P2P

56 P E E R T O P E E R : I L T A ' S Q U A R T E R L Y M A G A Z I N E | S P R I N G 2 0 2 0 F E A T U R E S Usage Drives Utility Firms have tried to pull together disparate sources of data with additional profiling in the past. But these were usually point or transient solutions (for examples, feel free to reminisce about Excel- based experience matrices!). Today, with business drivers from Finance, Knowledge Management, Business Development, and other functions - not to mention in response to the challenges of need to know security - firms are renewing their focus on the importance of experience management, and all the related entity data that new systems are required to keep up. Having a central platform for cross departmental use that includes experience management, expertise location, client management and other configurable uses enables teams to take advantage of the day to day work of others. The KM team improves their search outcomes through integration with the narratives Business Development creates for proposals. Matter events fed in from an integration with third-party data and analytic providers help to feed predictive analytics to improve outcomes, as well as inform more accurate pricing and budgeting estimates. When implemented across departments, practices, and industry teams a central platform encourages a common language to form around information that can help break down silos between people as well as data, enabling the firm to be more responsive to its clients and capitalize on opportunities. Getting to a 360° Client View Lawyers have been asking to see dynamic client "tear sheets", including key indicators, related work, practice involvement, and important relationships inside and outside of the firm for as long as I can remember. Prior attempts like CRM solutions and internal dashboards have frequently not lived up to expectations because, for a variety of reasons, they have incomplete data reflecting a limited number of use cases. A full, real-time view of a client that works for relationship partners and client teams requires details from many internal systems blended together to create the full picture. To return to our example of a system like Foundation, platforms of this type make it easier both the bring data together for comprehensive use cases and to identify the gaps which emerge between siloed systems with their own siloed objectives. It helps to have cross-functional use cases to concretize the need to reduce complex data intricacies between time and billing, CRM, ERM, and HR. In other words, our client profile use case can be both the driver of change, the identifier of gaps, and an output that exemplifies the benefits of data management and information governance processes. This happens when partners can click to pull up a client to understand the state of the client relationship, including key health metrics, diversity statistics, practice involvement, billing trends, relationships amongst portfolio companies, etc. They can then drill down to any of the related information to get necessary details about related attorneys, matter specifics, and third-party details. The lesson here is that delivering value to end users leads end users to request more reports and analytics. This leads to more data integration, process improvement, and competitive analytics. Knowledge Management in a Need to Know Environment The least privileged security model presents particular challenges knowledge management in the legal profession. Clients requiring need to know access to their documents make it difficult for lawyers to identify and retrieve relevant prior work product, and to gauge colleagues' experience based on past matter contributions. This places a firm intelligence platform at the core of a firm's ability to function as a law firm under the least privileged security model, versus a series of client walled off silos under a single umbrella. By consolidating matters from internal firm systems and enriching them with contextual "A firm intelligence platform is the way to maintain a firm's value proposition as a law firm."

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