New for the Legal Technology Awards 2009, the judging process will take place over two stages with the introduction of a 'Dragon's Den' style presentation process across three of the four award categories. The aim of this is to promote as much transparency as possible in the judging process, and also to provide shortlisted nominees with the opportunity to support their written nomination with a live presentation.
The two stages are listed below:-
Stage One –
Once the shortlist has been announced the published panel of judges will reconvene to decide which of the shortlisted organisations they think should win and which should be highly commended.
Stage Two – “Dragon’s Den” style supporting presentations
Following the success of the “Dragon’s Den” presentations at the Legal Technology Awards 2008, at the Legal Technology Awards 2009 this additional stage in the judging process will be expanded to cover all the Firmwide, Team and Supplier achievement awards (the only categories that will not be judged by presentations are the Individual achievement awards). Should you be shortlisted in one of the following awards, your organisation will be required to make a presentation to the published judges and additional guest judges during the day of the Legal Technology Awards:-
Firmwide Achievement awards
Fee earner desktop/portal of the year
Training initiative of the year
CSR/Green IT initiative of the year
Website of the year
Outsourcing/Offshoring project of the year
Commoditised legal service of the year
Most client focused law firm of the year
Team Achievement Awards
Regional - IT team of the year
City/national - IT team of the year
International - IT team of the year
Regional - KM/Information team of the year
City/national - KM/Information team of the year
International - KM/Information team of the year
Supplier Achievement Awards
Technology innovation of the year
Technology implementation of the year
Electronic Disclosure support/service provider of the year
Integrated system of the year
Best of Breed system of the year
On-line product of the year
Most customer-focused supplier of the year
On the day of the Legal Technology Awards 2009 a representative/spokesperson from each of the organisations shortlisted in the categories above will be invited to attend The Royal Lancaster Hotel. At this point they will present why their organisation, team or project should win the category that they have been shortlisted in. The presentation guidelines are listed below:-
- A pre-agreed spokesperson from your organisation will make the presentation
- You will be given 5 minutes to present to the judges
- Following your presentation the judges & guest judges will have 5 minutes to ask questions
- No audio visual aides are to be used and project/product demonstrations are not allowed
- No handouts are to be used
- You cannot watch the presentations of other organisations shortlisted in your category
- The presentations will be done in alphabetical order
A published judge will chair/facilitate each of the categories and the presentations within that category. Also present for each presentation within each category will be guest judges, who will be invited to attend categories relevant to their experience and expertise. There will be between 2-6 guest judges per category.
- For the Supplier achievement awards - the guest judges will be Head’s of IT and Litigation Support from a broad spectrum of firms
- For the Firmwide and Team achivement awards - the guest judges will be representatives from corporate/cleint organisations.
At the end of each presentation, the organisation will be scored by the published judge and the guest judges. At the end of the day votes will be counted and the winners will be announced at the awards dinner that evening. The percentage weighting of the published judges to the guest judges will be 60:40. This is because the published judges will have reviewed the nominations in far greater detail and in turn discussed the merits of the shortlist in greater detail. The guest judges will be given the nominations in advance for the relevant shortlisted organisations to ensure they have adequate background information on shortlistees.
N.B All of the presentations/vivas will be professionally recorded and edited, and may well be used in the public domain so please be cautious when presenting not to divulge confidential information that would not be suitable for the public domain.
