CIT

CIT's Corporate Legal Department Increases Business Agility with Interwoven and Micro Strategies

The corporate legal department at CIT faced growing challenges in supporting its global enterprise. The group's content was stored on shared drives that made it diffi cult for attorneys to organize information and access documents remotely, and also posed security risks. Email-based collaboration led to content silos, and the lack of robust document management (DM) capabilities made it diffi cult to support the business effectively. "With attorneys collaborating across multiple locations and business segments, we needed a better way to manage and share the content related to our internal and external clients," explains Teresa Allen, Assistant Vice President, Legal Administrator, CIT.

Allen's group needed a way to deploy best-of-breed DM capabilities—without straining its limited IT resources. "As a cost center, we have to be very careful about the way we spend money," she says. In the past, this had at times meant developing software in-house rather than implementing a commercial solution. "Internally developed systems generally have a long lead time and may not provide the functionality and ease of use needed to be really effective," says Allen. This time, CIT turned to the legal industry's top solution provider. "Interwoven has a sterling reputation and leadership in the industry, and the high quality of everything they've developed and continue to develop, complemented by the skilled implementation, training, and support provided by Micro Strategies, is evident in the software we depend on every day."

Providing Tailored Functionality Department-wide

The Interwoven Corporate Legal solution, powered by Interwoven WorkSite document management software, gave CIT's corporate legal department the tools they needed to enhance productivity, reduce risk, and keep pace with CIT's dynamic global business. Interwoven partner Micro Strategies tailored the solution to the department's specifi cations. Says Allen, "Micro Strategies helped us flexibly address the needs of different groups and user types throughout the department within a single unifi ed environment."

"Interwoven's relationship with Micro Strategies has been a tremendous benefi t in helping me support 70 attorneys and staff," reports Allen. "The training and service they provide lets me conserve my limited IT resources for other tasks."

Sharing Content to Improve Productivity

"We've seen a tremendous increase in productivity with WorkSite," reports Allen. "Attorneys can access and share complete content for their matters and projects from any of our offi ces, at home, or on the road." A document work list provides a shortcut to recently accessed items, and integration with Microsoft Office and Adobe Acrobat allows the department's professionals to access, retrieve, and save documents stored in WorkSite from within the applications already in use. "CIT's professionals now find it much easier to stay billable rather than wrestling with paper and searching for things," says Dave Prekel, senior project engineer for Micro Strategies.

WorkSite also helps CIT efficiently repurpose existing content for new projects. "As our department grows, we have a wealth of information in the system," says Allen. "WorkSite's rich search capabilities make it simple for attorneys to find previous work product they can re-use instead of constantly reinventing the wheel."

Eliminating E-mail Overload

By providing a better way to collaborate around content, WorkSite has enabled CIT to wean its legal department from bulky, unmanaged e-mail attachments. Instead, attorneys and staff send each other links to a single version of a document stored within the WorkSite repository, where version control eliminates confusion as to which document is the most current. Complete e-mail management helps the group fully leverage the matter content within the e-mails they do send. "The ability to save e-mails into WorkSite directly from within Outlook makes it easy for our team to search and refer back to complete correspondence on a given matter, and also find and re-use past e-mails. These are all big time-savers, and time is money."

Reducing Risk

WorkSite's strict yet flexible security model makes it simple for CIT's legal department to apply security policies down to the document level. Risk is further reduced through nightly backups of the entire repository. Moving forward, WorkSite will provide a foundation for emerging records management and e-Discovery mandates. "These are significant challenges for any organization, but Interwoven gives us a good base to work from," says Allen.

Building on a Successful Relationship

As CIT's legal department continues to grow, WorkSite will help its members collaborate seamlessly across a global network of offices. "We have new personnel coming online in Dublin and Hong Kong, and we'll make sure they can access complete department content just as easily as our US-based attorneys," says Allen. Meanwhile, Interwoven helps Allen keep things running smoothly. "We find that as people continue to use WorkSite, they keep finding new and better ways to use it," she says. "From my perspective, WorkSite's benefits in cost savings and productivity have been all I'd hoped for and more."

About Interwoven

Interwoven is a global leader in content management solutions. Interwoven's software and services enable organizations to effectively leverage content to drive business growth by improving the customer experience, increasing collaboration, and streamlining business processes in dynamic environments. Our unique approach combines user-friendly simplicity with robust IT performance and scalability to unlock the value of content. To learn more about Interwoven, please visit www.interwoven.com.

About Micro Strategies Inc.

Established in 1983, Micro Strategies has distinguished itself as one of the most innovative technology solution providers and a strategic business partner for premier technology vendors. As an Interwoven Platinum partner, and industry leader, Micro Strategies is at the forefront of architecting and implementing quality technology solutions with a commitment to responsive, client-first service.

Learn more about the company and its solutions online at www.microstrat.com.

Solution

Interwoven WorkSite powers collaborative document management for the CIT corporate legal department, enabling the group to enhance its professional productivity, provide the best possible service to its internal clients, share information, reduce cost, and mitigate risk. High ease of use and minimal requirements for service and support make it a cost-effective solution in light of the group's limited IT resources.