AI Responsibly with ndMAX
For the first time ever, ILTACON sold out! Clearly, people were excited about the opportunity to be back in person to connect and network with colleagues old and new, to learn more about the unique challenges and solutions occurring in the legal technology space, as well as celebrate wins and successes. Throughout the week, I kept hearing, “ILTACON is back!” The team from NetDocuments echoed all of those sentiments and more. (And we’re seeing similar excitement about Inspire coming November 7-9.)
We kicked off the conference with the launch of PatternBuilder, our new no-code document automation and workflow solution. So while many started their ILTACON week off with the Monday keynote address, NetDocuments already had a packed house even earlier for the first of our daily breakfast series. Attendees got a firsthand look at how legal teams can automate their expertise into easy-to-use apps that can be launched from anywhere to build entire packets of documents with sophisticated legal logic.
After months spent building the acquired Afterpattern technology into the NetDocuments platform, it was exciting to share PatternBuilder with the legal community and see their positive reactions all week long. We held an encore session on Tuesday and then did a live app building session on Wednesday so people could really dive into the offering. All three sessions were highly attended, and our team completed hundreds of demos in just four days! It was rewarding to see customers engaging so strongly with this latest step by NetDocuments to solve legal teams’ document lifecycle challenges.
According to the 2021 ILTA Technology Survey, more than 60% of firms have deployed Microsoft Teams for online meetings, as well as chat and collaboration. Indeed, Teams has been a hot topic all year long... ILTA hosted two-day Teams events in the spring and July, as well as our Teams planning webinar.
So at ILTACON, NetDocuments continued the focus on Teams with a Tuesday breakfast featuring ChatLink, our deep integration with Teams. Josh Hogan, the Product Manager for our PLAN and DELIVER solutions, discussed how problematic Teams can be for managing files: Documents get moved into SharePoint and OneDrive via Teams meetings and chat, which causes all kinds of information governance issues. With our new document-sharing capabilities and soon to be released file management tools, IT teams will have a way to gain control of these files in the wild.
Josh then moderated an educational session Tuesday afternoon entitled “Leveraging Microsoft Teams to Connect People, Processes, and Data to Enhance Collaboration,” where firms discussed how they are enabling their users to collaborate while containing content sprawl and protecting sensitive data. Other Teams sessions focused on using Teams for telephony and “The Microsoft Teams Journey: Where do you want to go?” We can safely say firms are still exploring the capabilities and limitations with Microsoft Teams, but it is here to stay.
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Tuesday held several highlights for the team at NetDocuments. First was CEO Josh Baxter’s introduction of Tuesday’s keynote that woke the crowd up with this promo video capturing the essence of why customers are choosing NetDocuments every day. Keynote speaker Patrick Schwerdtfeger offered a deep dive into how the explosion of big data technologies and the Internet of Things have led to dramatic advancements in artificial intelligence and machine learning. As evidenced by the educational sessions at ILTACON, these technologies are fueling big changes in predictive analytics, image recognition, virtual reality, document lifecycle management (something NetDocuments is very keen on), and countless other areas.
Our breakfast series session on Wednesday covered NetKnowledge, NetDocuments’ enterprise search solution, powered by Upland BA Insight. According to Upland, 61% of knowledge workers search four or more systems daily to get the information they need to do their jobs. Because not all data is contained within the document management system, having an enterprise search tool to present results across the varied data sources within your business is essential to connect the dots and gain insights you might otherwise miss when viewing single silos of data. Having that search tool within your DMS means fewer places people have to go to, which turns into quicker, more informed decisions and much deeper insights.
Our second highlight on Tuesday was the annual NetDocuments Company Update. In addition to the CEO update from Josh Baxter, we mixed things up with a demo of our new document automation tool PatternBuilder, a look at our roadmap with our VP of Product, Jill Schornack, and a chat with CIO Mike Lucas and CINO David Wang of Wilson Sonsini.
"The digitization of legal work is not something that's going to happen in the future. It's here already." – David Wang, Wilson Sonsini
Mike started off describing why his firm selected NetDocuments for its superior cloud pedigree and platform capabilities that will enable the next generation of their work. Then David shared his firm’s journey toward automation, with the development of Neuron, a custom client application to speed and manage a startup’s legal needs. After watching the PatternBuilder demo, David and Mike both agreed that PatternBuilder will be a key accelerator for firms seeking to automate their work in the future.
Looking beyond PatternBuilder, Jill highlighted NetDocuments continued 360° approach to innovation with our products, recognizing our customers’ reliance on us for their mission-critical work every day. One of the ways we do this is to continue investing in the value of our existing offerings. By listening to our customers, we’re able to make key “quality of life” enhancements that save time, clicks, and confusion with improved workflows and user experiences. Jill also mentioned some of the key enhancements coming for Workspace Security Manager, our advanced security management solution, as well as enriched analytics that unlock insights based on user behaviors in NetDocuments.
So while PatternBuilder marks a key step into the future of legal services delivery, our customers can always do their best work with NetDocuments.
It’s hard to believe so much can happen in four days, but we gained valuable knowledge and insight from industry thought leaders and experts, while also collaborating and exploring new and innovative strategies with our partners, customers, and prospects for the fast-evolving world of legal technology.
With all the changes happening around us, it is imperative for legal professionals to keep pace and be well-equipped with the right tools and technologies to support their businesses goals and initiatives…tools built not only for the problems of today, but also prepared to meet the challenges of tomorrow. ILTACON is the perfect place to take a step back to reflect, catch up, energize, and explore the possibilities.
See you at Inspire 2022!
