Modern Law Awards – Online Interview: January 2019
With Michael Warren, VP, Business Development Practice, Wilson Allen
- How can Wilson Allen help law firms and professional services organisations improve their business performance?
Professional services firms are under tremendous pressure to grow and be profitable. Success is dependent on committing to properly managing the entire client life cycle. But most firms have historically worked in silos across systems and teams. They’re challenged to take their software, align it with a new way of thinking about client lifecycle management, and get all of the firm’s software to share information in a meaningful way.
Wilson offers solutions that help firms connect the dots between these silos and build stronger relationships, work more efficiently, and run more profitably. Our people have worked deep in the operational and technical trenches for many years, across industries, and hundreds of client engagements. We put this experience into practice for our clients.
- How can businesses use your solutions to help them streamline their workflows and work more efficiently?
Developing business workflows requires more than cursory knowledge to tackle with any finesse. Wilson has accumulated aggregated knowledge across practice management systems, processes, and technologies that we apply in ways to significantly accelerate the development of workflows. It’s not just about the technical implications but also how to solve for process improvements.
Our Wilson Proforma Tracker is an example of how we applied this knowledge to build a better mousetrap for improving the billing workflow. The software features a mobile-friendly interface and integrates with practice management software to simplify the preparation and validation of proformas.
- What new software and technology do you predict for the legal market in 2019?
We believe there is going to be further acceleration among firms choosing new practice management systems and new CRM platforms. That’s not exactly an earthshaking prediction. But what may cause some tremors is the implications of these changes. Whether firms make the right decisions in the selection process, in system design and implementation, and communication and change management is going to largely drive success or failure for the firm.
CRM, as an example, needs to be not just a contact management system. It must evolve to a wholesale commitment to thinking about firm relationships and the business development cycle differently. Integrating CRM into previously unintegrated applications, like business acceptance and client feedback, is going to be a differentiator for firms. Additionally, we see an acceleration in the adoption of workflow software.
Firms are really starting to dabble heavily in machine learning and AI. We suspect 2019 will still be a year of experimentation rather than widespread adoption. But we think that experimentation is going to start yielding some very real benefits for the firms that are experimenting.
- What are Wilson Allen’ aims and aspirations as a business?
We’d like the market to appreciate just how important it is for firms to break down the silos between finance, risk, IT, HR, marketing, and business development and to have a wholesale view of the client matter life cycle. And we’d like the market to appreciate just how well positioned Wilson is at the nexus of those disciplines.
- What are Wilson Allen’ plans for 2019?
Wilson has always focused on serving as a trusted advisor to our clients with specialized expertise in specific software platforms. In 2019, we see this role expanding. We’ve formed many strategic alliances that will enable us to be a partner to firms across technology platforms. We’ll continue to have specialized expertise and business partners, but a pivot is happening where we’ll form deeper partnerships with our clients.
See the article online at the Modern Law Magazine website.