a lesson here.

Rather than go through the normal ‘textual’ channel in my brief to describe the regulations and how they did or did not interact with the FLSA, I created a flowchart that graphically demonstrated how the regulations worked, when they applied, and how they meshed or did not mesh with the FLSA.  At the time — it was 1995– it was probably a relatively crude illustration (made in Microsoft Visio). But it allowed the judge, who was considering a summary judgment motion against my clients’ claims, to obtain a very quick overview of the statutory framework and how it interacted with relatively complex transportation regulations. It was, literally and figuratively, an illustration worth at least a thousand words.

Despite the vast amount of visual tools and related software, lawyers seem to underutilize illustrations and visual materials in briefs. I’m not sure why, other than, as in many aspects of the law, “it’s always been that way.” For some reason, we are highly skilled in the cognitive aspect of breaking down complex legal issues into understable parts, but less skilled in actually visualizing the breakdown and how the parsed-out parts interact. There are a number of ways to do that — in flow charts, diagrams, graphs, and illustrations.

My favorite is the mind map, a more robust ‘flowchart’ that allows you to map out complex problems or analytical processes. I’ve used mind maps to chart workflows, to explain complex subjects, and, as an example, to demonstrate the somewhat complicated application of the federal Residential Lead-Paint Hazard Reduction Act. Mind maps, at their best, explain in illustrations what your mind (and what other minds) go through analytically to comprehend a subject. They also help you make connections you simply cannot see through a forest of text. That’s why they make such good tools for breaking down complex legal issues and why you should consider mind mapping software as a tool in your legal technology bucket. We do.

But what to use? Though pricey, MindJet’s MindManager is top-notch, with rich features and a robust and intuitive interface. We use it here on projects for practicelaw and are experimenting with it now to demonstrate the framework for handling a case or for filing forms in a particular practice area. On the other end is the open source software Freemind. But it suffers from what a lot of open source products suffer from: a much less intutive and clunky graphical interface. Good for geeks, not so good for the rest of us. Other choices include Xmind, a much better open source product than Freemind, and PersonalBrain, which I have not used but looks very promising (and with a free version).

Very much worth mentioning is Thinking Space, a mind mapping application for your Android-enabled phone. By far, Thinking Space is the most impressive application, as it is free and amazingly useful on the relatively tiny screen you are given on your phone. Plus, you can export the mind maps as images, files, or ‘into the cloud’ and stored online. Indeed, the image in the slide show promoting this post was made in a few minutes using Thinking Space on my G1 phone.