Bressler Risk Blog

In this month’s sponsor thank you, Intapp opted to once again share the spotlight with its consulting partners.

Audit letter response poses a compliance conundrum for many firms. Organizations need to address their professional and client obligations, while navigating significant process complexity and staff/lawyer overhead.

Today, several firms are taking advantage of their existing (or new) investments in the Intapp platform to achieve a more effective and efficient approaches. Read more:

From InOutsource comes a printed case study: “Ballard Spahr — Automating Audit Letter Responses with Intapp” —

• “Responding to audit letters is a professional requirement for every law firm. When clients get audited, the auditor confers with the client’s attorneys for feedback on loss contingencies, including any pending litigation, claims and assessments which might impact the auditor’s assessment of the company’s financial condition.”
• “The InOutsource team conducted an assessment of the firm’s existing process for responding to audit letters along with recommendations for how Ballard Spahr could automate key steps and streamline the process.”
• “‘We started looking at possible solutions. It turns out that, although every law firm deals with audit letters, there is no tool on the market that is built specifically for audit letter responses,’ says Nicholas Weeks, Director of Risk Management, Ballard Spahr.”
• “‘We have virtually eliminated paper,’ says Lisa Waldron, Risk Compliance Manager at Ballard Spahr. ‘Going electronic has saved us so much time. We send an electronic link to the responsible attorney and to the committee and they click on a link and review it that way.'”

And from Aurora North comes a webinar recording highlighting their own client success story. In the case, a firm that integrated Intapp workflow and DocuSign document assembly software to automate its audit letter endeavors: “FOCUS ON: WilmerHale’s Audit Letter Response Workflow Automation Solution” —

• “Finalists for ILTA’s ‘Transformative Project of the Year 2020,’ the team at Wilmer Hale joins us to present an in-depth overview of their innovative workflow solution.’
• “They shared how they designed and implemented a solution to automate this burdensome process (using existing internal tools), with software-driven document creation and process workflow management (notifications, reminders, tracking, and reporting).”
• “We explored the client and regulatory rules driving the need for consistent, comprehensive process execution (no matter the overhead involved). And there will be plenty of time for audience Q&A.”

In this month’s sponsor thank you, Intapp opted to share the spotlight with a consulting partner who recently published a case study highlighting their joint success. “Client Viewpoint: ‘Investing for the Future’ — Freeborn & Peters, on moving to the Intapp Cloud with Aurora North” —

• “Freeborn was one of the first firms to go live with Intapp OnePlace for Risk — including Intapp Intake and Conflicts — in the cloud. In addition, the firm uses the cloud version of Intapp Time and Intapp Flow.”
• Robert Funk, financial systems manager at Freeborn, shares his experience working with Aurora North in moving to the Intapp Cloud:
  • “As a firm, our strategy has always been to invest in the latest and greatest technology, and we had the full support of firm leadership, including our CFO on this. We always want to put our best foot forward with clients, we want to make our systems accessible and secure for our attorneys, and we want to help the business grow.”
  • “In 2016, we decided that we needed to upgrade our legacy systems for conflicts and intake. We started looking more closely at Intapp because the cloud versions available for Intake, Conflicts, Time and Flow were very compelling.”
  • “We see many advantages with the cloud model: we don’t have to manage servers on the back end, and in the event of a disaster, this application would still available for us.”
  • “Whether a power outage occurs near us at the Willis Tower, or a disruption related to COVID-19 happens, we do not have to worry about keeping the lights on and keeping the systems up and running.”
  • “Instead, we can focus on supporting our users who are working remotely, and making sure that we as a firm are maximizing the value that the applications themselves have to offer.”
  • “Best of all, we know we always have the latest and greatest technology since it is updated automatically. Intapp regularly pushes out scheduled updates that add new functionality and deliver improvements.”
  • “One of the key features is how forms work in Intapp Conflicts and Intake. We are able to easily configure our forms to help enforce compliance, so that we are capturing all the client information the firm needs up front.”
  • “Intapp is regularly updating the functionality of its Cloud applications and we know we can count on the Aurora North team to make sure we are taking full advantage of the latest and greatest featuresand all the capabilities the platform has to offer.”

For additional detail, including the firm’s commentary on their implementation experience and other detail, see the complete case study.

I’m very pleased to welcome a new sponsor to the Bressler Risk Blog. You may have heard of these folks, I know I have — it’s Intapp.

They’re here because they told me it was important to them to continue supporting and connecting with the legal risk community. And over the past two years this blog has grown into a pretty respectable channel for reaching this select and discerning audience.

So expect to see a monthly sponsor “thank you” post, which will include an explicitly commercial message promoting content or resources that may be of interest. Email readers will also see a discrete newsletter footer with brief commercial messages. As always, anything beyond that is up to my editorial discretion. (Though I am objectively quite curious to see the results of their risk staffing survey when that’s ready…)

I’d like to thank Intapp — and in particular Risk GM Nigel Riley, whom I’ve enjoyed getting to know better this year — for their support.

Of course, the real reward of this enterprise is the feedback and support of my readers. I always encourage folks to share this blog with colleagues and invite them to join the mailing list. (And if you happen to cross paths with anyone from Intapp and mention that you saw them on the Bressler Risk Blog and think that’s a good thing, well that’d appreciated too…)

Now, a quick word from our sponsor. And then back to the risk blogging.

INTAPP IN BRIEF

• OnePlace Risk & Compliance gives risk and compliance professionals the solutions they need to thoroughly evaluate new business, onboard clients quickly, and monitor relationships throughout the client lifecycle. You’ll improve conflicts clearance, mitigate risk, and ensure compliance throughout the client lifecycle — and turn risk and compliance management into a competitive advantage.
• They’d love for you to see their latest, which you can do via this link.