1. Digital Skills In Action
Alisa Willows
Managing Partner

2. Wolferstans Solicitors
Est 1812
Plymouth, Plymstock, Plympton
184 employees
17 partners
Aiming for £9m turnover 2018/19
Managing Partner since 2011
120 including partners
Turnover £6.5m

3. Infrastructure 2008 Moved from in-house to hosted; citrix access
2011 Added case management and basic workflow
2015 Paper-light; rationalised print; post scanning
2016 Accounts package migration to encrypted SQL
2017 Acquisition – new branch; conversion; new infrastructure; training for TUPE staff
2018 so far Changed ISP; upgraded to 500mb/1GB
Upgraded Telecoms from ISDN to SIP
Obtained Cyber Essentials
2018 to do Move to Microsoft Azure datacentre
Upgrade infrastructure from Office 2010 – Office Windows 2007 to Windows 2010
Cyber Essentials Plus

4. Frustration Disconnect – apparently doing well but…
Workflows ‘out of the box’
Time/prioritising – not using what we had to capacity
Roll out of product to clients which was inadequate
Difficulty holding providers to account
IT in a silo
Gap between digital use at home and in the office
Lack of interest from partners
Decided needed changed focus
Became my priority for 2017/18
…but what?

5. The Missing Link
Attended Alternative Legal IT Forum – 19/20 Sept Oxford
Julie Hawker, Cosmic – HSBC The Digital Revolution – 29 Sept
Invited her to do the presentation at our Partners Conference set for Jan 2018
Digital Leadership Course – Learndirect funded
Mixed group of 10, one from each department
5 full day workshops – Nov 2017 to April 2018
Digital Vision – trends, new technologies, business direction
Digital Operations – productivity, marketing, communication
Digital Mindsets - people, skills, innovation attitudes
Digital Roadmaps - modelling, project planning
Project presentations and assessments
blockchain/AI/video conferencing/digital twin/bots/agile working

6. Personal Digital Skills Journey

8. Personal Digital Skills Journey
What I told the Board in
October 2017
March 2018
Why? Because it’s not about tech, it’s about
Client service
People
Culture
Change management
Being Human – at the heart of what we do

9. What’s next? Back to basics
Data management programme – Cosmic associate to support and mentor skills in existing staff re cleansing and configuration
CRM – consultant to train and mentor marketing team
Further project work with Cosmic
Workshops - digital group to champion Office 365
Develop policies for adoption and training materials
Digital skills framework for firm/training needs assessment
Individual project development e.g. virtual assistant
Process remapping/Lean/redefinition
Partner and Head of Department Workshop

10. What next? Budget Recruitment Compliance manager (my time/GDPR)
Digital apprentice
Digital marketing assistant
Solicitor who can build specialism in advising clients on digital e.g. SAAS/hosting agreements

11. Smart Legal Experience
Alisa Willows, Managing Partner
Direct dial