Connect with us

Global Banking and Finance Review is an online platform offering news, analysis, and opinion on the latest trends, developments, and innovations in the banking and finance industry worldwide. The platform covers a diverse range of topics, including banking, insurance, investment, wealth management, fintech, and regulatory issues. The website publishes news, press releases, opinion and advertorials on various financial organizations, products and services which are commissioned from various Companies, Organizations, PR agencies, Bloggers etc. These commissioned articles are commercial in nature. This is not to be considered as financial advice and should be considered only for information purposes. It does not reflect the views or opinion of our website and is not to be considered an endorsement or a recommendation. We cannot guarantee the accuracy or applicability of any information provided with respect to your individual or personal circumstances. Please seek Professional advice from a qualified professional before making any financial decisions. We link to various third-party websites, affiliate sales networks, and to our advertising partners websites. When you view or click on certain links available on our articles, our partners may compensate us for displaying the content to you or make a purchase or fill a form. This will not incur any additional charges to you. To make things simpler for you to identity or distinguish advertised or sponsored articles or links, you may consider all articles or links hosted on our site as a commercial article placement. We will not be responsible for any loss you may suffer as a result of any omission or inaccuracy on the website. .

Technology

Making the journey to the cloud

Making the journey to the cloud

Just a few years ago, the idea of migrating a law firm’s document management system (DMS) to the cloud was in many cases met with suspicion, uncertainty or outright dismissal by its senior management. Today, alongside data security, the cloud is one of the most discussed topics amongst law firms, with most planning to move their DMS to the cloud at some point in the next few years.

As a naturally risk-averse profession, it’s fair to say that the legal sector has been slower than other industries in cloud adoption, with data residency, security and privacy concerns being cited as the biggest barriers.

However, the landscape is changing rapidly, and a ‘cloud-first’ strategy is being adopted by CIOs and IT Directors of many law firms and corporate IT. Yet, the biggest challenge in adopting this approach has traditionally been around how to demonstrate and convince the wider firm that this is a low-risk approach and the right strategy.

So, what considerations need to be made by a law firm on its journey to the cloud?

  1. Form a strategic cloud plan

The success of your journey to the cloud will be largely determined by the plan put in place at the offset. This needs to consider a current state analysis, inter-office collaboration and library design, data residency and hosting, and both logical and physical security. Ultimately, the objective of this design stage is to get clarity on where data is going to be hosted, how it will be accessed, and what integration rework will be required. Take time to understand collaboration processes and patterns between departments and offices; jurisdictional restrictions on data; and clients’ agreed terms for cloud hosting. Maximise efficiency by having a clear goal in mind and designing a prioritised roadmap that will outline each key stage of the process and the involvement required. Finally, appoint a project team, who can ensure buy-in from all of the necessary departments to minimise obstacles and enable any challenges that do arise to be quickly solved along the way.

  1. On premise vs hybrid cloud

Consider whether a full cloud-only approach is the best way forward for the firm, or whether a hybrid solution might be more suitable. Are you looking for a solution with direct SQL access, flexible reporting options and simple integrations? Or can these be reworked to take advantage of the lower management overheads, infrastructure costs and enhanced security offered by cloud solutions? The same solution won’t work for all law firms, so understanding the firm-specific challenges needing to be addressed will help to inform this decision.

  1. Engage the business and understand cloud data regulations

Business engagement is a crucial stage to gain ‘buy-in’ for cloud acceptance across the firm. Within the legal sector, stakeholders are likely to be risk-averse, resistant to change and have a mixed perception of the issues. Where this is the case, make sure that communications to stakeholders address these concerns. Educate them that cloud does not mean the firm compromises security or control of data, and that the needs of the client will be considered at every stage of the journey.

Understanding where your data should be located is critical, as is examining specific regulations that apply in different global regions to ensure you know which regulations apply in which jurisdiction. As part of engaging the rest of the business with your cloud strategy, make sure you feedback your findings to stakeholders so you can provide reassurance that you would not fall foul of any regulatory restrictions.

  1. Respect client requirements

Most law firms would be unwilling to turn away work if a client has specific requests around their data. A critical element of your move to the cloud must therefore be to identify which, if any, of your clients might be cloud-averse. Review your contractual terms and identify any clauses regarding data governance, residency, transfer and use of third parties to ensure your new system is able to respect these requirements. Often these restrictions are historical and can be refreshed without compromising the client relationship.

  1. Costing the cloud

By understanding client data requirements and how these map to your data, you should be able to understand and present both the commercial benefits and cost efficiencies to the wider business. Calculate the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) for different hosting options – including server costs, software licencing, future upgrades, and other relevant costs – in order to ensure final business case signoff is a smooth process.

Continuous learnings

The journey to the cloud needn’t be complicated as long as the process begins with clearly defined aims, realistic scope and a clear roadmap of how you expect the journey to unfold. Have a clear understanding of both your clients and stakeholders, ensuring you are ready to address any concerns they may have about information security. Lastly, have an exit strategy in place. Most firms move to the cloud successfully and never look back, but you need to be prepared for all eventualities.

Cloud hosting is now the primary hosting model for DMS’s. Are you ready?

David Malkinson, Technical Director, Phoenix Business Solutions

Global Banking & Finance Review

 

Why waste money on news and opinions when you can access them for free?

Take advantage of our newsletter subscription and stay informed on the go!


By submitting this form, you are consenting to receive marketing emails from: Global Banking & Finance Review │ Banking │ Finance │ Technology. You can revoke your consent to receive emails at any time by using the SafeUnsubscribe® link, found at the bottom of every email. Emails are serviced by Constant Contact

Recent Post