IT directors are feeling insecure and undervalued. Long gone are the days when law firm IT directors could kid themselves that they themselves had the power to transform – even revolutionise – legal practice and that their influence on strategy could be compared to that of a chief financial officer. Managing an IT department is about delivering a good service to the lawyers while cutting costs for the business, nothing more and nothing less. An IT director acting as a revolutionary change agent and driving the firm’s business in new directions – that is the stuff of fantasy.
These were the overriding messages from the fifth Legal IT Forum at the Gleneagles Hotel in October. From the conference seminars and from idle chit-chat in the venue’s infamous bar, it is clear that many once high-flying egos have taken a bruising and a few industry thought leaders on both sides of the Atlantic have come down to earth with a bump.
