Unlike most law firms of its size, historically Taylor Wessing has not felt the need to use a document management system (DMS), instead relying on a standard filing structure to allow people to find documents. Last year, it was decided that this was no longer suitable, as the firm had grown past the size where this approach provided adequate support. With the increase in the number of people working on any one document, which now includes fee earners as well as secretaries, some form of control was required.
With the DMS market being fairly mature and the higher end largely a choice between Hummingbird, iManage or perhaps Documentum, the firm started a tender process to choose a new system in the expectation that all systems would broadly meet its needs. The choice, we thought, would come down to cost, the relationship with the supplier and how well the system fitted with the firm’s current systems and practices.
