Knowhow Consulting Case Study

XML Based Intranet Applications

Client

Masons are a top 25 UK law firm who specialise in construction. They have offices around the world, including America and South Africa, as well as in several UK cities.

Requirements

Masons's marketing department wanted to replace an inhouse CV library and a project experience database application with a more flexible solution that could be the first step towards implementing a Masons-wide Knowledge Management system. They asked Knowhow Consulting to develop a web based intranet solution that would enable Masons fee earners and marketing staff to create, publish and update CV and project experience documents from any office. The CV and project experience details would have to be stored in a standard and transportable format. They would also have to be displayed in different formats depending on the intended audience of the CV or project experience file. Security mechanisms would have to be set up so that CVs and Experience documents could be accessed only by authorised users. The application should be easily extensible to support more document types and should enable integration with Masons' Document Management and Case Management Consulting.

Solution

Knowhow Consulting built for Masons an XML content management and publication system, which manages the content of CVs and project experience documents in XML files. The content can be retrieved easily using a custom-built search component. XML is the ideal format to store content, it facilitates context-based searching and is rapidly becoming a standard format for content in Knowledge Management systems. The solution is hosted on an IIS Server with Active Server Pages. Microsoft's XML object model is used to access the XML data whereas XSL is used in order to display it in different formats. The system is accompanied by a monitoring application that notifies marketing staff, administrators and fee earners of any significant events regarding the life-cycle of a document. The Administration component of the system enables Administrators to maintain data that can be reused when creating a CV or an experience file.

Results

At the end of a testing and adjustment phase the web site was rolled out and demonstrated to many of the UK Masons offices. A worldwide rollout will follow. Users are now able to enter and view their CV and project experience documents in a standard format. Using a "copy to clipboard" feature, users can also paste the details into a Word document knowing it will always be in the same Masons-wide format. The powerful search functionality facilitates the marketing department's fast response to customer queries on Masons experience with similar projects. Most importantly the application allows Masons to capture and manage what Masons know. The system will be extended with a component that will allow marketing staff to publish information on Masons events, thus, allowing staff and clients to know what Masons do.