Three steps ahead: leading law firm invests in multiple BigHand solutions
Muckle LLP targets strategic shift towards true operational excellence
Award-winning national law firm, Muckle LLP has invested extensively in BigHand’s portfolio of technology solutions as part of a strategic shift towards an operationally optimised support function and a culture of true financial control.
The firm has chosen to invest in three of BigHand’s solutions; BigHand SmartNote to automate the production and storage of routine documents, BigHand Now for task delegation and management, and BigHand Evaluate for matter planning and pricing. By adopting three solutions at the same time the firm will gain a holistic view of the current state-of-play across the entire organisation.
For Muckle, the investment is part of a larger business project to streamline administrative processes and optimise client service delivery. Historically, there was a lack of visibility of how work was delegated or moved around the firm, as well as how tasks were progressing. Low-level administrative work was often performed by fee earners or highly skilled PA resource.
With the introduction of BigHand Now, Muckle will have the information and insight required to make informed decisions about support ratios and team structures ensuring the right work goes to the right resource, at the right time and cost to the business. Muckle will gain full visibility of all tasks by viewing and tracking work in one centralised list, as well as having access to various reports based on task distribution, performance, or work type turnaround.
In line with the firm’s goal of optimising the legal support function, Muckle wanted a way to remove some of the high-volume low-value transcription work generated by processing file, attendance, and telephone notes. They plan to use BigHand SmartNote, to automate these tasks freeing up time to focus on more value-add work. Using the technology’s integration with the firm’s document management system, iManage, finished documents are automatically saved in the correct location.
Implementing BigHand Evaluate will provide the firm with a solution to plan, manage and monitor all matters from not only a financial and regulatory view but also from a client perspective. BigHand Evaluate will work to increase the firm’s financial recovery by building on its profitability, insight, and thinking in regard to pricing. The software surfaces key financial information to allow the progress of matters to be tracked against budget throughout the lifecycle of a matter.
Dan Speed, UK Managing Director at BigHand said, “At BigHand we help law firms understand and transform their approach to pricing, while also automating and streamlining elements of their back office. In an increasingly challenging legal landscape, our applications directly address profitability while making the life of professionals and support staff that little bit easier. It is fantastic that award-winning firms like Muckle have identified this value and are building multiple BigHand tools into their technology infrastructure.”
Andrew Black, Director of IT at Muckle comments; “As a firm, we pride ourselves on being ahead of the curve in our adoption of technology. We saw the value in adopting all three products together straight away. The operational support side of our business is intrinsically linked to our matter planning – something we will be able to assess from a holistic view with the help of the new technology. BigHand has become a trusted partner whose solutions will not only ensure we maintain the highest levels of client service delivery, but will also help us to secure a competitive edge in the market when pricing our legal work. With increasing pressure from clients to do more for less, BigHand’s technology will act as the building block we need to future-proof the firm and gain an advantage in the market.”
