Simmons & Simmons
Delivering Best Practice to a Global Law Firm
International law firm Simmons & Simmons are a leading name in the legal sector, with operations located in major business and financial centres throughout Europe, Asia and the Middle East.
The strategic aim of Simmons & Simmons was to create a world class IT service equipped to meet and exceed its future demands on a global scale. However the firm, which employs over 2,000 staff in 20 offices worldwide, had disparities in its infrastructure, with individual offices across the globe using different hardware and software which was supported locally.
Simmons & Simmons identified these inconsistencies and the associated costs of supporting such a disparate environment as opportunities to both streamline service delivery whilst reducing long term costs, something Abby Ewen, IT Director at the firm clarifies. "We identified the need to invest in our IT in order to ensure the firm maintained a fully efficient, streamlined, world class IT service."
With this in mind, Simmons & Simmons undertook Project Vanilla - a complete overhaul of their global IT systems. As a subset of this Project Phoenix was born with the focus of adopting Best Practice Service Management by providing a structured framework to drive service improvement, deliver efficiencies and ultimately reduce global IT costs. Plan-Net were engaged to lead this project and Abby Ewen confirmed "I have worked with many large IT companies that did not visualise projects in the way we at Simmons & Simmons had hoped. I found Plan-Net to be a breath of fresh air and an integral part of this project. It was immediately apparent that each member of the Plan-Net team has copious experience in working on this type of project - with everyone we encountered having experienced this first hand. They have all worked within the legal industry and within the service delivery environment and were consequently able to offer experience and practical know-how that was immediately applicable to us."
As a precursor to the project Plan-Net evaluated the firm's existing IT support department and function. Following this Plan-Net proposed a rapid implementation of ITIL aligned Best Practice processes designed to support the strategic aims of the firm within a shortened time-frame. This Service Baseline review assisted in the definition of scope for Project Phoenix, namely Incident, Problem, Change, Configuration and Service Level Management.
The initiation of Project Phoenix saw the establishment of a Project Board as part of Phase 1. Key project governance materials such as the Project Initiation Document (PID), Communications plan and Education strategy were established and Process Champions for each of the processes within scope were appointed. The idea behind these appointments was to both ensure a collaborative approach and to provide ownership both during and post implementation. Following these appointments, and as Phase 2 of the project, a series of workshops were scheduled in order to define the ‘future state' policies and processes. Each workshop lasted for between 2-3 hours, and as they were delivered at Simmons & Simmons' Citypoint offices, they involved minimal disruption to their day-to-day work. The workshops were used to introduce the attendees to the Best Practice framework and also to identify the specific needs of the firm taking into account any existing working practices which were required to remain in place. With the ‘one size does NOT fit all' mantra key to the projects effectiveness, it was important to outline Simmons & Simmons' requirements at this early stage.
Establishing the requirements at the outset of the project assisted with the global communication and long term establishment of the processes in scope. This was crucial to the success of the project according to Pete Canavan, one of Plan-Net's Principal Consultants. "We needed to ensure Simmons & Simmons' technical personnel had a clear understanding of the purpose of each process in order to ensure their compliance. Due mainly to our previous experience in situations such as these, along with the fact that the Project Board quickly recognised the importance of this, we were able to communicate the scope of the project effectively through a combination of delivery channels.". Following completion of Phase 2, policy and process documentation were delivered and formal sign-off was received from each of the Process Champions.
At this juncture the focus shifted to the evaluation, selection and implementation of a new integrated Service Management software solution. Plan-Net produced a Statement of Requirements (SOR) identifying both essential and desirable criteria, one of the most important requirements existed around ensuring Simmons & Simmons had the ability to handle SLAs across time zones.
A formal Request For Proposal (RFP) was then drafted which clearly defined the governance for the selection process. Plan-Net matched the specific requirements of Simmons & Simmons against the plethora of tools available within the market place. The four most suitable vendors were identified and product demonstrations were arranged which were attended by the Plan-Net consultants and key Simmons & Simmons personnel. Following completion of these demonstrations the RFP was issued to each of the vendors, the responses were scored by Plan-Net using a weighting system based upon delivery of each requirement either ‘Out of the box', ‘With Customisation' or ‘Non Deliverable' with a weighting applied across the scores. The two most appropriate toolsets were selected and the vendors invited for a further demonstration, following these and subsequent reference site visits Simmons & Simmons made their choice of preferred technology.
In parallel with the toolset selection exercise Plan-Net developed the step by step procedures for each process which supported the policies and process flows developed, once again formal sign off by each of the Process Champions was sought and obtained. At this point the chosen toolset vendor was engaged by the Project team and key dates for implementation identified, the first being the imminent expiry of the licensing for the incumbent tool. Plan-Net's consultants worked with both the vendor and Simmons & Simmons staff to ensure the successful delivery of the initial module of the toolset, namely Incident Management. Following this successful implementation work commenced on the scoping of Simmons & Simmons' specific process requirements.
Alongside this scoping exercise the focus of the project turned to Process Establishment - without doubt the most important phase of the project, as Pete Canavan explains. "When it comes to Service Management, and specifically where ITIL is concerned, the goal is not pure implementation but embedding and establishing the processes and procedures within the day-to-day working environment of IT. This is because while policy, process and procedure definition are all fairly straightforward, the adoption of each as part of day to day working practices is something different. The embedding aspect enables us to work with our clients at the outset to develop a culture of change while all the time working towards embracing the processes in full"
An education plan was developed in consultation with Simmons & Simmons which saw each of the Process Champions provide a formal presentation to the global IT department based upon the processes for which they were responsible. This approach enabled Plan-Net to ensure ownership and understanding was is in place across key individuals and that all IT staff were aware of their specific responsibilities and the methods required in order to perform their role in the future.
The final stage of the project, was the formal rollout. A staged approach saw the implementation of Incident, Problem and Service Level Management, which was subsequently followed by the introduction of Change and Configuration Management. This approach enabled IT resources to adjust to the initial changes to their working practices over a number of weeks before introducing the next processes.
As a direct result of engaging Plan-Net to assist in this efficiency driven project, Simmons & Simmons have found themselves in a strong position to deliver support in a far more cost-effective manner.
However Paul Whitlock, Head of Service Management at Plan-Net believes the biggest gains from Project Phoenix have come from its alignment to Project Vanilla;
"During a period of massive change our work on Project Phoenix took away some of the pain for Simmons & Simmons. Since then it has meant the client can really get the most from Project Vanilla, which has itself delivered tangible improvements to service and efficiencies and led to demonstrable cost savings, something for which Abby Ewen and her team can be duly proud. Through Simmons & Simmons continued work, both with Plan-Net and through internal initiatives, these benefits can only grow, and they can continue to improve upon the provision of IT to the firm's global user base."
