Insights
Pacesetters 2024: The findings
legalWith data breaches becoming increasingly commonplace – Transport for London is this month’s latest victim – it’s not surprising many law firms think of data as a burden rather than a blessing, underinvesting in data management and strategic initiatives. Nicholas Lory, Head of Data & AI at Pace, is focused on changing that.
Nicholas Lory says: “We’re trying to shift the mindset from thinking about data as something that simply costs you money, to start thinking about data as an asset, something that can actually make you money.
“Normally we invest in assets in business. We should be doing the same for data.”
That’s not to underplay the risk. Compliance can be expensive. But for too long the focus has been on data maintenance – making sure you’re storing it and backing it up, that you’ve got the right data retention policies in place and you’re not falling foul of GDPR laws. To maximise the potential of data, law firms should also be focusing on how you leverage that data to grow your business. How do you utilise it to help your decision-making or to enable intelligent automation to improve productivity?
Lory says: “It’s not only about having the right software in place, it’s also, and perhaps more importantly, about people, process and governance.”
A good data strategy should start with a data landscape analysis and capability maturity assessment to identify gaps and opportunities, while ensuring systems are integrated and scalable to support future growth and innovation including analytics platforms, and AI capabilities. Businesses should educate staff not only on data management best practices but on the value of data as a critical business asset.
Lory adds: “Data empowers people. It means that when you come to the table, you’ve got your intuition, you’ve got all the contexts, all of your paradigms, plus hopefully high-quality data, so you can make informed, more objective decisions.”
Schedule a call to discuss how Pace can help with your data strategy.
