Introduction

Choosing legal tech doesn’t have to be a mystery. IT procurement experts have developed a formula for purchasing software to reduce the mystery, and to help you plan the process efficiently. Planning, discussion and documentation can help you get through the selection and implementation process quickly, efficiently and comprehensively. This guide is designed to help you structure your process so you don’t miss anything.

This article discusses the five steps to follow on your legal tech journey:

1. Get organised

2. Define your current problems

3. Specify your requirements

4. Meet with the providers

5. Make the decision

Create a weekly or bi-weekly project working group, involving as many people on your team as practical. It helps to have a range of people from your team, and your business, for example a representative from the IT team, a couple of members of the legal team and perhaps a paralegal. Weekly meetings will help you structure the work you need to do together to understand your challenges, create requirements, meet with vendors, and to make a selection. Each person brings their own perspective and experience.

The From/To analysis

The first step is to consider where you are now, and where you want to be. The simple From/To analysis helps you and the team to clarify where you’re going and why. Here are some of the central questions.

From:

• Where are we now?

• What are we doing well?

• What are we not doing so well?

• What do we need to change?

To:

• Where do we want to be?

• What do we need?

• What do our ‘customers’ need?

• What does that look like?

• How will it work?

• What is realistic? What is optimistic?

• How long do we need it to take to make the change?

• How do we bring everyone on the journey?

Following are some of the challenges most legal teams are facing as they consider their tech needs. Asking yourselves these questions helps you to clarify your current problems, then to indicate your software requirements. The best way to attack this is to write it all down on a spreadsheet. This may be tackled in one session, or several sessions where you dig deeper into the issues.

• What’s taking the most time?

• Where are we most inefficient?

• What do our customers complain about?

• What is the level of transparency into our work?

• What’s most affecting the budget?

• What happens when someone takes annual leave? Or leaves the company?

• Where are our key documents stored? Are they located centrally?

• How quick can we turn around work?

• Can our customers serve themselves for repetitive tasks?

Brainstorm

When you’re thinking of your requirements, it’s great to brainstorm a big list with your team, with no boundaries or exclusions. The sky’s the limit! Make sure you transcribe all of the ideas, because you will inevitably forget something.

Prioritise

Now it’s time to go back and prioritise the list, with the most important starting on top of the list. You’ll be surprised that what’s important to one person is not so important to others. For example, the General Counsel may need detailed reporting for her CEO and CFO, while the team members are keener on intake forms. The group needs to work together to prioritise the list on a spreadsheet to ensure that all voices are heard, and so you don’t create a disaffected group whose needs are unmet.

What product features do we need?

Features vary somewhat between the different products, but for the most part, matter management and legal operations software products have some combination of the following modules:

How secure are the vendors’s systems?

Verified security is a fundamental requirement for legal tech to ensure your business continuity, customer satisfaction, and privacy. No one wants to meet around a table to discuss a ransomware payment or how you will inform your customers about a data breach. Provider security is usually explored in partnership with your IT team as part of the process when you are comparing your last providers. It’s important to require:

• ISO 27001 certification: this certification is externally audited and examines the quality and dissemination of an organization’s Information Security Management System, which is a set of policies and procedures designed to enforce information and data security

• SOC2 certified: SOC2 takes the process a step further by including an accounting audit to test the veracity of the security approach

• Cloud based certifications: activities such as an AWS Well-Architected review or external security assessment

• External testing and auditing: penetration tests and network vulnerability scans should be conducted regularly and available for your IT team to review.

What will the system cost? What is included?

The cost of legal tech generally depends on the size of your team and the level of complexity you want in your system. While your budget may vary depending on your company’s resources, it’s important to consider that you might end up paying for a lot of functionality that you won’t actually use. Functionality outside your requirements list may be expensive, difficult to implement and poorly regarded by your internal customers. The old adage of keeping it simple applies here.

It’s advisable to discuss your budget with the team, your manager, and/or the CFO and the IT team. Each group will have opinions and will value the consultation. You’ll also need to consider the practicalities of the vendor’s billing cycle and contract length.

Pricing for legal tech can be mysterious and it’s important to dig in deep to understand what is included in the quoted price. Hidden costs for consulting, configuration, single sign on, extra users, training, document migration or integrations can blow your budget if you forget to ask.

Researching providers

Researching providers is generally the easy part. You can search on the internet, ask your colleagues, attend conferences, and visit websites such as CLOC, ACC, and the College of Law. Providers are keen to meet you, often more than once, to find out about your needs and to build a relationship. Most providers will give a demonstration and enable you to use a trial system or ‘playpen’.

To save time, you can present providers with a list of your requirements before the first meeting. In response, they can tailor the discussion and demonstration to your needs, which saves time for everyone. In particular it means that it’s clear when a provider does not have the functionality you have requested on the requirements list.

It’s a little proscribed, but it’s important to check through your requirements list and ask for a demonstration of those things that are the most important on your list during your meeting with the providers.