I'm a power computer user - I know that software is hard to make - And I know that it is even harder to make software that has to work with other software.
Lawyers have to use multiple software - that's cool - sort of - but one day a KM guy shows up and says "you need some new software"- a sale is iffy - it's hard to get lawyers to adapt to new stuff - there's moat around the Castle.
Another moat around the Castle is the IT guys - A/K/A the "unsung heros" - I mean that! - they have to untangle the spaghetti that is inherent in making one piece of software talk to another.
Example - Word Processing program (i.e. Word Pefect) has to talk to Document Management Program (Imanage). Upgrade of one (say Imanage is required to fix new problem that users experience (i.e. can't reliably find indexed document using search for words in document). Upgrade takes place. Now another problem crops up. Lots of conversations with tech support. - now we have to upgrade the word processing program to new version - but when you do that you need to upgrade the operating system....and on and on - this is no fun for anyone - especially the IT guys who have to listen to lawyers complain, and they can't really explain the problem in terms the lawyers (who know they are smart) can understand.
What does this mean to guys selling KM? The lawyers don't understand it (why do I need this today? I didn't need it yesterday). The IT guys are wary of adding another program that not only interacts with existing systems, especially one whose whole function is to "interact". So who is going to attend the meeting wearing the "We love KM software" T-Shirt?
Maybe it's just me - a lawyer interested in technology in a Louisiana firm with >40 lawyers and 3 offices. Does that sound familiar to the guys at BigLaw? Stay tuned. I'm sure someone will transmit a response....
