One of the fun things about being me these days is that people keep calling me to show me their cool new products.
Yesterday, I was on the phone with Bob Tennant and Kathryn Rakow at Recommind getting a preview tour of their new MindServer Legal Matters & Expertise, an addition to the MindServer Legal product suite that also includes Enterprise Search. Matters & Expertise extends document search to include a firm’s attorneys, matters, deals, cases and documents associated with any topic.
Anyone who tells you that document and file management in many law firms are not disasters waiting to happen are just whistling in the dark. I’ve commented on this issue as I’ve wondered whether large firm document management systems are broken. I’ve also talked with corporate counsel and corporate execs who have told me that they are afraid to ask their law firms about the state of the electronic records. They really doubt that their law firms can produce anything like a “complete” file with all of their documents.
I’ve been impressed with what Recommind has been doing for a while. After they showed me a great demo a year or so ago, I was begging them for a “personal” version of the search tools. They’ve, probably wisely, decided that they had other business to do than create tools for me.
Here’s my reaction to MindServer Legal Matters & Expertise. It rocks. It took me only a few moments to see the power and simplicity of this tool. I realy like the way that the search tools focus on what is most important to practicing lawyers in their work. Recommind has clearly listened to lawyers’ needs.
I like the way they’ve expanded the search universe to include not just documents, but “back office” systems and even designated information repositories.
However, the breakthrough, at least for me, is the way the tool focuses on matters and expertise. It makes it easy to find out who in the firm has worked on certain types of cases or matters, who has experience with certain clients or types of clients and other information that it always frustrated me that I couldn’t get in my years in large firms.
Is it enough to get me back to a large firm? If I learned a firm was using the Recommind system, they’d get my attention.
Here’s what I liked best – you can see the benefits in just a few minutes of demo.
Recommind is exhibiting at LegalTech in New York next week, so you’ll get the chance to see MindServer Legal Matters & Expertise there. Even if you are not there, I suggest that you put this product on your must-review list for this year.
I don’t have any financial relationship with Recommind – I just like the people there and what they are doing.