Law Firm Services

Technology Assessment & Optimization

Law firms need an integrated and holistic technology infrastructure in support of information needs. In performing a technology assessment, Unbiased will design a strategy that best fits your maturity level and anticipated growth. We compare your current state technology against industry “best of breed” tools and innovative practices, providing recommendations in selection and/or leverage of software solutions and cloud-computing environments. Our deliverables include a recommended roadmap comprising project prioritizations and implementation plans that are practical and unbiased.

We are expert in all categories of law firm technology, including the following solutions in support of legal practice and business operations:

Business intake and conflicts operations are fundamental to a firm’s client and matter strategy; it enables the firm to mitigate both business and technical risk. Onboarding clients and quickly opening matters provides operational advantage. Unbiased’s experts advise on intake strategy and loss prevention; we assist our clients to re-engineer internal processes and identify needed resource skills.  Let us help you select and implement automation in support of this increasingly strategic part of the business.

Business intelligence (BI) is a suite of tools designed to capture, sort, consolidate, analyze and present data from many repositories into digestible reports. Unbiased helps to identify, cross reference and develop such reports; these can then be used to glean meaningful insight in support of quantitative management of your teams. In this way, Unbiased helps you identify opportunities to mine and expose data “nuggets” to support operational improvement.

Unbiased has broad knowledge of and deep experience with most forms of legal practice and law firm business operations processes, identifying opportunities and executing on solutions that increase efficiency through workflow automation. Cycle time reduction and cost improvements are almost always an output of these engagements.

Case/matter management software is a relatively mature technology that has been in use for over two decades. Since its inception, Unbiased consultants have taken an industry-leading role in assisting law firm clients to define requirements, evaluate, select, design, configure, implement and leverage its investment in the technology. Serving as the hub of a matter-centric computing platform, it is critical that the design of the system take into account the information and reporting needs of both the line lawyer and legal management team. Fortunately, Unbiased consultants are masters of this art form.

In today’s highly-regulated commercial environment, it is critical that lawyers assess contracts for potential issues of non-compliance as well as identify areas of opportunity for additional revenue recognition. Using the latest in machine learning, structural analysis, metadata extraction and natural language processing techniques, contract discovery and analytics software can be used to find the “needle in a haystack”, replacing manual labor with cheaper and more accurate automation. Unbiased understands the use of these tools–often grouped under the banner of “artificial intelligence (AI)”–to support contract review and analysis in areas of M&A, accounting requirements, and financial regulation.

Deal room and collaboration software allow two or more disparate organizations to work off the same data sets in a secure and easy to access cloud environment. Unbiased is expert in the selection and implementation of these solutions.

Unbiased has spent many years advising clients on solutions that enable quick development of documents using standard legal forms and templates. These automated “assembly” tools provide better self-service capability and greatly reduce organizational risk. Our expertise also extends to comparison tools that analyze, mark-up, and present changes between different versions of a document regardless of format.

Document management is a foundational tool within every law firm. Unbiased brings great familiarity across the spectrum of document management automation, including governance, standards, and best practices. Our consultants are expert in the selection, planning, configuration and deployment of document management systems–both on-premise as well as cloud solutions.

Our experts help you define requirements, select software and support the planning, project management and implementation of financial systems, including accounts payable, accounts receivable, general ledger, payroll, estimating, budgeting, and fixed assets time entry. Our team also has deep experience with report writing and business intelligence tools and we frequently assist clients to define and analyze financial and operating metrics and key performance indicators.

Unbiased helps drive change through Human Resources automation. We help our clients define requirements, select, plan and manage the implementation of HRIS, payroll, and professional development and tracking systems.

Unbiased has spent years advising clients on how best to leverage and share knowledge, best practice procedures, general communications and approved templates within and external to the legal function. Intranets and portals are two such areas where we work to articulate and distribute communications and information in support of expertise identification, knowledge sharing, and client self-service.

Unbiased has a long intellectual property (IP) practice history and experience set. We work with our law firm clients to drive electronic change in support of streamlined, automated and consistent practices in patent and trademark prosecution as well as litigation. We have teamed with some of the most progressive solution providers in creation of cost-efficient and sustainable IP best practice workflows. These solutions help lower the effort and cost related to this practice specialty.

Technology and automation are now permanently tethered to the practice and business of law. Unbiased’s consultants help you define requirements, develop your technology approach, design your plan for information architecture–data, systems and infrastructure–and build actionable budgets. Our team has worked with hundreds of law firms – helping them exploit tools that benefit the law firm and the law firm’s clients.

Knowledge management (KM) helps law firms support more efficient and effective operation–it is essential to reducing cost while maintaining quality. KM technology aids in capture and sharing of legal expertise, resulting in better team collaboration. Whether you are focused on exploiting institutional knowledge and lessons learned or on information sharing and collaboration with clients and vendors, we have the experience and know-how to help. Beyond document management, the latest-generation KM solutions include use of smart enterprise search, intranets as practice portals, and specialized tools built to take advantage of artificial intelligence techniques (i.e., structural analysis, metadata extraction and natural language processing) as well as machine-learning algorithms.

Unbiased consultants are certified Project Management Professionals (PMPs), highly skilled in how best to apply LPM concepts to legal practice. While we appreciate that LPM extends beyond any single software solution, we understand how to use latest-generation tools to assess incoming requests for legal service, plan for needed resources, execute against agreed scope, monitor and measure progress, and identify lessons learned. Where needed, we can fill any gaps where technology alone won’t suffice.

Maintaining a physical library and electronic legal research tools can be costly. Unbiased can help identify alternative solutions and services and substantively reduce such costs using our deep experience in library management and time-tested relationships and sourcing expertise.

Unbiased’s team understands litigation and the case scheduling processes needed to insure compliance with court and jurisdictional rules. We have deep experience with the industry tools to help automate this function, centrally and with consistency. Our team helps you define requirements, select appropriate software, plan, test and implement litigation docket software.

Unbiased’s team understands litigation and the case scheduling processes needed to insure compliance with court and jurisdictional rules. We have deep experience with the industry tools to help automate this function, centrally and with consistency. Our team helps you define requirements, select appropriate software, plan, test and implement litigation docket software.

Unbiased has advised hundreds of clients on configuration and use of office productivity tools–including email and word processing. Our solutions include all major third-party platforms; our emphasis on functionality and user experience drives our strategy and advice. Knowing that most lawyers prefer to work from with inside these systems, an information architecture that supports easy access to legal content through these platforms is often essential to user adoption.

The right print and scan solution will serve as the hub of your document workflow. It enables court and agency e-filings, using scanning functionality to digitize paper case files. It supports recovery of print and file costs related to cases and clients. It allows documents to be scanned and sent to your electronic document management repository. Bates stamping, scanning to email, security features, and more are all crucial capabilities of today’s multi-function devices (MFDs). Unbiased can help you select and optimize use of your print and scanning technologies–typically delivering cost savings of over 30% of current spend.

Good records management practices help reduce legal risk and lower eDiscovery costs, It includes policies (records policy), procedures (designating record type) and technology (retaining/deleting records per retention schedule). The Unbiased team includes certified records managers (CRMs) who understand records best practices and the various records, email and document management technologies that, in combination, support a good information governance structure.