Mr. Smith,
The
technological product I am evaluating for our firm today is one that is
being increasingly utilized in the legal community, Microsoft Project.
Microsoft Project is a project management software program designed to
aid in the development of a plan, assigning resources to tasks, tracking
progress, and analyzing workloads. A recent survey by ALM legal
intelligence reports that 56% of respondents were either currently using
or seriously considering using professional project management
software. Among those surveyed, MS Project was the most popular
selection with many citing their familiarity with Microsoft products as
the impetus for purchase.
It
is true that in the past our attorneys have been resistant to the
implementation of a project management software because of the increased
scrutiny from being tracked and the level of detail they were required
to disclose in order to properly delineate effective project milestones
and planned completion dates. However, the changing demands by clients
for accountability and alternative fee structures makes a tool like
Microsoft Project more relevant than ever. The goal of our attorneys
historically to increase billable hours has led to a philosophy that
efficiency takes a backseat role to increasing the quantity of work
done. The emergence of alternative fee arrangements that cap billables,
assign a flat payment, or penalize case resolutions past a specified
deadline have created a very significant incentive for our firm to
increase our productivity. Micorsoft Project is a tool we should
consider to increase our productivity and ability to work together as a
cohesive office unit to fulfil client obligations in a tighter timeframe
with set resource constraints.
One
of the benefits of using Microsoft Project as a project management
solution is its integration with other products from the Microsoft
product suite that we already employ, such as being able to easily
transition data from Word or Excel into MS Project. Additionally,
Microsoft Project uses an interface very similar to its other programs
such as the proprietary ribbon tool, which would make it easier to
acclimate our administrators and lawyers to this new piece of software.
Having a tool in place to create case-specific project plans that fully
illustrate what every portion of the case demands with regards to
actual tasks and necessary resources could be a way for our firm to
become better organized internally and possibly demonstrate the efficacy
of our operations to our clients. Also, using a program like MS
Project would enhances communication and clearly depict a centrally
managed schedule. This collaborative and easily located schedule would
be our alternative to relying on shared schedules through outlook and
should generate greater overall efficiency in our case management.
The
cost of adopting Microsoft Project is relatively straightforward with
the standard version costing $589.99 per installation and the
Professional edition increasing to $1159.99. Although in my previous
technology recommendations I have generally opted for purchasing the
Professional edition of products(Ubuntu Desktop for Business,
professional premium themes for blogging, etc.), after analyzing the
differences in the two programs I feel confident in saying that the
features that accompany the standard product should satisfy our project
management needs. The capability to build scalable solutions or use
enterprise outline codes to analyze time-phased data seems to be
superfluous for our organization. If we were to acquire licenses for
all 20 of our employees it would sum to a total of $11,799.80.
Considering that managing attorney resources falls under the auspices
of our current administrators, I do not feel it would be necessary to
enlist outside help to manage Microsoft Project. However, we should
allocate 5 hours per administrator and attorney to become comfortable
with the software and any new functions they would have to perform while
using it. With 11 combined paralegals, secretaries, and general office
workers making an average of $16/hour that would create a cost of $880.
For our 9 attorneys who would potentially not be able to generate
billable hours at an average billable rate of $200 per hour would
create a total cost of $9,000. This brings the total cost for a
Microsoft Project implementation to $21,679.80.
While
this cost of adoption is significant, it is overshadowed by the
potential income our firm could generate by creating greater efficiency
in project management and the additional business we could attract by
demonstrating to clients our firm’s ability to better meet deadlines
with a more proper management of our resources. If using a
comprehensive project management tool could eliminate administrative
redundancies in case management and scheduling to make our
administrative staff overall 1% more efficient, our firm would maintain a
savings of 0.01*288,000=$2,880 (11 workers at an average hourly rate of
$16/hour for a combined 360 hours per week or 18,000 hours totalling
288,000). Understanding that many of our clients such as school boards
are dividing their work between us and our competitors and that they
are under increasing pressure to only enlist the services of resource
efficient firms that can effectively resolve cases in a minimal
timeframe, if our dedication towards MS project could influence our
clients to hire our firm for 125 more hours a year that would create
revenue of 125 hours X $200/hour average billable rate=$25,000. This
sum estimated revenue of $27, 880 would be a recurring benefit each
year, while the $21,679.80 would be a one time expenditure and loss of
productivity that would be isolated to the date of implementation.
The
figures that I have postulated may be rough sketches as to how the
adoption of MS Project would create a net benefit for the firm, but they
also represent a significant and necessary shift in our operations to
accommodate a shifting landscape. As alternative fee assessments become
more prevalent, it only creates a greater impetus for our firm to be
able to have a streamlined project management system that could most
greatly profit under a fixed fee or missed timeframe penalty fee
structure. I recommend that we begin acquiring the licenses and
software for Microsoft Project and start to introduce our administrative
staff to its interface. Although there is always risk in integrating a
new technical component into the daily responsibilities of our legal
staff, this particular program will lead us towards being more cost,
time, and resource effective, and ultimately of better service to our
clients.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
No comments:
Post a Comment