Happy New Year to you all!
Hope you had a good 2010 and I wish you all a great 2011. As per last year I thought I’d try a prediction of the technology areas that I will be big for Legal IT in 2011, so here it is my top 5 2011 list of legal IT technologies.
At #5 we have a new entry: More a grouping of technologies I’ve termed "Glue Tech”. The technology that sits between one or more core Legal IT services. Technology like IntApp that uses information in existing systems and applies logic to other systems. Also bespoke developed applications to join systems in ways that provide extra benefit for the lawyer. I also include workflow and case management applications like VisualFiles in this category, a recent visit to a smaller law firm highlighted some of the benefits joined up applications in VisualFiles can make to a business process.
Down two places at #4 we have Microsoft Lync. I think the instant messaging aspect of lync will continue to push into law firms in 2011, especially with the introduction of Office 2010. But the other features of Lync may take longer than 2011 to become widespread in law firms.
New in at #3 is a technology that will be very familiar, but maybe new to law firms and that is YouTube. Or at least similar online video capabilities, this has huge potential for IT training etc. Think about it, if you’ve a tech problem at home who hasn’t searched for a how-to video from YouTube?
Up three places to this years #2 is Mobile Applications. The Smartphone is here, the iPad is on a march and with Android and BlackBerry tablets are starting to come to market. That mobile application market that has exploded in the consumer arena is surely ready to crack the business market. We just need to crack the risk/IT security aspect to it!
And up two to take this years #1 spot is Office 2010 and Windows 7. Sure it’s not sexy tech and yes it’s Microsoft centric. No, it’s not social or cloud computing, but it is the bread and butter stuff of law firms whether you like it or not. Office 2003 and Windows XP need to retire and this is the year.
So the top tech in legal IT may not be cutting edge, but it reads to me like a true corporate IT list. Nothing frivolous, but no longer 5 years behind. Behind these applications I suspect there will be a push for technologies to control the vast amounts of data law firms are now generating, whether this is cloud or self hosted I’m not sure. If the legal and risk aspects can be ironed out then maybe cloud will start to grow.
As for social computing? I don’t think there will be any killer application that makes it’s way into Legal, but all the top five will bring some degree of social computing with them.
So that’s my five, am I on the mark or way off? Let me know in the comments.
Jason, some great predictions. I actually think #2 and #3 are well connected. There are some interesting opportunities for reaching out to clients and employees using video inside a mobile app. Video might be just what we need to take legal apps to the next level.
I’m curious to know what you mean by “We just need to crack the risk/IT security aspect” For this, are you referring to the risk associated with distributing sensitive information to clients/employees using mobile apps?
John, yes exactly that. The perceived risk of losing unencrypted data on those mobile devices. Or access to data being obtained through those devices.
Hi Jason,
Glad to see you back with another set of predictions for the coming year.
I think you are right about #1 and #2.
At #3 I’d have Cloud Computing / SaaS – for companies with less than 500 employees its a no-brainer. Why run your own Exchange Server for instance when you can get higher quality of service at lower cost from a SaaS provider?
At #4 I’d have social computing for the enterprise / Intranet 2.0 / Enterprise 2.0 – whatever you want to call it. In the Microsoft stack I’d expect SharePoint 2010 to get a higher uptake than Lync for instance in the coming year.
Jason, thanks for the clarification. It’s interesting that you say perceived risk, it sounds a lot like the early days of cloud computing when companies were fearful of using cloud based CRM systems like Salesforce.com.
I think in the end though, the convenience of having access to the information people need to make their decisions while on the go will win out over the perceived risk. Either way it ends up though, it’s shaping up to be an exciting 2011!
I’d agree with all your predictions Jason, nice list. On the perception of risk point mentioned in other comments, the thing is that it’s not just our perceptions (the law firms) but those of our clients.
Whether people think we’re being paranoid about information security doesn’t really matter, it’s what the clients think about it that’s important, and they won’t accept the argument that it was more convenient and cheaper to expose sensitive information to risk.
So I think you’re right to flag up that risk/security needs tackling, and also to infer that it will be cracked somehow – we can and should be innovative, but we just have more hoops to jump through than other sectors…
A good list with many very relevenat technologies. Inspired by this I decided to write my own list, with a viewpoint more on the SME law firms: http://bit.ly/idlCCr