Are You Reaping These 3 Benefits of Legal Help Desk Automation?
The Window of Opportunity Is Wide-Open
Written by: Brian Redar JD, Vice President of Sales at Frontline Managed Services
If the past two years have taught us anything, it’s that our best laid plans should be written in pencil. Agile organizations aren’t afraid to use the eraser as new information becomes available.
The realities of the COVID era have all but forced law firms to take a hard look at how they conduct business. Firms are using disruption as an opportunity to make changes that benefit their clients and employees, and many have invested in legal innovation and technology to make these improvements.
One area of rapid change is the way law firm end-users consume internal services. Law firms need to rise to meet the moment if they wish to effectively compete. Work-from-wherever, a fierce competition for talent, chronic staffing shortages and a generation of lawyers entering the field who were raised using technology are all factors that are motivating CIOs to re-evaluate the way they deliver IT services. Regarding help desk services specifically, it is increasingly clear that automation is critical.
Automation includes artificial intelligence and machine learning, self-service capabilities, multi-media functionality and chat and bot technologies, among other tools. Forward-thinking help desk service providers have positioned these tools front-and-center for their CIO and law firm clients. Here are the top three benefits help desk automaton offers law firms.
Decreased Turnaround Time
Automation reduces the time it takes to resolve an issue or ticket. Automation handles routine, repetitive tasks quickly and efficiently. As a result, the IT team’s workload is lessened, which allows them more time for complex ticket resolution.
Through decreased turnaround time, end users spend less time waiting on requests, which contributes to the next benefit of automation.
Improved End-User Satisfaction
Technology is an integral element to lawyers’ day-to-day activities, which directly impacts their productivity and efficiency. The help desk end-user can now choose the best method of service for their needs, including chat, self-service and other processes and technologies. Today’s law firm help desk user has a different skillset than 20 years ago, which is why its’s critical for law firm service providers to evolve so that their clients can easily and readily access services in the way that’s easiest for them.
Reduced Reliance on IT Personnel
Not all help desk support requires human intervention. Although the Frontline team is always available to our clients, automation can act as the first line of troubleshooting. Automated systems follow predetermined “if, then” scenarios to complete tasks along the best course of action. As a result, issues are resolved more quickly and repeat interactions are reduced. Automation also reduces potential human error.
Help desk automation allows firms to redeploy internal resources to focus on other priorities. Finally, automation lowers overheard costs by removing the need for additional IT support, hiring, training and retention budgeting.