McAllister Olivarius

iManage ECM Modernization

Client Profile

McAllister Olivarius is an international law firm with special expertise in bringing discrimination claims in the United States, England and Wales. They also have a thriving practice in corporate law, conducting transactions and providing advice for companies on both sides of the Atlantic, and two charities; all housed at their Maidenhead Headquarters.

As a common amongst law firms, McAllister Olivarius was operating on an iManage Worksite system. The limitation of managing content from four separate divisions and entities within the organization iManage resulted in the need for a more structured and inclusive online environment.

To address this situation, Microsoft’s SharePoint Online product was chosen to provide a complete and extensible Content Services component for the practice.

To enable this quickly and smoothly, McAllister Olivarius chose Proventeq’s Migration Accelerator software and an extensive migration service program to provide a timely, end-to-end solution.

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LOCATION

UK

SECTOR

Legal

SOURCE

iManage Worksite

DESTINATION

SharePoint Online

McAllister Olivarius’ Unique Challenges

Large content volume

Thousands of Matter (i.e workspaces) in iManage were migrated to their individual sites that were especially designed to facilitate improved and collaborative ways of working for the law firm.

Review of the existing IA

A review of the existing information architecture(IA) was needed to determine necessary mapping and transformation rules based on the metadata required for migration.

Strict timeframe for migration

To minimize the impact on the busy law practice both in the UK and internationally, the final migration had to take place over a 48-hour period. This was successfully executed and delivered.

Audit trial

An audit trail and metadata reports were required for the entire migration to ensure all the items scoped for the migration had been moved across correctly and could be admissible in court.

Content integrity

More than 500,000 files required both accurate migration from Worksite, and that all-important case assets retained their relationships and integrity

Organizational segregation

With three sister organizations; files were located in the same flat system which required a segregated configuration where each organization had its own workspace

Our Solution

Proventeq’s migration experts worked closely with McAllister Olivarius to design and implement a migration plan that enabled a smooth transition to their new SharePoint Online environment.

Discovery & analysis

After meeting with the client’s team to understand their particular migration requirements, a full discovery and analysis of their content was performed to identify inconsistencies and potential issues before the migration started.

Information architecture Optimization

The existing information architecture was optimised to classify content in ways that met the demands of accessibility and navigation within the SharePoint architecture for all four separate McAllister Olivarius entities.

File structuring

The creation of a new ‘tree-like’ hierarchy file structure required the flattening of a large number of nested folders and mapping these to the new system. This allowed them to have a clean break and start working immediately in the new system.

Migration design & configuration

The client had a complex information and records structure consisting of nested folders that required flattening so that the new hierarchical structure could be incorporated into the target SharePoint environment.

Pilot migration

A pilot migration was conducted for the content to be fully mapped prior to live migration; keeping their firm operational on their existing ECM system prior to the final go-live to SharePoint.

Incremental live migration

Proventeq migrated all 500,000 files and numerous user IDs over a 48-hour period. Integral item audits took place during the process to ensure that any errors were instantly noticed and rectified, and each item was migrated safely.

The Results

Data consistency and reliability

As McAllister Olivarius had a high number of legally sensitive files to be migrated, frequent item-level audits were carried out on asset integrity and to preserve important case files.This ensured that McAllister Olivarius maintained the flawless degree of data consistency required and meet the challenges of internal governance and regulatory control.

Practical content structure

By professionally tailoring a new structuring system that matched the brief, Proventeq enabled McAllister Olivarius to effectively separate content from each of the four entities, which make up the organisation. Additionally, each corporation was disconnected and remapped into its own digital landscape.

Minimal impact to business

Migration Accelerator’s trial function created a detailed map for the content and was, therefore, able to be completed to an extremely strict timescale. This ensured that both the migration process itself, and the switchover between platforms, did not impact the client’s business negatively.