Providing the highest caliber service with WebEx
Bullivant Houser Bailey is a full service law firm based in Portland, Oregon that represents a broad spectrum of business enterprises, institutional clients, insurance companies, and individuals. Besides the Portland office, the firm has offices located in Seattle and Vancouver, Washington; and in San Francisco, Sacramento, and Irvine, California. Bullivant has over 400 employees consisting of 166 attorneys, 44 paralegals, and approximately 200 support professionals. The firm represents clients in forty practice and industry groups. Their client list includes companies such as Allstate Insurance, Bankers Trust, Caterpillar, Dow Chemical, McDonald’s Corporation, Merck & Co., Nike, and many others. In addition to serving clients in the U.S., Bullivant has represented clients in the Asia/Pacific, Central and South America, Canada, and Europe.
Bullivant is dedicated to using advanced communications and technology systems that allow the firm to effectively and efficiently communicate internally and with clients, in order to provide the highest caliber of service and work product. They recognize the strategic benefits technology plays in effectively supporting clients and managing time. The firm is continuously searching for new products and systems that allow them to streamline performance and service.
In late 1999, Bullivant implemented an extranet for storing and accessing correspondence to support a large client in Chicago. Janet Ratzlaff, a paralegal in the Sacramento office, was given the responsibility for training the client on using the extranet, which required travel to the client’s site. Ratzlaff saw the benefits to be derived from the extranet, but also realized the limitations she faced in promoting its expanded use. The travel time alone would have been prohibitive given her other responsibilities. Ratzlaff was introduced to web conferencing in the fall of 2000. She quickly saw the benefits of using this type of technology in support of her own needs at Bullivant, and in support of other areas of the firm’s practice.
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Following this initial experience with web conferencing, Ratzlaff took the lead and began investigating web conferencing solutions for use by the firm. After reviewing several solutions over a two-month period, she selected WebEx Meeting Center, which she felt provided the best solution to meet Bullivant’s needs. Some of the key factors in her decision to select WebEx included:
- The “Web Browser Sharing” feature supported by WebEx enabled Ratzlaff to logon to the firm’s extranet via the Internet and demonstrate the extranet functions to users in remote locations in real time. “This capability replicated what I would normally do in the client’s office—without having to be there,” says Ratzlaff. “It also provides me with control over the demonstration from my desktop, so I have the attention of the viewers on the other end.”
- The user interface on the meeting page displayed during web conferencing sessions was simple and easy to follow. It required little or no explanation to users attending a web conferencing session in WebEx for the first time.
- The integrated teleconferencing capability enabled meeting attendees to enter their phone number when logging onto a WebEx session, and have the WebEx server automatically call them back and connect them to the audio conferencing portion of the meeting.
- The “Record and Replay” feature supports saving web conferencing sessions and replaying them at a later time. Although this feature has only been tested, Ratzlaff sees “using this capability as a promotional tool on the Bullivant website in providing an introduction and some initial training on the extranet that clients can access.”
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Ratzlaff presented her case to adopt WebEx to the IT group at Bullivant in December, 2000, and received approval to use WebEx Meeting Center as their web conferencing solution.
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The Company
Bullivant Houser Bailey is a full service law firm based in Portland, Oregon that represents a broad spectrum of business enterprises, institutional clients, insurance companies, and individuals. Their client list includes companies such as Allstate Insurance, Bankers Trust, Caterpillar, Dow Chemical, McDonald’s Corporation, Merck & Co., Nike, and many others.
The Challenge
Janet Ratzlaff, a paralegal in the Sacramento office, was given the responsibility for training the client on using the extranet, which required travel to the client’s site. Ratzlaff saw the benefits to be derived from the extranet, but also realized the limitations she faced in promoting its expanded use. The travel time alone would have been prohibitive given her other responsibilities.
The Solution
After reviewing several solutions over a two-month period, she selected WebEx Meeting Center, which she felt provided the best solution to meet Bullivant’s needs. Some of the key factors in her decision to select WebEx are listed in the full story.
The Benefits
“WebEx Meeting Center has significantly reduced the travel time and costs associated with training employees and new clients on the use of the extranet, as well as training employees on PC applications and delivering CLE training. An additional benefit that has occurred is bringing the offices closer together.” This has occurred through improved support from the home office in Portland, and in providing remote offices with better access to information and services offered by the home office. Meeting Center has been key to extending the use of the extranet, which serves as a central repository for reference materials and legal documents used by attorneys and clients working on cases together.
Intro to WebEx
