BACKGROUND
Jameson Babbitt Stites & Lombard, PLLC is a 25-person law firm located in Seattle,
Washington providing legal services to individuals and to local, regional, and national
businesses. JBSL layers are skilled in a broad variety of legal practice areas, with much
of their work involving commercial real estate and civil litigation.
PROBLEM
Like many professional service firms, JBSL relies on their computer network and
infrastructure to support them in delivering their services to clients. Over the years JBSL
struggled with finding and retaining qualified technical personnel to sufficiently support
them and their network. Turnover was an ongoing issue as IT specialist would leave for
“greener pastures” and selecting a qualified consulting firm to rely on was equally challenging.
“We spent a significant amount of time and money hiring companies to provide our IT
support – but it never really worked for any length of time. The biggest issue was a lack
of consistency – we would see new technicians on a regular basis who had no idea about
nuances of our system. It became extremely frustrating and inefficient,” said Lawler.
SOLUTIONS
JBSL knew that hiring full time, permanent in-house IT staff along with the
corresponding management and human resources overhead was not a viable option.
They also wanted more than what a one or two person consulting firm could provide and
were interested in finding a firm that was “just the right size” for them.
Ideally JBSL wanted to partner with a firm that had a background serving the legal
industry, sufficient size to handle the breadth of their technical needs, senior staff who
understand how technology supports business strategy, consistency in personnel, quick
response times, and a company which could also act as a one-stop technology shop. It
was also important that the selected firm have strong relationships with leading
hardware and software manufacturers.
JBSL chose isoutsource.com® complete information services™ – beginning with a
strategic plan and continuing on with customized support services that keep their
lawyers billing not waiting for the network to become available.
JBSL has standardized with the following hardware and software products:
- Hewlett-Packard Server Hardware
- Microsoft Windows Server Operating System
- Microsoft Exchange Server for email and messaging
- Velograph™ computer workstations running Microsoft Windows and Office
- Highly-customized mix of software for specialized needs including accounting,
cost recovery, legal research, litigation management, document creation and
management, redlining, full-text indexing and more - McAfee Anti-Virus Suite
- Veritas Backup Exec
Hewlett-Packard DLT & Sony AIT tape drives - Hewlett-Packard ProCurve Switches
- WatchGuard Firewall
- JBSL also has a complete information services™ plan covering:
- Periodic security reviews
- Helpdesk services
- End-user training
- 24 x 7 server monitoring
- Patch management and IT documentation
RESULTS
JBSL is able to provide technology support for their staff without the commitment and
higher expense of an in-house IT department saving thousands of dollars per year
versus the alternatives.
“isoutsource.com® has been a highly competent and trusted partner for us. They
provide not only the strategic insight into how technology can help our business but are
there on a regular basis to keep us running at top speed at a cost that is less than we
would spend bringing it in house,” said Lawler.