Simpson Neely Group

Merging Law Department Technology
The Document Production Process

Merging Law Department Technology
A Simpson Neely Group client had recently acquired another large oil and gas company and was awaiting the close of the merger. Prior to the close, SNG was tasked with merging the matter management systems of the two law departments. Both law departments were utilizing the same legal application, "CLMS" by Mitratech, but in very different ways.

SNG faced the challenge of maintaining confidentiality of data between the two companies prior to the close of the merger. SNG accomplished this important task by conducting separate interviews with the various legal teams and facilitating design sessions that excluded any discussion or examples of existing litigation matters.

Another challenge facing SNG was the time involved to close the merger. The merger was originally scheduled to close in October but actually closed almost six months later. The delay was taking a toll on members of the law department since many of the staff during this period were not certain that they would be retained as part of the new organization. To maintain a personal investment in the outcome of the project was a challenge for end users of the new system.

Very shortly after the start of the project, SNG found out that two of their five client project team members were going to be out for six weeks due to unforeseen reasons. SNG was faced with either waiting until their return, which would delay the project, or restructuring the project to accomplish tasks that did not require a significant amount of input on their part. SNG chose the latter and maintained the overall timeline of the project.

SNG knows from experience that projects, as originally envisioned and no matter how well planned, are affected by sources outside of the project team's control. SNG's ability to respond to changes quickly and creatively is extremely important to SNG clients.

In the end, SNG's client achieved full implemention and usage among members of the law department remains high to this day.

The Document Production Process
One of Penny Simpson's projects called for the creation of a process to manage litigation document productions within a corporate legal department. Although a system review was included, this project's focus was primarily process oriented.

The client was a major oil and gas corporation that was looking to reduce costs as well as risk through the development of a start-to-finish document production process. Penny led the project team through a comprehensive process mapping session that allowed participants to identify redundancies and streamline the process. In addition, the team identified and incorporated best practices into the process. The project team decided how to use internal resources efficiently and where to outsource portions of the process.

Once the project team documented and implemented the process, they interviewed and selected vendors and trained the end users. The client is now in the process of developing metrics to measure and track actual cost savings.