Peer to Peer: ILTA's Quarterly Magazine
Issue link: https://epubs.iltanet.org/i/1274297
15 I L T A N E T . O R G D uring this difficult time, it's increasingly hard to stay connected, Mobliciti hosted a virtual wine tasting and discussion surrounding 'Legal in Lockdown' for 13 Legal IT Directors from the UK's top 20 firms including two magic circle firms. The discussion began with sharing thoughts and experiences of lockdown across firms and the change of focus from 'just get people working remotely' to 'what more IT can achieve in the current phase.' In the Beginning The move to working from home was not one that was done gradually but rather everyone, all at once and so initially IT departments threw resource at it. The aim was to just get everyone working as fast as possible, there was agreement that "everyone mucked in from IT", ensuring the transition was as quick and painless as possible. One firm stated that "we've recently completed a massive refresh, so have reasonably been okay." With another echoing this statement saying, "we had everyone able to work from home straight away due to the investment over the years." It appears that those who have already begun or allowed working from home adapted quickly to the change. Remote Support Ensuring support was available for end-users was a priority but now that the country is several months into lockdown firms are finding that "people are savvier now and therefore calls have dropped." "The first few weeks, we thought support resource would be the problem. Whilst a challenge, the business has received it extremely well. Service desk calls have dropped off a cliff after a couple of weeks. The business has truly recognised the value of our service." Another firm stated, "emails to our Service Desks has never been quite so high" with one firm moving from a 70/30 split of calls vs emails to 50/50, whilst another stated they had moved from 80/20 to 20/80. Users User behaviour has adapted to suit the new working world, where there was some resistance before around working from home, it has now been fully embraced. "Lots of things have gone really well. Seeing how the lawyers have responded has been really interesting. Lawyers with no desire to work remotely before the lockdown are amazingly starting to bill more hours as they work more effectively from home. There was also feedback from across multiple firms that people want to have more flexible working and to work remotely more often once lockdown ends. It boils down into the fact that lawyers have been forced to embrace technology and now understand the value the new tools can bring. Home Broadband Home connectivity was a highly topical subject matter, firms want to provide users with the best connectivity possible but unlike within the office, home broadband, as it stands, is not manageable. Home Broadband is "unmanageable and upload speed is a killer". Simply put, it's a contended service and frankly not designed for Enterprise. "The biggest challenges have often come from the senior partners who have big houses with a long drive in far-flung remote places!" But what can really be done to resolve the issue? "We have looked into whether it was possible to have access to someone's home broadband to help support our users, however, this quickly became a no unless we