KM:  Collaborative Work Systems ("CWS")

Lessons Learned

Here you will find information on organizations where CWS (i.e., work teams, self-directed work teams, collaborate networks, work groups, etc.) have worked successfully and instances where CWS have not been so successful.  One thing that is certainly clear is that knowledge must be shared for CWS to be effective and work.
Based on some of our findings, law firms and legal departments differ in the way in which they approach KM.  Law firms have traditionally been reluctant to knowledge sharing and the use of technology due to older generations of practitioners within the industry; however, there is a shift from that thought process as firms compete for business, try to become experts in their field(s) and become technologically more savvy.  Practice groups (which can be considered a type of CWS) within law firms have emerged.  Dennis Kennedy, a legal technology expert, stated “Law firms have become more pragmatic in their use of knowledge management technology, and they are less concerned about the buzzwords and more focused on what can be accomplished.”¹  Corporate legal departments don’t have as many barriers to KM or CWS as their counterpart, and they embrace or adopt the sense of a team environment much easier.
Some elements that have helped firms to achieve successful CWS include:

•  Management involvement;
•  CoPs;
•  A culture that supports/fosters knowledge sharing;
• Strong leadership;
• Having accountability;
•  An effective communication plan;
•  A strategy for achieving goal;
•  Knowledge sharing;
• Technology (although this is not an absolute, it can be quite beneficial and is necessary for the interaction and communication of dispersed groups);
• Trust;
•  Defined processes; and
•   Selection of the “right” people for the team/work group.

In his book, A Culture of Collaboration, Rosen makes it clear simply by stating the obvious – things we already know – such as “a meal in an upscale restaurant is often the work of an executive chef, sous chef, line cooks, prep people, expeditors, servers and others.  And without an anesthesiologist and nurses, a surgeon – not to mention the patient – would be in trouble.  The world’s best quarterback needs receivers, running backs and linemen.  To save Gotham City, Batman needs Robin.  And even the Lone Ranger needs his sidekick, Tonto.”  CWS can work with the right ingredients – resources.
Law firms are likely to collaborate with the use of technology - videoconferencing, extranets/intranets, blogs and the like - especially in litigation cases where a large volume of documents must be organized, analyzed and reviewed.  In 2002, Finkelstein Thompson & Loughran located in Washington, DC was "responsible for the extranet system handling millions of documents and numerous law firms in the Microsoft antitrust litigation" case (Features - Law Firm Collaboration Via Extranets, 2002).  Through the effective use of the extranet for the Microsoft case, attorneys in the same office and from different law firms had access to the relevant documents pertaining to the case, and the attorneys were able to effectively collaborate with one another and work on the documents simultaneously through the use of an Internet repository.
In the article, Extranets: Creating the Collaborative Law Practice, Granat and Levine "believe that extranets that connect large law firms with the corporate legal clients they serve, can result in new and deeper levels of collaboration and communication, which in turn result in raising the level of productivity of the entire system for creating and delivering legal services."  For lawyers to be effective, they must be a part of multi-skilled teams and work across different functions.
As reported by Business Week, self-directed teams "are, on average, 30 to 50 percent more productive."¹  A number of companies including Federal Express (cut service errors by 13%); AT&T (increased the quality of its opertor service by 12%); 3M's Hutchinson facility (increased production gains by 300%); and Johnson & Johnson (achieved inventory reductions of $6 million) reported improved productivity results due to CWS and/or self-directed work teams.
Boeing is having parts of its 787 Dreamliner (“787”) passenger jet (to be released in Nov. 2008) built by partners halfway around the world.  This collaboration is made possible through the use of technology, and it is a requirement that all partners working on the 787 utilize a software application called Catia (Computer aided three Dimensional Interactive Application) which is made by Dassault Systemes and marketed by IBM.  With the use of this software, the plane is designed at an online site called the Global Collaboration Environment which Boeing maintains.  Even though the collaboration process is experiencing problems such as on-going challenges with the production work, software and systems integration issues and parts shortages, this is an excellent example of CWS in place at a global scale.  “Boeing EVP Scott Carson, the CEO of the company’s commercial airline division, said delays stemmed in part from ‘unplanned rework for sections delivered to us.  Parts availability from remaining structural pieces to fasteners to other small parts has affected the sequence of the work in the facto, compounding these delays.’”²   Boeing has been, as you would suspect, quite engaged with each of its major structural suppliers and other partners down the supply chain.  Boeing is learning from this collaboration, and has taken steps to correct problems.
In organizational "environments the boundary between corporate legal client and the law firm that services it, is becoming increasingly diffuse.  Re-engineering of the manufacturing process has resulted in customers and suppliers becoming integrated into the corporate decision-making process resulting in faster decision-making, increased productivity, less duplication, and reduced bureaucracy.  The legal profession is not immune from these developments; it is just that the legal profession is the last of the knowledge professions to be 're-engineered' by the corporations that pay their legal fees"  (Granat).
An environment where the culture welcomes knowledge sharing, and there is strong leadership along with the right mix of individuals for any given team (along with diversity of team members) and the use of technology, as the case may be, has the groundwork for a CWS; other factors will definitely come into play depending on the environment and the method of communicating with team members.  In addition, a CWS needs a plan with clear objectives, goals, an effective communication plan and a method of rewarding knowledge sharing in order to succeed.  CWS can be beneficial for small, medium and large firms and no matter what the industry.

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