Microsoft finally enters the KM space with Knowledge Network

Bill Gates announced yesterday at Microsoft's annual CEO Summit, their first product targeted towards knowledge management, more precisely centered on expertise location called Knowledge Network, which will be a part of SharePoint 2007. There's a brief blurb about it here on a ZDnet page from the UK. I've already got it on good authority that there's an API developers will be able to tap into to extend the functionality of this tool (which predominately mines e-mails and contacts to help determine expertise in certain subject matter). Knowledge Network technology looks through workers' email and other data and then automatically generating working profiles of expertise. The software also takes a page from social networking sites in the way that workers get matched up with in-house experts. The software can see if the information seeker and expert have any worker friends in common who might be able to make an introduction. Workers can also choose whether they want to be open to being contacted directly.

Out of the box, I'm sure this tool will need a lot of work to truly help mine experience and expertise within a law firm, but it's good to see Microsoft enter the KM arena.

ILTA KM Session - KM 101: The Three Stages of Knowledge

This is the first session spawned from the new KM Peer Group for ILTA. You do not have to be a member to attend this session.

Join us for an overview of Knowledge Management focusing on the three stages in the KM Systems Maturity Model. This will be a discussion on what a firm just beginning a knowledge management program should focus on to develop a successful program and things to consider in developing projects for intermediate and advanced knowledge management programs.

Our Speaker:
John Szekeres is the Assistant Director of Knowledge Management for Cleary Gottlieb Steen and Hamilton LLP. John has worked to develop the firm’s Intranet as well as various knowledge repositories including discussion forums, deal tracking databases and precedent databases allowing practitioners throughout the firm’s 12 offices to collaborate and share their knowledge. He has worked with the lawyers at the firm to develop methods and techniques to enhance collaboration, workflow and the transfer of knowledge. Prior to joining Cleary Gottlieb, John was with the legal publishing company of Matthew Bender & Co. Inc., a part of Lexis-Nexis, where he helped to develop CD-ROM libraries and later publishing on the Internet He is the Vice-Chairmen of the Electronic Communications Task Force Committee (ECTF) of the New York State Bar Association and was a member of the executive committee of the Law Practice Management Committee. John has served as a speaker for numerous seminars in the area of knowledge management and Internet research for lawyers.

Fee: The fee is PER CONNECTION and is $25 for ILTA members and $75 for non-members. You will receive connection (both phone and internet access) information upon receipt and processing of payment.

REGISTER online under the Meetings page at ILTA's website (http://www.iltanet.org/).

Questions? Please contact Peggy Wechsler at 210.481.5451 or peggy@iltanet.org.

Getting lawyers hooked on EDD processing, the paper v. plastic dilemma

While much has been made over the last 12 months about e-discovery, Zubalake and Morgan Stanley, the reality is that many lawyers and their clients are still a bit naive and shocked about the costs involved in properly handling e-discovery. This is especially true when you talk about the cost to processing e-discovery, with prices as high as $2,000 per GB. In many instances the costs to simply process the data can seem extremely high in comparison to the legal fees billed to handle the matter. For example how does a lawyer handle 10GB of e-discovery, which isn't a particularly large amount, when they'll likely bill less $50,000 to the client? Sending this to a vendor could cost as much as $10,000, which would be 20% of the fees billed.

What often happens in these cases is that the lawyer ends up forgoing the 'proper' method in an effort to save money and asks 'just to take a look at what's inside all these PST files'. Which means pulling them into Outlook, not the most effective platform for review. More firms, including ours, are looking to bring some of this in-house to offer more cost effective solutions for our clients, but at the same time, vendors are beginning to lower their rates to stay competitive.

We just started a 'paper v. plastic' roadshow to help illustrate the differences between handling electronic discovery the traditional way (printing everything out) and keeping it electronic. One of the most compelling demonstratives we used in the presentation was a visual of what a CD worth of printed material can potentially look like, since this is often what they lawyers are produced and their knee-jerk reaction is to just ask for it to be printed. What had a local vendor bring us 20 empty boxes and stacked them up in the conference room. While a bit over the top, it made the point to those in the audience that if they are asked to have everything printed from a CD, this room full of boxes could be the result. It was very effective at getting their attention and helping illustrate the need to keep things electronic.

We're hoping that by bringing this in-house (for small to mid-sized projects only) we'll be able to keep our lawyers from printing everything and ensure they are using the best tools for the job. While I'm optimistic about this project, we'll see how many of the old dinosaur lawyers we can get off of their paper and into the digital age :)

Knowledge Management v. Practice Enhancement

In recent years, I've struggled to try and define knowledge management. I actually joke about it when partners at my firm ask me "What does a Chief Knowledge Officer do anyway?" and my response is often "When I find out, I'll let you know" - which is usually followed by a chuckle. I used to give this long winded, jargon filled response that would typically make a lawyer look at me the same a dog does when you've said something they don't understand - head tilted sideways with one eyebrow lifted. I know that it's been commonly stated that KM means different things to different people and if you pressed me for an answer I guess I'd say that KM ultimately means getting the right information to the right people at the right time. But, does that really help a lawyer understand the value you bring?

I've always felt what we do, at least at my firm, isn't so much 'knowledge management', we're really focused more on what I'd call 'practice enhancement'. This should not be confused with 'practice support'. I think the tools and services most firms offer these days are no longer really in support of a lawyers practice, but truly enhance the way they practice.

Evidence of this shift can be seen in several areas, even in the upcoming Ark Group KM Conference in NY. There's a session titled 'Is KM Morphing into Practice Support Consulting?' Ron Friedmann (Prism Legal Consulting), David Hambourger (Winston & Strawn), and Eugene Stein (White & Case) are presenting on the topic. And while I would debate that what most firms are doing isn't supporting, but enhancing their firm's practice, the point is that more and more firms are starting to look at KM in alternative ways. And if you look at the agenda, many of the sessions are focused on breaking out of the traditional KM topics.

Hunton and Williams, Alston Bird and several other firms have a team of business analysts or consultants that are dedicated to KM or practice support functions. Sonnenschein has someone on their team with the title of "Director of Consultant/Client Advocacy" (I'm jealous).

While I'm not quite ready to dump 'knowledge' from my vocabulary, I am ready to put my focus on enhancing the way my firm's lawyers practice law.

The Best KM Software Yet? Yahoo 'Answers' the Question

Okay, so if you've noticed, most of my posts don't talk about traditional KM systems (if there is such a thing), but I think I've found something very interesting that Yahoo has in beta now, http://answers.yahoo.com. With a Yahoo account, you can start using the system right away. The interface is very easy to use, allows you to associate your question to their taxonomy, tracks and rewards the number of questions you post and respond to and provides additional 'points' when your answer to a question is deemed the best by the asker. If you ask too many questions without responding to any, you eventually run out of points, which is a good way to ensure people contribute. The more points you rack up, the higher your rating is in the system. The system also allows you to browse questions by topic, conduct full-text searches among questions and check the status of questions you post or respond to. You'll also get e-mail notification when your questions are answered.

The methods and principles used by Yahoo Answers are basic and straightforward. Anyone with a sharp developer could build something similar to help capture and retrieve information at their firm, rather than this information being lost in the "All Attorney" e-mails that go out.

A nice compliment to CRM - Social Networking

For those of you lamenting over the level of effort required to keep your CRM systems up-to-date or the lack of use by lawyers, these new tools may be the answer.

Social networking has been around for a while. Personal products like Plaxo, Spoke and LinkedIn have millions of users and offer several nifty features. For example, LinkedIn has an optional plug-in that will mine your e-mail traffic, create Outlook Contacts and upload them to your LinkedIn account, hosted via an ASP. While this type of mining may be okay for individuals, I doubt most firms would be interested in something that requires you to upload the firm's contact information to a public ASP. However, the concept of mining e-mail has emerged in two products which do allow you to host the software on your own network, Contact Networks and Branch-IT. Visible Path is also a really interesting product, but they only work on a ASP model.

What I like about Contact Networks and Branch-IT is that these products address two crucial shortcomings of traditional CRM systems. First, because they mine your firm's e-mail server and create individual contact records from e-mail your lawyers send and receive (filtering out spam and other junk mail) there's absolutely ZERO data entry required by lawyers or their secretaries - genius. The second thing these systems do is offer various access levels to contact information, which can provide lawyers a much greater level of control over the use of their contacts then in a traditional CRM system. Contact Networks takes it a step further and maintains their own database of companies, along with the executives of those companies, and the system will attempt to match up (based on the domain of the e-mail) an e-mail address not only with a company, but with an individual person. Their database also tracks what industry/SIC code the company is in, which is great information hard to manually keep in CRM.

That being said, these systems aren't meant to replace CRM, they are simply meant to offer a supplement for the all important 'who knows who' questions that arise. CRM still is needed to manage mailing lists, track opportunities, etc. But, if you're firm is serious about leveraging its relationship capital, these tools shouldn't be overlooked.

Law Firm Inc. Recognizes Blogging Trend

Business Week magazine ran a May 2, 2005 cover story on blogs, Webster proclaimed that the word 'blog' was the most looked up term in 2004, so it was only a matter of time before blogging make its way to the cover of Law Firm Inc. Vickie Spang, our CMO, and I made the cover. Good thing I asked them to airbrush some extra hair on for me :)

The article in print provides an overview of what we've done at Sheppard Mullin, but also a very nice summary of other law firm's blogging initiatives. The online version is a bit more condensed. It does include some good quotes from partners at our firm who've been involved with blogging as well as law firm blogging veteran, Kevin O'Keefe, CEO of Lexblog, whom we use to design and host our blogs. If you're just starting out with blogging, or want to understand what's involved to get a blog up at your firm, this is certainly a good primer to get you started.

Knowledgeline makes Technolawyer's "BlawgWorld 2006" list

From the Technolawyer site, "According to various studies, approximately 80,000 new blogs launch every day, including dozens of legal blogs (blawgs). No one knows how many blawgs exist, but whatever the number, monitoring them would amount to a full-time job.

For this reason, we've published BlawgWorld 2006: Capital of Big Ideas, a TechnoLawyer eBook designed to take you on a journey through 51 of the most influential blawgs."

Knowledgeline is one of the 51 blogs profiled in this eBook. This is free if you're subscribed to Technolawyer, click here for more information.

Richard Susskind's Slam on US Firms

Richard Susskind recently authored an article in the Times Online titled, Backroom boys lead 'positive disruption'. In the article, he briefly talks about US firms general lack of interest in innovative technology. He correctly points out the historical void of client pressure, cultural indifference and huge profitability which leaves US law firms basking in the glow of their own success and not motivated to change direction or embrace new technologies. Probably my favorite quote from the article,

"Without hunger for change, without the worry of being left behind by the competition and, vitally, without clients clamouring for new forms of service, it will be business as usual for the US legal behemoths for many years yet. They will wring every last cent out of the increasingly unsustainable practice of hourly billing and will steer well clear of innovative IT."

While I regard Mr. Susskind as one of the most gifted and brilliant thought leaders on Legal IT issues, I do feel he's a bit short sighted in his view of US law firms on the whole. In the article, he points out one US law firm (Davis Polk & Wardwell) that he thinks demonstrates client enabling technologies that are innovative. While DPW may be the firm with the most visibility in the UK, there are many more state-side who have shown the desire and dedication to client-facing, innovative technologies. Ron Friedmann's excellent source (while slightly dated) lists many examples of UK firms implementing interesting technology, but also a drove of US firms. A few examples:

• Baker & McKenzie's implementation of BakerMAKS a KM system with document assembly capabilities.
• Bryan Cave's No Trade Zone helps obtain accurate, up-to-the-minute legal advice and opinions regarding specific international trade transactions.
• Dykema Gossett automates commercial real estate lending for all parties involved with Streamloaner.
• Foley & Lardner's web-based document drafting for IP, varied resources for HR, patent application software
• Littler Mendelson online compliance training.
• Mayer Brown's Securitization. Net service which offers resources for structured finance industry
• Morgan Lewis & Bockius' HSRscan® - Morgan Lewis provides clients with access to our searchable database of Hart-Scott-Rodino Act informal interpretations and related information
• Orrick's online compliance training program, WeComply.

There are even more listed on Ron's site and I'm sure that just scratches the surface of what's out there. Not everyone is willing to share their 'secret sauce' when it comes to innovative client-service projects.

I do believe that UK firms have historically been a bit more leading in the area of client-service technologies, firms in the US have quickly made ground in this area and do see the value in what they offer. While our business model may not support an army of PSLs running around gathering documents for a KM system, US firms are innovative and many are dedicated to providing client-facing systems that add value and create a competitive advantage.

Podcasting, the next big thing?

With blogging becoming a bit more mainstream, well at least at my firm, the next frontier for lawyers to get their message out might be podcasting. Like blogging, the barrier to entry for podcasting is minimal. With a voice recording device (handheld or through your PC), a few hundred dollars worth of hardware and software and a website or blog to publish it to, and you're all set. Some lawyers even take advantage of their commute and author their podcasts while on the road. Reed Smith intellectual property lawyer and popular blawger Denise Howell's podcast features insightful talk about the ways in which advanced technology can help lawyers on the job. She produces her podcasts by recording herself on a cell phone as she drives to work. Let's hope she doesn't cause any major pile ups on the freeway!

What's compelling to me about this medium is that it's easy for lawyers to use and is richer than text for delivery. People can get feeds via RSS, which makes it even easier to get the word out about your podcast. From the consumer's perspective, you can download this to any MP3 player or your laptop and listen to it at your convenience.

Here's what you need to get started listening to podcasts. There are a number of free podcast clients available for download. The two most popular are iPodderX (available for free at ipodder.org) and Apple Computer's latest version of iTunes (Version 5.0; also a free download). Also a great article on Law.com (subscription required) which talks about this in more depth.

I'm not sure how far this will go, or if it's a fad, but we're certainly looking into it further.

And the Legal IT Innovator of the Year award goes to..

You guessed it! The blogging initiative we've put together at Sheppard Mullin was submitted to the Legal IT Forum for consideration of an award. This award could be not entered directly. Instead, the judges looked through all the entries and rewarded any special projects or initiatives that we deemed to deserve recognition.

From the Legal IT Forum announcement, "The winner demonstrated a striking piece of lateral thinking by shifting away from standard e-newsletters to the world of Blogging. From an original readership of 10,000, the winner's blogged content has surpassed 1,000,000 hits and averages nearly 10,000 hits per day and consistently appears on the first 5 hits for relevant search terms in Google and Yahoo. The winner of Legal IT Innovator of the Year is Tom Baldwin, Chief Knowledge Officer at Sheppard Mullin Richter Hampton, LLP."

This project really was a classic example of IT and Marketing working together. Our Chief Marketing Officer, Vickie Spang, took this idea and ran with it. Without the collaborative efforts of her group and mine, this project would have never been the success it is. My post on this idea months ago kicked started our efforts, but our Marketing group was instrumental in the adoption of blogs here at the firm.

And yes, that's me in the middle donning a kilt for the event. More pictures (thankfully none that are blackmail worthy) can be found here. If you haven't attended the Legal IT Forum, it's an excellent networking event, for senior level IT professionals at firms across the globe.

New KM Survey

A group of KM professionals recently gathered by conference call to discuss the need and interest of forming a national/international group focused specifically on legal KM. We agreed that it was logical to form such a group but wanted to solicit feedback and gauge interest from a larger segment of KM professionals before taking the next steps at organization. Please take a few moments to complete this survey and provide your opinion. Thank you.

Survey Link
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.asp?u=827061357009

Building e-Discovery Teams

There has been tremendous coverage, almost ad nauseam, about e-discovery issues lately. Vendors are popping up all over the globe to process data, on-line review tools are being heavily touted and more additional forums are now available to 'get religion' on e-discovery.

What I find to be disturbing is that very few people are talking about how to practically apply and disseminate this information within their firm. All the software in the world won't prevent a lawyer from accepting discovery via e-mail and expose themselves and their firm to potential spoliation. The best e-discovery processing tools can't ensure that the collection efforts are solid. In a word, we need to educate.

What firms need to do is take a slightly more proactive approach to this issue. Getting your lit support staff and a couple lawyers trained will not be enough. Look to go deeper and the results will be amazing:

• Build an e-discovery team composed of Partners, Associates, Paralegals, Lit Support and IT.
• Be sure that you have someone from each office and practice group that handle litigation on the team - you want geographic and practice area coverage. Some lawyers will want to deal with someone 'down the hall', others will want someone who knows their practice.
• Put them through a certification program, Kroll and Applied Discovery both have excellent ones.
• Commit to meeting monthly to discuss new updates in case law, technology available and any real life situations in your firm.
• Once the team is up to speed, go about educating the rest of the firm - don't stop with your team. Setup an office-by-office road show, buy lunch and invite all your litigators and paralegals for 1-2 hour overview of the key issues.
• Publish regular newsletters on e-discovery.
• Create a page on your firm's intranet with practice guidelines, checklists, form documents and other on-line resources so that any lawyer can get some basic information in a pinch.
• Some firms even have e-discovery blogs they maintain.

Once you've gotten to this point, you've not only taken precautions to help your firm avoid e-discovery liability, but you'll be well on your way to creating competitive advantage for your firm.

9-year-old earns accolade as Microsoft pro

Okay, so this is a bit off topic, but I couldn't resist... An MCP at 9 years old? I know that kids this age are now getting cell phones, IM'ing each other, etc. but come on. I was trying to master my Atari at 9... I've got a 2 1/2 year old at home, I'm wondering if she's ready for MOUS certification?

For more on this wiz kid with no future of a social life, click here.

KM Competitive Advantage Matrix

One of the first projects I undertook here at Sheppard Mullin, was to develop a 'menu' of potential knowledge management projects that a department or practice in the firm could take interest in. Often times lawyers would ask 'What can my department do with knowledge management?' The menu, or KM Matrix, was designed to give the lawyers some starting points. I worked with Mark Keller, a consultant with a lot of experience in these projects, to help define the matrix and also attach a level of 'competitive advantage' to each project. While subjective, it would at least help guide them to projects that would potentially yield the greatest return.

Some KM initiatives have universal appeal, while others naturally lend themselves to benefit specific groups. This menu of KM options was designed to expose the world of possibilities within Knowledge Management. The idea was that we would identify projects of interest to a practice group, prioritize the various initiatives and build a KM Project Plan for the firm. The menu is not meant to be all-encompassing of every conceivable option within KM, but provide a starting point in the process.

I've attached the menu, but have omitted much of the detail as it's our IP. What's not included is more detailed descriptions of each project, highlighting the pros/cons, business issues addressed, level of attorney involvement, etc. I included the first few, so you could see what details we tried to include for the lawyers.