2005 Trends in Knowledge Management

June 28, 2005 Washington, DC Tania Daniels Senior Consultant eSentio Technologies Ron Friedmann Principal Prism Legal Consulting

Trends in Knowledge Management

Is KM a Separate Initiative? Baking it into the Process Expertise Locators Future Trends
Automated versus manual solutions Blogs: publishing as KM driver Collaboration E-discovery spill-over Marketing as KM movers

Trend #1 Is KM a Separate Initiative?

Is KM a separate firm initiative? Or is it the overlooked business process of law?
Attorneys are knowledge workers Practice of law is the application of legal principles to a unique set of facts Requires utilization of research resources, work product, expertise

Trend #1 Is KM a Separate Initiative?

What are the goals of KM efforts?
More effectively utilize internal and external knowledge resources Requires understanding practice specific requirements, workflow analysis, collaboration efforts

Organizational KM confusion: where do KM groups reside?

Within IT department Within Library Separate department

Trend #1 Is KM a Separate Initiative?

Where does firm know-how reside?
DM, E-mail, RM, CRM, Accounting, Marketing, HR

Is the attempt to organize content and resources, cull best practices and precedents, and identify expertise separate from the requirements of practicing law? If not, how does this change the organization and management of a firm KM program?

Trend #1 Is KM a Separate Initiative?

Trend towards viewing KM as an integral part of business of practicing law Benefits of an integrated organizational perspective:
Requirements gathering analysis look at the practice of law from attorney perspective Offers integration opportunities in daily workflow routines Becomes a firm-wide initiative that everyone benefits from not just those inclined to use KM resources

Trend #2 Baking it into the Process

Processes with KM opportunities Hiring Client development Matter in-take Matter staffing Document and e-mail creation Time keeping Official filings (court, SEC, etc) Vendor or expert retention End of matter (deal closes, litigation done) Records management

Trend #2 Baking it into the Process

Examples of Specific Firms Discussion

Trend #3 Expertise Locators

What expertise do you want to track?
Internal Substantive Who Knows What
Who knows about issue A in context of facts B?

External Who Knows Whom

Whos appeared before Judge X in jurisdiction Y? Whos worked with co-counsel J?

Substantive versus Process

How do you define expertise?

Number of hours billed Self-ranking Contextual analysis of documents/e-mail

Trend #3 Expertise Locators

Whats out there?
LawPort
Number of hours billed, adjusted if necessary Self-rankings with comments Bios include expertise Categorized by firm taxonomy topic, industry, jurisdiction, language Topic Pages view expertise on subject Matter Pages view others with expertise on topic

Trend #3 Expertise Locators

Whats out there?
Recommind Matters & Expertise
Number of hours billed Links to bios, documents, other matters

ii3s AdvanceKnowledge
Expertise determined by number of documents submitted within a taxonomy category

Trend #3 Expertise Locators

Whatever happened to?
Tacit
Contextual analysis of email, documents, portal/Intranet content, extranets ActiveNet is still active but not in legal

Kamoon
Gone? [URL is no longer active]

Trend #3 Expertise Locators

Homegrown Solutions
Many firms continue to rely on e-mail messages to distribution lists Questions sent to central address Collect answers into full-text searchable databases with web interface Find prior answers, expertise Way to market expertise as well as collect it

Trend #4 Future Trends - Overview

Automated versus manual solutions Blogs: publishing as KM driver Collaboration E-discovery spill-over Marketing as KM movers

Trend #4 Future Trends

Automated versus manual solutions
UK and Australia rely on PSLs US trend is toward automated solutions
Enterprise search (e.g., Recommind) Work product retrieval (e.g., Practice Technologies, West KM)

Trend #4 Future Trends

Blogs: publishing as KM driver
Blogging is big Some large firms have public blogs At least one uses blogging internally Ease of posting combined with RSS feed may lead to paradigm shift

Trend #4 Future Trends

Collaboration
Collaboration is hot again Microsoft acquired Groove expect to see more collaboration built into Office
Collaborative spaces may create new opportunities to capture knowledge

Wikis gaining ground

Collaborative blog anyone can post Many large companies already use

Trend #4 Future Trends

E-discovery spill-over
Big dollars are flowing to e-discovery Software likely eventually to substitute for some lawyer review - semantic engines to support this are improving Potential to apply software developed for ediscovery to KM

Trend #4 Future Trends

Marketing as KM movers
Marketing departments need ready access to lawyer expertise, deals done, and cases handled In some firms, Marketing and KM aligned to capture the same key information

Concluding Thoughts
Schools of thought
Firms that dont do KM will die KM is a competitive advantage Theres no penalty for being a late adopter

Market pressure is missing

GCs say that want KM but dont vote their dollars Fixed fees favor KM but hourly billing reigns

But some firm dynamics favor KM

Merged firms must cross-sell Associate retention and lawyer life styles Risk management