Law firm IT leaders give their view on 2011: Gareth Ash (Allen & Overy)

24
Jan
2011

Geoff Zodda

The year 2011 will bring a lot of change to the legal technology industry. We at Legal IT Professionals wondered how law firm IT leaders look at the near future. To find out, Geoff Zodda put together ten questions and selected five IT leaders  from major law firms to answer them.

Today, it is Gareth Ash's turn to answer the questions. Gareth is CIO at Allen & Overy.

Will the role of the CIO/CTO change in law firms as some experts have predicted in the next year?
The role of the CIO is constantly changing as the legal industry changes, no great prediction there! The role will move further away from just "running" IT to looking at how IT can add business value primarily in the form of freeing up lawyers time and providing a differentiator to clients.

Will major IT projects that had previously been postponed as a result of the recent economy, such as upgrades, rollouts, and conversions, going to be re-initiated?
Yes, the world does not stand still nor can the law firm. "Sweated" assets and postponed upgrades will need to be restarted but also recent events in the global economy will re-shape subsequent major IT projects to reflect the changing nature of the legal environment.

Will current trends across the legal industry drive new technologies to emerge or come to the forefront in the next year? 
a) As the world becomes more regulated, tools and systems to support regulation, compliance and anti money laundering etc
b) Client collaboration, the ability to work closely and effortlessly with clients throughout the life cycle of a transaction and beyond will be a differentiator. The technologies will encompass a whole range of technologies from portal sites, social media, unified communications, document management, knowledge systems and ebilling etc
c) The constant drive to provide more for less and lower the cost base will see process improvement systems and tools being rolled out

Will the majority of firms within the AMLaw 250 develop SharePoint or other web-based portals in-house?
Not being a US firm cannot comment too strongly but I know a number of American firms are developing SharePoint sites either internally or using 3rd party resources.

Where will be the major areas of growth departmentally within law firm IT groups?
I don't envisage major growth but as more services go to cloud or get sourced from elsewhere, the need within the firm for thought leaders, commercially astute people and vendor managers will grow.

Which of the major software vendors will have the greatest impact on law firms’ spending in 2011?
Most likely Microsoft, not because of any great value but predominantly because most firms are in the MS 2010 upgrade cycle where most of our systems need to be upgraded to remain in support. Likewise some firms are at a point with their finance systems where they need to consider an upgrade - the usual suspects of Elite and Adherent along with SAP figure here.

Are law firms going to continue with VoIP technology or is there another trend on the rise within telecommunications?
Depends what you mean by VoIP? IP usage for audio communications will continue to grow, leveraging the use of more desktop based applications such as Microsoft Lync (previously Office Communicator) and Cisco Unified Communications. For some situations tapping into Skype like applications will also have its uses. The lines between a handset, desktop and the mobile device will continue to blur. Law firms are reluctant to adopt Presence but cannot resist the inevitable. Voice as an application will mean calls directed to any device, anywhere and messages picked up from any device - we already have voice messages in emails.

What types of applications will begin to be utilized that haven’t been widely used in the past?
CRM type applications and other business development tools will be a growth area. As the market gets more competitive, ways of tapping into where the value is will become more crucial. Desktop delivery and the nature of the desktop will change.

As law firms continue to take on sizable litigation matters, will firms build up their litigation and e-discovery support practices internally, or outsource services?
Most of the larger firms already have established litigation support personnel in place. The extent to which Litigation Support Managers outsource all or part of the e-disclosure process will continue to vary from one firm to the next and for one client to the next. The one certain aspect is that all litigation departments will need to have either in-house e-disclosure expertise or, at least, access to external expertise and consultancy services.
A&O has established in-house expertise and will continue to play a significant role in both e-disclosure practices and the development of the e-disclosure rules themselves. It will also continue to promote its award-winning innovative Suite of Options to assist clients in reducing their document management and e-disclosure costs.

Will firms centralize their IT departments or will they build them within the individual offices?
Command & control needs to be central. However, actual delivery of IT services will be influenced by geography, time zone, distance and the demands of the business meaning there is no one size fits all for delivery side.