Allens, a leading commercial law firm in Australia, is no stranger to using technology to streamline service delivery and improve customer experience.
For four years running, it has been recognized as one of the ‘Most Innovative Professional Services Firms’ by the Australian Financial Review.
In 2020, Allens started working with OutSystems and delivery partner DB Results to modernize 10 crucial legal practice applications. Results include the retirement of a legacy platform, improved user experience and a 70% saving in support effort in the case of one application, allowing its roll-out to numerous clients.
Lisa Kozaris, Chief Innovation and Legal Solutions Officer, Allens, said: “‘Innovation in the context of legal services means looking for and developing, ways to improve how we deliver legal services and outcomes to clients. It also plays a part in positioning us to capitalize on future opportunities. This new capability opens more possibilities for the firm to explore future solutions we can create for our lawyers and clients.”
The firm’s development team was keen to evaluate the OutSystems platform by building out three existing applications during an initial trial supported by delivery partner DB Results.
Allen’s developers rapidly upskilled with OutSystems
Working together with DB Results helped the small team of developers rapidly master the OutSystems visual programming approach, as DB Results assisted with the design and build of more complex requirements.
Allens conducted user testing with representatives from the firm’s legal and corporate services divisions. The overwhelming majority (91%) preferred the user experience of the new OutSystems applications.
The results from the trial made it an easy decision for Allens to adopt OutSystems as its low-code application development platform. The firm set a target to migrate 10 legacy applications in three months to decommission a legacy platform.
Working alongside DB Results provided Allens’ development team on-demand access to additional technical resources to ensure the project ran smoothly.
Allens crushes its innovation backlog with faster development
Allens migrated all the production applications and several smaller MVPs and prototypes to OutSystems.
Improved scalability and reliability have enabled Allens to extend the benefits of some of its applications to additional clients. Previously, one of its legacy applications was only used by two clients because it required almost a full-time resource to maintain it. Even though the application significantly saved lawyer time, the firm could not justify scaling its use for other clients because of the high support cost.
Since migrating that application to OutSystems, support requirements have dropped to less than half a day per week – a 70% saving – with most of that time focused on product enhancements. Allens can now roll out the solution to more clients, saving more lawyer time and delivering efficiency savings to clients.
For a dedicated innovation team servicing a large law firm, freeing up resources has been a game-changer. Before adopting OutSystems, the team had a portfolio of 40-plus initiatives at various lifecycle stages, with 15 applications waiting for developer capacity.
Since adopting faster low-code development, the team has completed 21 of those initiatives. Allens now has the development capacity needed to support its pipeline of high-value initiatives and respond quickly to the continuous stream of new ideas coming from the business.
Outlook
The significantly improved user experience provided by the new OutSystems applications has been a boon with end-users. Moreover, as developers can now deliver prototypes in days and MVPs in weeks instead of months, the Innovation and Digital Solutions team has improved engagement from all stakeholders across the law firm.