The University of Florida Law’s Legal Technology Institute recently published the Case, Matter and Practice Management Software Study. The "Perfect Practice® – Legal Technology Institute Case, Matter, and Practice Management System Software Study" (“The CMS Study”) was originally developed to establish how case, matter, and practice management system software can further enhance legal services and to better understand current use and future trends of such technologies. The CMS Study, conducted in the fall of 2009, received 341 completed and qualified surveys (75 questions). The 320 page final report achieves a vital study goal of providing information to assist law firms and corporate legal departments in making better management software decisions. In addition, the study clarifies the terminology used by the industry and provides software designers with insight on how to improve the usability and efficiency of their case and practice management products. The "for purchase" report includes an abundance of intelligence pertaining to current technology environments; core applications; software market leaders; security concerns; cost concerns; future technology plans; decision drivers, and total cost of ownership. 

"Although case and matter management systems have been available to the legal industry for 30 years, there is still confusion about the differences between case, matter and practice management," said Andrew Z. Adkins III, founder and director of UF's Levin College of Law Legal Technology Institute. "This survey now helps set the standard for terms used by the industry." In addition to developing an industry glossary, Adkins said the survey results will benefit the legal profession and software companies alike. The findings will enable law firms and legal departments to compare software capabilities and costs, and will give software companies valuable information on user trends.”

CMS Study highlights include:

• One-third of the survey respondents indicated they use a case, matter, or practice management system. This is an increase from 25% reported in the 2000 ASP Study, also published by LTI.
• Transactional firms (32%) are just as likely to use a CMS as litigation firms (36%).
• The most common reason provided for purchasing a CMS (70%) is “to become more efficient”.
• Only 12% of respondents indicated they were “not satisfied with their current CMS”.
• Respondents indicated the biggest problem with CMS is “integration into the firm or law department” (36%) and “total cost of a CMS” (30%).
• More than half (55%) of respondents indicated that having document management system (DMS) functionality in a CMS was important; less than half of the respondents indicated that having full front office/back office functionality in a single system was important.
• Less than one-third (28%) of respondents indicated that staff using the technology had significant input into the decision-making process.
• Less than 20% of respondents indicated that CMSs are “too complex”.
• The use of software as a service (SaaS) platforms has increased slightly over 10 years from 9% (reported in LTI’s 2000 ASP Study) to 14%.
• There is not a higher SaaS adoption rate for small law firms and legal departments. However, almost half (45%) of large firms or legal department respondents indicated they had used a hosted solution for document review.
• Recommendations and referrals are still the main source of information and decision for selecting software, as reported by more than half of respondents.
• Software trials and references are more important than case studies and white papers when researching software.
• “Ease of use”, “cost of software and services”, and “integration into existing technology” were the most important decision drivers for selecting new technology. 

The comprehensive 2009 Perfect Practice Legal Technology Institute Case, Matter, and Practice Management System Study can be purchased for an introductory price of $395. The executive summary of the survey can be downloaded here.

The Legal Technology Institute would like to thank the study sponsors for participating in this groundbreaking research and for their support which enabled a much more comprehensive survey scope and resulting findings report. The CMS Study sponsors include: Perfect Practice, Platinum-level title sponsor; gold-level: Client Profiles, LexisNexis, Thomson Reuters; and silver-level: InsideLegal.com, Legal Files Software, Omega Legal Systems, PerfectLaw Software, and Synaptec Software.