This second post looking at workflow and process orientated software brings me to a product from IntApp and their aptly titled “Flow”. IntApp Flow is borne out of their “Open” product which supports the Intake and Conflicts process in law firms. Flow is a lot more open and can be used to automate a number of processes or workflows.

Underpinning it is the IntApp Integration Builder product (as with a number of the IntApp solutions), this handles the integration into a number of Legal systems, it is likely there are integrations for the majority of legal systems you’re using. Update: From the looks of the IntApp website this product has now been rebranded to IntApp Integrate, a list of some of the key applications and systems is on their website here.

On top of this integration is a simple interface for building forms and modelling workflows, you can quickly knock up a form to capture information or a trigger to initiate a process and then create a complex workflow that triggers other systems, notifies people, gets authorisation at key points etc. The beauty is the simplicity of the interface and I guess the aim here is that once all the integrations are set up a business analyst is able to build up the workflow realtime with the lawyer and have something ready to run almost immediately. As Leonardo da Vinci said “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication“.

There are other features like dashboards, metrics, reporting available to help manage the workflows or monitor KPI’s. Overall it’s a really simple product and that is a real positive. I’ve been in IT long enough to realise things can look easy in demos but when it comes to implementation you really start to see the reality, but for those that have already gone through a project to implement integration builder the hard part to me looks to be done as I’d imagine getting all the integrations correct is the most difficult part.

For those law firms looking at business process re-engineering it’s worth having a look at flow. If you haven’t already got integrations built between your legal systems then it may just help.