How to Procure Legal Software for Your Corporate Law Firm

3 min read

Legal software procurement isn’t easy.

There’s a seemingly-endless array of solutions on the market for any given task or need, and in a high-stakes industry like law, it can feel overwhelming to even think about the consequences of making a wrong choice. If your expensive new software suite doesn’t do the one thing you bought it to do, then you’re looking at not only wasted money, but also the prospect of restarting the procurement process from the very beginning.

Complicating the matter is that every service provider says their software is the ideal choice for your firm. Every service provider has a feature they can point to that the competition doesn’t have, or a technical standard they can meet that the competition can’t. But which of those unique, not-available-anywhere-else features will actually move your firm forward? Which features will create a measurable business outcome? And which ones are just fancy bells and whistles that do nothing other than look nice? Unless you have a technology background, it can be difficult to determine what it means to have a SOC-certified solution; all you really want to know is whether a piece of software can get the job done without creating a headache.

While it’s tempting to paint all legal software with the same brush — underpowered, too complicated to use, not secure enough, just too plain confusing — a closer look will reveal meaningful, deeper-than-surface-level differences in how each piece of software goes about doing its job. Some of these differences are obvious, while others might only get noticed by IT professionals.

More importantly, not every difference between software suites has a meaningful impact on your firm’s business outcomes. Some of the differences between what providers offer are the equivalent of selling a blue car instead of a red one; other product differences are more like pitting a brand new Dodge Challenger against a rusted-out 1970 Mercury Capri. Getting the right software for your law firm means understanding which differences are meaningful, and which ones are superficial.

There’s a lot that goes into an effective software procurement process. If you’ve tried to implement a new piece of software in your law firm in the past, then you’re likely already familiar with the merry-go-round of free trials of underpowered or difficult-to-use software that never quite meets your needs. Without an effective procurement plan, your law firm won’t know what to look for in your legal software, which means you’ll always be disappointed with the end result.

When software procurement fails, it usually happens due to a lack of proper planning and organization and a lack of a defined procurement and adoption process. But legal software procurement doesn’t need to end in frustration and cancelled trials. Having a robust software procurement process is the best way to ensure that you find the best solution for your firm’s needs — with minimal frustration and minimal time wastage.

In our extended legal software procurement guide, we’ll walk through the basic steps involved in legal software procurement.

Whether you’re looking to switch from an existing solution or you’re seeking out new software for the first time, we’ll show you which questions to ask, which criteria to use when evaluating providers, how to narrow your choices to a shortlist, and how you can leverage your team to help you make the procurement decision — all without any disappointment or fear of change.

Get the “The Busy Legal Professional’s No-Hassle, No-Fear Guide to Legal Software Procurement” today: download now.