Image [cc] Cody Simms

It seems that every day for the past month I’ve had someone that I really admire ask me “Are you going to be at ILTA?” Sadly, I will not be traveling to Nashville to partake in the activities, social gatherings, and general awesomeness that looks like will be the case at ILTA 2011. However, I thought that I would at least see which of the talks that others are attending or presenting, and give them a chance to tout them here for this week’s Elephant Post. We had a lucky number of 13 contributions this week. I’ve also notice that others are posting on their own blogs about some of the ILTA sessions that they are presenting as well (so be on the lookout for those as well!)

Take a look at all of the great presentations that are going on and hopefully this will give you the motivation to attend a few listed below. While you are there (you lucky dogs!!), take some notes, and be prepared to answer another Elephant Post in a couple of weeks that explains what you learned at ILTA.

In the meantime, we are posting another Elephant Post question for next week. So, if you are attending ILTA, you better go ahead and fill out the form below before you head off to the airport. Thanks again to all who contributed. Enjoy Nashville!

Anatoly Soyfer
Marketing

Business Integrity, that’s who I work for, Has a kick-ass emerging technology track session on Document Assembly!   We’re actually going to show you how our clients have profited from implementing our ContractExpress products and how EASY it is to author templates right inside Word for attorneys. No template programmers required!!

John Gillies
KM lawyer

The key to success for any KM initiative is having a strategic plan. With one in hand (approved by senior management), whenever someone comes up with what seems (to them) like a brilliant idea, you go back to plan with them and see where it fits with the priorities that are set out there. So, the one session you MUST attend is Creating an Optimal KM Value Strategy.   The panel moderator is Mara Nickerson, and the panelists are Steven Lastres, Patrick DiDomenico, Sally Gonzalez, and myself.

Julia Montgomery
Knowledge Management/Project Management

First, a full disclosure: I am a member of this year’s Conference planning committee.  Now, with that out of the way…  I think it’s a great lineup this year, but I’m especially excited about three sessions which are exploring a non-traditional format. This year, ILTA will offer two half-day Bar Camp sessions — one on Law 2020 and the other on Information Management. Each Bar Camp will focus on six topics, and generate crowdsourced content to be shared.   In addition, the “What Your Attorneys Want You to Tell Them About Social Media” session (#INFO13) will use a “modified  Bar Camp” format which will give attendees a chance for small-group interaction with an all-star lineup of social media pros: Bill Caraher (@WilliamCaraher), Adrian Dayton (@AdrianDayton), Natalie Huha (@legalerswelcome), Scott Preston (@sapreston) and Tony Hartsfield (@tlhartsfield).  I’m genuinely excited to take part in these sessions, and think they’ll deliver some of the most engaging, interactive and high-energy experiences we’ve seen at ILTA.

Carlos Rodriguez
Network Manager

ILTA’s Servers Operations and Security PG is delivering six amazing sessions as part of the Technology Operations track. These are very technical sessions. There are two must see sessions: 1. Deploying Virtual Desktops, #SOSPG5, where you will see how a large firm has successfully deployed over 700 VDs globally, and how two 300+ attorneys firms are using this technology to deliver client facing collaboration & products. 2. Law 2020: A Technology Operations Forecast #SOSPG2. A group of respected Legal Technology leaders will discuss how your firm can prepare for the future of technology operations and gain technology advantage. A brief description of all sessions can be found in ILTA’s website and also this blog post.

Danny Johnson
Law Student – 1L

Tuesday’s 11:30am session on “Mobile Access can Drive Successful ECM Initiatives” featuring a panel with Leonard of NetDocuments and others. Mobile is the next wave in legal technology and this session should get people thinking forward.

Ben Wightwick
IT

I’m not attending ILTA (not through not wanting to) but my good friend and former colleague will be on the panel of ‘SharePoint as a DM/ECM System: Early Adopters Tell All’. Grant is very knowledgeable in this area and candid with it. I’d love to attend this session purely to just to keep him on his toes.!

Chris Hunt
IT Director, ILTA Conference Attendee + Speaker

CTPG5 – Smartphone Shootout. Should be a lively and informative look at the popular smartphone platforms available today, pros and cons of using each one in a corporate environment, along with some discussion about how to manage and secure them without frustrating the users too much. And I’m a speaker (well, that may not be a plus).

Heather Colman
KM Specialist

I am a panellist for the Next Generation Intranets session along with Brian Bawden from Bennett Jones LLP and Joshua Fireman from ii3 and moderated by Deborah Panella from Cravath, Swaine and Moore LLP.    Attend our session to see highlights from Bennett Jone’s award winning intranet and Hicks Morley’s social intranet and their use of employee profiles, blogs, wikis, tags, comments to address Knowledge Management and Information Management challenges.   The session will also include a riveting discussion led by Joshua on the future of intranets including personalization, web applications, mobile access and the semantic web.

Sean Luman
Director, Knowledge Management

As with Julia M., I must admit to being an ILTA2011 (#ILTA11) conference committee member.  The Information Management track has fantastic topics around law firm/law department IM– including Knowledge Mgmt, Risk Mgmt, Records Mgmt, Enterprise Content Mgmt, Business Process Mgmt, and MORE–see for yourself.
If you’re not going this year, go next year–we’re back in DC (Gaylord National).

Toby Brown
AFA

Future-Proofing Your Law Firm on Monday at 11:00 #INFO1. Brought back by popular demand from last year, this sessions takes an interesting and comprehensive look at how firms might re-shape themselves in order to survive.  The All-star panel includes: Michael Mills – Kraft & Kennedy, Inc., Gerard Neiditsch – Mallesons Stephen Jaques, Jeffrey S. Rovner – O’Melveny & Myers LLP and Ron Friedmann – Integreon.

Ron Friedmann
Improving and transforming law practice and business

I am a panelist for Future-Proofing Your Law Firm on Monday at 11:00   #INFO1.   Description below.   I speak for my fellow panelists in encouraging (1) folks to attend and (2) then PARTICIPATE.   We had a great, lively session last year thanks to the audience.   Brought back by popular demand from last year, this sessions takes an interesting and comprehensive look at how firms might re-shape themselves in order to survive.  The All-star panel includes: Michael Mills – Kraft & Kennedy, Inc., Gerard Neiditsch – Mallesons Stephen Jaques, Jeffrey S. Rovner – O’Melveny & Myers LLP and Ron Friedmann – Integreon.

Jeff Fehrman
eDiscovery Consulting and Forensics

I am a panelist for Controlling Litigation Support Costs on Monday at 1:00 PM #LPSPG2. We’ll be covering methods and best practices for controlling the costs of litigation support, including considerations for targeted collection and preservation during discovery, approaches to outsourcing and more.    Moderated by Scott Cohen (Winston & Strawn LLP), panelists include Eric Lieber (Toyota Motor Sales), Dan Regard (iDiscovery Solutions, Inc.), Kevin Behan (Winston & Strawn LLP), and Jeff Fehrman (Integreon).

George Farrall
Discovery Consultant

I am a panelist on LexisNexis: Gaining a Competitive Edge and Economic Advantage in E-Discovery on Thursday at 3:30 PM #LEX3. I’ll be joined by fellow panelists Jennifer Stevenson (LexisNexis) and Miklos Wenczl (Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, LLP) to discuss new strategies and best practices for leveraging internal and external teams to efficiently manage the discovery process, as well as considerations for the use of  e-discovery and litigation management technology. Hope you can join us for what is sure to be an informative session at the conference.

Next Week’s Elephant Post:

What is the Best “Conference City”?? What Makes It So Special?

I think this one should be a pretty easy one to answer. We all have certain places that we like to go for conferences. If you’re like me, most of your conferences are in the heat of the Summer, so I tend to go for some of those “cooler” towns like Seattle, San Francisco, San Diego, or Boston. Many folks like the bright lights of Las Vegas or New York. While some like the convenience of those “East Coast” venues like Washington, DC or Philadelphia. Tell us which is your favorite, and why you like it so much.