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Nearly every day we learn of new advancements in the areas of artificial intelligence, data science, automation and much more. For all the attention on modern technology and innovation, IT departments in firms of all sizes continue struggling to implement solutions that will move their firms forward. Many are caught between the costly and often inefficient option of keeping all IT functions in-house and the option of outsourcing all those functions which, in some cases, may result in the loss of internal knowledge, control and governance as well as the degradation of the user experience and a decline in morale among staff.

Forward-thinking CIOs at progressive law firms are addressing these challenges by pursuing a smarter approach to managing their IT departments. But what is preventing other firms from doing the same?

Many firms remain uninformed about all their options for sourcing IT work, still under the false assumption they have only an all-or-none binary choice between keeping everything in-house or outsourcing it all. Even among those aware that there are more possibilities, challenges remain related to anticipated cultural issues, fear of job loss, legacy IT debt or a lack of the leadership required to pursue a change. These are common obstacles, but all that may be overcome to allow a firm to adopt a smarter approach to IT.

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A Better Approach: Smartsourcing

Smartsourcing is a hybrid solution to the traditional choice between keeping IT functions in-house or outsourcing them all. It allows firms to invest in resources that keep high-value IT work in-house, while outsourcing commodity work without losing governance or control over it.

Smartsourcing involves using an external platform to perform commodity work that IT departments currently deal with, which provides a better user experience for employees. The idea is to take the trivial tasks that are overburdening firm staff and delegate them to the platform for third-party providers, allowing internal people to focus their time and energy on high-value work.

There are several benefits to smartsourcing that reduce the downsides of traditional outsourcing. Most important, smartsourcing is not about headcount reduction. Unlike with traditional outsourcing that results in trimming staff when work is sent outside, smartsourcing allows you to keep your current staff. They simply focus on more critical work, using the knowledge and skills they've cultivated over time. It's not the high-value work that's being outsourced.

What smartsourcing does is delegate the commodity work that often prevents in-house IT staff from pursuing innovative projects. Because that work is outsourced to a platform, you don't lose control or governance over it like you typically do when outsourcing. Instead, the commodity functions are performed by outside parties, but remain under the guidance and management of the firm.

Another key benefit of smartsourcing your commodity work while retaining your higher-value work is that you prevent employee burnout and promote improved work-life balance.

Whether your IT department has three or 50 people, they're constantly being asked to do more with less. Not only are they overburdened with operational tasks and details, they're also expected to stay on top of compliance with outside counsel guidelines and create innovative new technologies to keep clients happy. When all these tasks are viewed as equal priorities, the only realistic outcome is employee burnout, which has become increasingly prevalent in legal IT departments.

Preventing employee burnout is especially important for law firm IT departments, for which the pool of available resources remains shallow. Firms often struggle to attract the necessary talent both to keep their basic IT infrastructure operating and to deliver the innovative solutions required by lawyers to stay competitive. So, when they secure that talent, it is important they find ways to retain them.

Firms that smartsource their operational burdens tend to have greater success avoiding IT staff burnout and get better outcomes on the high-value work necessary to run their firms.

Smartsourcing also leads to cost savings. Chances are, your IT staff are currently employing dozens of different tools to handle all their tasks. By smartsourcing to a platform, you centralize everything in one tool, eliminating not only the logistics and confusion of juggling an arsenal of technology, but also the costs of maintaining each of those numerous tools.

The combination of a lack of qualified talent and increased client demands has created a perfect storm that has left law firm IT departments struggling to do more with less and facing a serious risk of burnout. Under present conditions, firms are poised to see an exodus of talented IT professionals. Smartsourcing is critical to preventing that.

By strategically outsourcing certain tasks but retaining governance and control, you can keep your team engaged and not lose critical knowledge base, all while making your clients happy and keeping the lights on for the foreseeable future.

Arup Das is CEO of Alphaserve Technologies. He is an expert in institutional-level technology governance and operational risk management standards that are prevalent in hedge funds, private equity funds, venture capital funds and global law firms. Das regularly writes and speaks for legal and other audiences on topics related to digital transformation.