Published on the 08/10/2013 | Written by Newsdesk
The leaders of Australia’s law firms are playing ostrich when it comes to IT, with many keeping their head in the sand over the technology investment needed to thrive in the future…
A survey of chief information officers employed by Australia’s leading law firms has revealed a reluctance among law firm leadership to invest in the technology needed for the future.
More than half (57 percent) of the respondents to the LexisNexis/Lawtech Summit survey said that they battled with the willingness of law firm partners to invest in IT upgrades or development. This is in spite of recognition among law firm CIOs that within ten years all successful law firms will be highly automated and commoditised with routine legal work outsourced to the cloud or offshored.
The report notes that in the future, “we will see the emergence of virtual solicitors where decision-making systems will help users get legal assistance online”. Despite this apparent threat to their current business model, senior solicitors – the partners who in general actually own law firms – seem unwilling to make the necessary investments.
According to Peter Campbell, director of IT and knowledge at Sparke Helmore, “because partners are like major shareholders working beside you, they are very engaged in any initiative that will require investment. To get a business case across the line you commonly have to win the hearts and minds of more people than in a traditional corporate environment.”
However he acknowledged that, “this sometimes means you can move faster than traditional companies if the idea is a good one and the business case is clear”.
Ninety three percent of respondents to the survey said that law firm CIOs needed to assume the mantle of innovation evangelists in order to drive change and secure necessary funding.
At present however 86 percent of CIOs said that their number one priority remained improving operational cost and efficiency, rather than pioneering new business models.
The biggest challenge that CIOs reported was safely incorporating mobile devices (67 percent of respondents) followed by developing and deploying more efficient work management solutions. Securing the buy-in of partners was the third greatest challenge for law firm CIOs.
