Legal Technology Journal

Omnia is Allen & Overy’s global, matter-centric virtual file system. Here we look at its development and roll-out.

Like most large, international law firms, Allen & Overy derives a significant part of its income from key clients involved in major, cross-border transactions. In an increasingly competitive market, the ability to provide exemplary service to those clients anywhere in the world, and at any time, is an essential prerequisite to doing business with the world’s biggest companies and financial institutions.

The firm, which operates in 20 countries, has always focused attention on its major clients, but this focus increased some five years ago, partly as a result of a string of significant mergers with smaller firms. Each firm had its own way of working and, originally, its own distinct technology. To be an effective, global firm, it was clearly going to be necessary to address both the way in which the firm worked as a whole and the underlying technology platform.

At the turn of the new century, a project was undertaken to define practices to be followed by those working on cross-border matters. There were many good ideas proposed, but somehow they did not seem to take hold and the project was largely forgotten.

The challenges of working together were exemplified quite well by different approaches to document and e-mail handling. A number of lawyers tended to work in splendid isolation, surrounded by piles of carefully stacked paper. By contrast, others were evolving more advanced ways of working, including the storage of all transactional documentation (not only legal documents but e-mails as well) in an electronic (or virtual) file, available to all working on that transaction. It was clear that paper could not form the basis for effective international working and that some form of globally available electronic file would be essential.

Another consideration was the increasing use of e-mail, in particular for providing advice to clients (previously, advice had always been provided by letter). It was becoming imperative to ensure that e-mails were captured and retained reliably, in part to manage the firm’s own risks. Furthermore, the requirement within some jurisdictions to file paper versions of e-mails was becoming unworkable and a solution had to be found to this growing problem. In truth, Allen & Overy was not facing a unique problem, but one that affects all major enterprises: how to manage the burgeoning volume of data and information, and retain critical information reliably.

The last key factor that influenced the firm’s thinking was exemplified by the high-profile Enron-Andersen and MCI-WorldCom cases. It was recognised that these cases would have implications for the firm in terms of how it conducted its business. The subsequent legislation, such as Sarbanes-Oxley and the European Market Abuse Directive, has placed a greater onus on firms to, for example, maintain complete records, have well-defined retention policies and exercise stronger control over access to documentation.

The Omnia project

Omnia had its genesis in a project that set out to map the key data and information used in the firm, and to try to find ways of making this information more readily and widely available, both to fee-earners and clients. The early work on the virtual file, mentioned above, seemed to hold promise. If we could create a globally available system, which captured all the key information in electronic form for any matter, then the firm would be able to work in a much more joined-up way. The key information identified fell into four main categories (see Figure 1):

• transactional documentation: legal documents, e-mails, faxes and paper mail;
• financial;
• know-how; and
• client data.

It seemed clear that the system should be organised around matters, since fee-earners tend to organise their work on a matter-by-matter basis. If one could also build into this system a security model that controlled access to matters according to their sensitivity, then the firm would be taking an important step towards managing its risk better.

The last, and undoubtedly most important, consideration related to working practices. It was essential to define the way in which fee-earners should work, particularly when they were working on cross-border matters that required high degrees of collaboration. However, an earlier initiative (mentioned above) had foundered. The hope was that, by introducing a system that would encourage and even enforce particular ways of working, we would be able to overcome fee-earners’ tendency to avoid changing their well-honed, individual ways of working. This aspect proved to be the most challenging part of the whole project.

Working practices

Over a period of 18 months, a group of senior, influential partners, drawn from each geographical region, met every two to three weeks to evolve a set of working practices. The key working practices that developed from these are:

• File management, including filing practices and policy, and document retention.
• Matter management, essentially the role of somebody (normally an associate) who manages such processes as matter inception/maintenance/close, access control and maintenance of complete documentation.
• Business acceptance, the process of incepting a matter, including provision of legally required data, conflict checking, and setting financial rates and caps.
• Know-how, including obtaining access and submission.
• Financial data, including accessing financial data on a matter, and the billing process.
• Office procedures, including handling of mail, scanning, paper files and closing binders (bibles).

The establishment of these working practices was a consultative process, which included a large number of workshops with partners, associates and trainees around the world, and required many iterations of various topics until a reasonable level of consensus was reached.

Technical solution

The design for the first release of the Omnia system was based around a portal to provide ready access to a range of information including documents, e-mail, faxes, scanned documents, know-how and financial data (in Elite). The design was for a matter-centric, virtual (ie electronic) file that would be readily accessible from anywhere in the world and form a complete, long-term record of any transaction. Security was to be established at a matter level in the sense that, for any matter, a defined set of individuals could access all the information in that matter, but no other individuals would be able to do so. Two classes of restricted matter were defined, the most restricted (for ethical walls) limiting access to a very small number of individuals.

After the evaluation of competing technology products, Hummingbird’s DM5 solution was chosen to hold documents, e-mails, faxes and scanned documents, and Hummingbird’s portal was chosen to provide an integrating access layer (see Figure 1). The fee-earner would work within the portal, frequently in an Outlook window, but be able to move readily to other application windows (eg document management (DM) listings, Elite, know-how) within the portal.

(Figure 1 - The architecture of Omnia showing the data types available within the virtual file: know-how and transactional documents and some client data are held within the Hummingbird DM5 system; financial data are held within Elite. The Hummingbird portal provides an integrating layer for the Omnia user.)

Experience with previous implementations of DM systems had shown that it was difficult to ensure that metadata (eg client-matter number, author) were correctly or completely captured, thereby hindering the effectiveness of any database searches. Accordingly, Omnia was designed to ensure that all items in the DM system are profiled (with metadata) as automatically/readily as possible:

• The portal is set up as a matter-centric environment so that, by default, any document created assumes the client-matter number of the extant matter.
• Any received e-mails can be dragged and dropped into the relevant virtual file, automatically assume the client-matter credentials of that matter, and pick up metadata such as subject, sender and recipient(s) automatically.
• On sending, any e-mails may be manually profiled to a client-matter (and folder) by means of a ‘drop-down’ which lists all subscribed matters and the folders within those matters.
• On receipt, incoming paper mail is scanned centrally and, where possible, profiled into the relevant virtual file; a link is then sent to the recipient.

A new know-how system was built, the documents being stored in the DM system and being assigned taxonomic tags through an application developed by Granite & Comfrey. Access to know-how is via searching on keywords or navigating the taxonomy.

A comprehensive matter inception process was built using Metastorm. This gathers all the required data via a workflow process and then automatically sets up the matter in both the Elite and the Hummingbird DM systems, including appropriate security. This system is a critical part of the firm’s risk management approach, providing the necessary information for checks such as money laundering, conflicts and market-sensitive matters.

Omnia was designed so that the full range of information available in an office is also available outside it. Through use of Citrix technology, the portal can be accessed securely from an Internet-connected PC anywhere. Thus, fee-earners can access all their matter-related data whilst working from home, in a client’s office or whilst travelling. Those who travel with laptops are able to access Omnia via wired or wireless Internet connections and through 3G services; they are also able to extract a read-only, encrypted copy of relevant matter files onto their laptops before they travel.

Since the firm is often entrusted by clients with highly sensitive data, it was important to be sure that the design and operation of the Omnia virtual file met all required criteria for the secure handling of information. Accordingly, in 2005 the firm went through a process of audit of the virtual file which resulted in the award of BS7799 (ISO17799) accreditation. Allen & Overy is currently the only major, international law firm to have this level of certification for secure handling of data within electronic file systems.

Roll-out time

A pilot system of Omnia was launched in August 2003 involving parts of the London, New York, Hong Kong and Amsterdam offices. It brought to the surface a number of technical issues, and the full roll-out of Omnia did not begin until April 2004. The roll-out to Allen & Overy’s 4,800 people in 25 offices across 20 countries was a major change programme, not only from a technical point of view, but also from a business perspective. Change programmes for fee-earners and support staff included training in the working practices, and assistance with areas such as migrating e-mail to the virtual file and clearing paper from offices (sometimes through scanning).

The technical challenge of rolling out Omnia was immense. Given the three-level server architecture of Omnia, and the need to provide for substantial data storage in the virtual file, a major programme of server deployment worldwide was established, and new storage area network devices were installed in a number of offices. Some offices were converted into ‘thin offices’ without local servers; they access application servers in remote offices using Citrix technology. The introduction of Omnia was also used as a vehicle for introducing other technologies including Windows XP client, LANDesk for client image distribution and Microsoft’s Active Directory. The active and enthusiastic participation of IT staff from all offices was a vital ingredient to a successful technical deployment.

Even whilst the deployment of the first production version of Omnia (v5) was underway, development was in hand for the next major version (v6). Feedback from the pilot group had indicated that a number of changes were necessary, notably:

• the display and manipulation of lists of documents and e-mails needed to be as Outlook-like as possible (as opposed to the web look-and-feel provided by the standard Hummingbird Webtop product); and
• performance had to be radically improved.

In-house development using Microsoft .Net technology produced a substantially better product in v6. An example of a key improvement was conversion of multiple filing of documents/e-mails (eg through dragging and dropping) into an asynchronous process, returning control quickly to the user and allowing the processing (eg profiling and saving) to continue in the background. The introduction of the Outlook-like user interface (see Figures 2 and 3) greatly enhanced acceptance of the new product.

(A screenshot of the Omnia portal. This shows, at the top, the current matter on which the fee-earner is focusing. Below are icons for the key applications (eg Microsoft Office, Carpe Diem). Below these is an e-mail node which, when clicked on, will open an Outlook window in the right-hand part of the portal (as is the case in this screenshot). There are currently four principal nodes beneath this, providing access to Matters, Personal data, Know-How & Bibles and Practice specific information. The Matter node has been ‘opened’ and shows part of the folder structure beneath one of the subscribed matters (ALNERY Legal Advice). Read e-mails (either singly or multiply) can be dragged and dropped (asynchronously) from the right-hand window onto a folder within the smartbar and the e-mail will be fully and automatically profiled into that matter. Newly created e-mails can also be directed and automatically profiled to matter folders as part of the e-mail send process.)

Omnia v6 went into pilot in November 2004. This highlighted some hitherto unrecognised problems with the underlying Hummingbird DM system and, with Hummingbird’s very active support, these were fixed by June 2005, allowing the global roll-out of Omnia v6 to be completed by November 2005.

What have we learnt?

We believe that we have a capability that few, if any other, law firms currently have. In particular, we are able to manage matter inception, control access to documents and maintain a complete electronic file for a transaction in a way that few law firms are able to.

Strict control of access to documentation does not come easily to lawyers. We have addressed this partly through use of videos which, with the help of actors, recreate scenarios which illustrate the sorts of risks we can face by not dealing properly with areas such as matter inception and document filing. These videos, together with refresher training on the working practices, are moving our fee-earners to a position of greater understanding, and management, of risks.

The matter manager role, right through the whole life of a matter, is a potentially very powerful one and provides associates with valuable management experience – good training for a management role as a partner. We continue to work on reinforcing the importance of this role.

Changing habits – eg getting people away from managing everything through paper to managing information electronically – is not easy. However, the carrot of the benefits of sharing information readily, together with the stick of e-mail limits to reduce dependence on Exchange as a storage mechanism, are progressively paying dividends. (Note – we are not a paperless office: fee-earners will still print off documents to read and mark up, but each new version is only stored electronically.)

There is still some way to go to match some elements of Outlook, in terms of speed of response and searching capability. Fee-earners use Outlook as a benchmark for performance and usability, and will tend to resist change if the competing product does not compare favourably. We anticipate improvements in the underlying Hummingbird product, and possibly use of alternative search technology, to deliver a system which fully meets fee-earners’ expectations.

(Figure 3 - This screenshot results from having clicked, in the smartbar, on the folder within the ALNERY Legal Advice matter. In the right hand part of the screen is a list of all the documents and e-mails contained within this matter folder. As is the case with Microsoft Outlook or Explorer, the list can be re-ordered by date, from, to etc and columns can be re-positioned or hidden. The icons along the top provide access to a range of functions, eg e-mail, print, metadata, search, preview, submit to know-how. E-mails and documents may be dragged and dropped (asynchronously) into other matters and/or folders.)

Developments in Omnia continue, the latest including: an extranet portal linked to Omnia, allowing ready export of documents to the extranet matter file; a global virtual file which further streamlines access to key documents on a matter in any office; and a system for generating and maintaining bibles (closing binders) from transactional documents in Omnia.

The main thing about the Omnia project that was not predicted was the degree of development that had to be undertaken to deliver a product which met everyone’s needs. The conversion of a system originally designed for the relatively unstructured storage of individual documents into one that is a performant, highly structured, matter-centric virtual file took more time and effort than anticipated. Although we had expected a degree of resistance to changes in working practices, and we conducted a major change programme to address this, we probably still underestimated the level of effort required to change the way people work. The early version of Omnia (v5) was not the best vehicle for promoting changes in working practices, but the current version is positively assisting changes in behaviour.

Overall, this has been a hugely ambitious project that has been a true pathfinder in the industry. We have had to develop key elements of Omnia ourselves, since these elements were not, and in many cases are still not, available in the marketplace. A major achievement of the project has been the development of working practices that are increasingly being used consistently across the whole firm (ie globally). Our confidence for the future is built on the culture of the firm, which encourages a high degree of collaboration globally, and so we are beginning to win that long-term advantage, for our clients and ourselves, which has always been at the heart of this project. 

Dave Burwell is the IT director at Allen & Overy LLP.