Digital White Papers

July 2014: Knowledge Management

publication of the International Legal Technology Association

Issue link: https://epubs.iltanet.org/i/355985

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ILTA WHITE PAPER: JULY 2014 WWW.ILTANET.ORG 34 WHAT IF THE DATA WERE PERFECT? A huge challenge for law firms in this changing, dynamic market is making sense of the mountains of data they currently sit on. The existing data structures were defined in a time when prices and demand rose every year, well above the market. As an example, time entries are structured with essentially one goal in mind: getting the client to pay the bill. As a result, the data is poorly structured (or not structured) for new, more demanding needs. Data analytics gives firms the ability to correct that problem, to discover and impose new structures on the binary large objects or BLOBs firms now own, such as images, audio or multimedia files. It's time for legal KM professionals to get out the magic data analytics wand and start waving it! Or is it? To answer that question, I pose the following one: What if the data were "perfect?" Let's assume for a moment the wand has been waved and the data in a given system is well-structured and perfect. (I realize "perfect" is an ideal that might never be attained. What I am proposing is we consider a firm's data to be the opposite of the current garbage in, garbage out model.) THE LESSONS OF CRM Let's consider the assumptions about the value of data, even if you think it is perfectly structured, in the example of early customer relationship management (CRM) systems. The promise of CRM was focused on business development. Demos would show how easily the system would identify various relationships between firm personnel and clients. The situations defined within a demo would show how a hypothetical lawyer wanting to contact a prospective client could easily see who in the firm already knew someone working for the client. The relationships might come from current work, past employment, law school or many other connection options. The idea was that the lawyer could then leverage existing relationships to gain access to the client to win more work. That was not exactly how it played out. What firms found was the data were not very good. Lawyers had basic contact information, but it was inconsistent. Lawyers also were not inclined to take the time to add in their various relationship points of contact that would make the system as useful as the demos were, and why would they? Firms were asking them to use their time to enter relationship data when the core and stronger message was to bill time. Since then, firms have tried repeatedly to solve this dilemma, usually by upgrading the software to make it easier for lawyers to enter data. Some firms hired data stewards to continually monitor the data and clean it up. Some firms even mandated lawyers to enter data, typically in order to get reimbursement for client development expenses. But still, the data have never been up to par with the promise. What if our magic wand could make the data meet that promise? Firms that could do this would have a competitive advantage in the market. Their lawyers would be more successful at developing client relationships and thus get more work — ideally. Perfect data and great technology are not enough, even when both are dedicated to solving a clear problem.

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