Royal London deploys Intapp documents to improve matter management and maximise its existing Microsoft 365 investment
Royal London, the U.K.’s largest mutual life, pensions, and investment company, chose Intapp Documents for Corporate Legal to centralize legal instruction, improve matter management, and leverage data to further enhance legal service delivery.
Overcoming the limitations of manual processes
Prior to using Intapp Documents for Corporate Legal, Royal London relied on manual processes, tools, and network drives to manage matters. “We had a disparate instruction process, we tracked matters on a spreadsheet, and we had a siloed approach to file management with limited opportunities for collaboration and knowledge sharing,” said Gökhan Koçak, Risk and Operations Executive for Group Legal at Royal London. “It was inefficient and time-consuming, and we had no real understanding of our legal matters, which made it impossible to surface meaningful insights or management information.”
The team also struggled with managing, transferring, and sharing emails, documents, and knowledge. “We relied on shared network drives for document storage, with emails being retained in individual inboxes, which introduced key-person risk,” said Koçak.
Evaluating solutions for matter management
Royal London’s Legal Operations team began searching for a solution that could address these pain points. “For the initiative to succeed, we needed to work closely with the legal team and key business stakeholders in IT and procurement, articulating what we were trying to accomplish and the value we would receive from the investment,” said Koçak.
As part of the evaluation process, Royal London’s Legal Operations team scheduled demos with a variety of providers. “Before engaging with Intapp, we had explored other vendors, and it quickly became clear that many of the alternative solutions were not as closely aligned to our requirements as Intapp Documents for Corporate Legal.”
“We were looking for a solution that met specific requirements that were important to our team and business — including simplicity of user adoption, which depended on compatibility with tools we were already using,” said Koçak. “Intapp Documents for Corporate Legal leverages our existing Microsoft 365 capabilities, which gave us confidence that we wouldn’t have problems with team user experience or business service disruption.”
“We built our business case on this,” Koçak continued, “in addition to the fact that the solution suited our budget requirements and was relatively simple to implement, as we already had clear documented processes and metadata requirements.”
Gökhan Koçak, Risk and Operations Executive for Group Legal, Royal London said: “We were looking for a solution that met specific requirements that were important to our team and business — including simplicity of user adoption, which depended on compatibility with tools we were already using.”
Taking advantage of rich analytics and knowledge capture features
Implementing Intapp Documents for Corporate Legal enabled Royal London’s Legal team to capture key metrics to monitor value and performance to inform department and stakeholder management information. “We now have a better understanding of the matters our lawyers are working on, insight into our service levels, and the ability to quantify urgent requests we’re receiving,” said Koçak. “We also use the data we’re capturing to send targeted surveys to business stakeholders as part of an effort to continuously improve the delivery of legal services.”
Using dashboards, Royal London’s Legal team can now access live data on legal matters. “If I’m in a meeting and someone asks me about the status of a matter, I can use the dashboard to see the full lifecycle of any matter,” said Koçak. “Also, producing regular management information can now be done with the click of a button. Previously, sourcing matter specific data would involve analyzing a spreadsheet, which could take hours.”
The Legal Operations team also uses Intapp Documents for Corporate Legal to build a front-door instruction portal and repository for knowledge management to store research, articles, and precedents. “We’ve recently added a custom field to legal matter set-up that allows the lawyers to check a box to indicate that a matter they’re working on should be stored in the internal knowledge bank,” said Koçak.
Gökhan Koçak, Risk and Operations Executive for Group Legal, Royal London said: “We routinely deal with a high volume of confidential documents, and the integration between Microsoft OneDrive and Microsoft SharePoint reduces our vulnerability to leaks and cyberattacks.”
Laying the groundwork for continuous improvement
Security and governance considerations heavily influenced solution selection, and Koçak points to the benefit of integrating with the Microsoft tenant. “We routinely deal with a high volume of confidential documents, and the integration between Microsoft OneDrive and Microsoft SharePoint reduces our vulnerability to leaks and cyberattacks,” said Koçak. “If a problem were to arise, our IT department would be able to contain and address it quickly and decisively because our whole stack resides in one system.”
Koçak describes a long-term strategic focus on operational resilience with respect to the delivery of legal services. “There is a keen focus on ensuring that legal operational processes are robust, as well as planning for what might be required in the future for sustained operational excellence,” said Kocak. “Looking forward, we will be working to ensure that Intapp Documents for Corporate Legal integrates seamlessly with our legal operational processes and systems.”
Executive Summary
Prior challenges
- Manual matter management tracking captured on a spreadsheet allowed for only one active user at a time, hindering speed, accuracy, and convenience.
- Siloed repositories for matter materials prevented efficient knowledge transfer, which resulted in lawyers having to piece together correspondence and documents.
- Limited data analytics compromised reporting capabilities and created lengthy lag times for responding to stakeholder inquiries.
Results with Intapp
- Centralized instruction, triage, allocation, and matter management: Department-wide access to matter data eliminates the frustrations and efficiencies associated with manual processes.
- Advanced knowledge sharing capabilities: Centralized data capture for matter correspondence and documents ensures timely and easy access to critical information.
Timely data analytics: Robust dashboards facilitate timely reporting and support stakeholder management and management decision-making.
