Posted 27 March 2023

The legal landscape has changed drastically over the past few years, and continues to evolve. Today’s firms are facing a growing talent shortage, shrinking margins, and a greater need to optimise working processes than ever before. 

At the same time, clients are demanding more from their legal partners. To keep pace with evolving client expectations and stay competitive in the market, firms must embrace technology and unlock innovative ways to deliver better client service. One significant challenge today’s firms face is managing the sheer complexity and volume of legal requests. A recent survey found that nearly 80% of legal professionals struggle to cope with increasing workloads and complexity of information. 

To overcome these challenges, many firms are turning to no-code/low-code platforms. These intuitive technology solutions use visual interfaces with basic logic and drag-and-drop functionality to enable lawyers and staff to quickly and easily build workflows, without the need for IT assistance. The adoption of these solutions not only helps firms attract tech-savvy clients, but also enables them to achieve greater agility while navigating a growing digital skills shortage. 

Here, we look at two real-world examples of how modern law firms are tapping into low-code/no-code solutions to enhance client service.

Wedlake Bell: Streamlining Supply Chain Legal Checks with a No-Code Solution 

Wedlake Bell, a contemporary London-based UK Top-100 law firm, operates an IP & Commercial team as part of its business services practice. An essential service the IP & Commercial team provides to its retail clients is the auditing of product supply chains. While these audits are crucial to protecting clients’ reputations and ensuring quality and compliance, they also require extensive due diligence and timely reports from Wedlake Bell’s legal team. 

Previously, these supply chain management services were supported by a custom application developed for Wedlake Bell nearly 15 years prior. In an effort to modernise the firm’s internal system and deliver greater efficiencies, Wedlake Bell teamed with Sysero to develop a no-code application to automate and streamline the process of managing supply chain audits. 

The new solution provides lawyers with the ability to streamline the processing of large amounts of data, efficiently carry out important legal checks, and automate inspection reports. As a result, lawyers can provide a speedy, high quality service to their clients. By opting for a no-code solution, Wedlake Bell also now has the ability to quickly scale the solution and modify it as and when required to meet the firm’s evolving needs. 

Spoor & Fisher Jersey: Realising Efficiency Gains with Low-Code Platform 

Spoor & Fisher Jersey employs more than 80 staff responsible for managing around 200,000 trademarks in all jurisdictions of Africa. Each week, the firm receives around 1,000 status update enquiries from its international and multi-industry client base.

In an effort to improve its internal processes for the firm’s clients and staff, Spoor & Fisher Jersey partnered with Sysero to develop a low-code solution to streamline the entire status update process for its trademark formalities team. 

With the new Sysero Trademark Enquiry Handling Workflow, members of the trademark formalities team can easily create a list of outstanding enquiries by selecting emails in Outlook to add to a workflow queue. Once ready, team members can start their workflow, and quickly process requests by simply providing the case number. The system automatically pulls in the relevant case information and merges it into a ready-to-send email template, which once sent, is automatically filed in the firm’s DMS.

The decision to use a low-code platform meant that when Spoor & Fisher Jersey noticed that around 1 in 10 cases in the IP system had sub-cases which were not supported by the firm’s DMS, they could quickly and easily add additional code to successfully handle these edge cases. Low-code features also enable the firm to easily customise the workflow to suit their evolving needs, without timely and costly IT support. 

Since launching the new workflow, Spoor & Fisher Jersey has been able to achieve improved response times consistently, which, while bringing obvious benefits for its clients, has also helped it boost internal morale as it’s now much easier for the team to manage their workloads.

 No-Code/Low Code: The Answer to Better Client Service 

No-code/low-code solutions empower today’s legal providers to speed up automation, deliver enhanced service, and quickly adapt to evolving needs and requirements. For firms looking to overcome profit and staff challenges, while continuing to elevate client service, these intuitive platforms provide the perfect solution.

Interested in learning more about how your firm could benefit from no-code/low-code solutions? Get in touch with our team to discuss your challenges.